Saqqara CommerceSuite solves Molex`s e-commerce catalogue challenge

When interconnectivity group Molex needed to e-enable its 50 000-component paper-based catalogue, it chose CommerceSuite from e-business product content software and services company Saqqara. The result has been easy access to information for customers, and rapid return on investment.

Molex, listed on the Nasdaq and London Stock Exchange, is the world`s second largest manufacturer of electronic, electrical and fibre optic interconnection products and systems. Until 1997, it depended primarily on a 1 000-page, paper-based catalogue to deliver its product information to its thousands of clients worldwide such as IBM, Compaq, GM, Whirlpool, Toyota, Sony, Nokia and Motorola. The catalogue listed over 50 000 components manufactured at 54 facilities in 20 countries around the world.

Initially the information was converted to static HTML Web pages for the Molex Web site. This manually intensive system posed numerous problems that seriously affected Molex`s ability to serve its global customer base effectively with detailed, accurate and timely product information.

For example, customers struggled to locate components that met their application and manufacturing requirements on static HTML pages. Plating might be important to one customer, and the distance between contacts to another.

Having to assist clients in locating components, Molex product managers found incomplete or out-of-date product details, while a lack of standardisation in component descriptions slowed searches, adversely affecting customer satisfaction.

In addition, catalogue creation was manually intensive and time-consuming. Product managers sent component information to a central location where operators keyed the data into a desktop publishing system. Web page production followed afterwards. This process delayed time to market for new products. In addition, as full-line printed catalogues were released only every two to three years, Molex had to take significant actions to inform customers of new product availability and to keep product information current on the Web site.

Clearly, a more robust e-commerce catalogue solution was needed to efficiently serve global clients` needs. Molex identified key requirements for the solution as support for multiple languages, a superior user interface for generating Web-enabled catalogues, and a search mechanism that was easy for clients to understand and use.

"Of the three solutions assessed, Saqqara stood out for its support of multiple languages, Web-centricity and patented Step Search technology," says Howell Evans, manager of Web content, Molex.

CommerceSuite`s capabilities include channel-customised storefronts with e-catalogue creation and publishing, advanced search and guided product selection, buyer-specific catalogues, channel browsing behaviour analysis and exporting of customised product content.

The core of CommerceSuite is ProductServer, an integrated set of applications that facilitates content authoring and publishing for e-commerce environments. Its Step Search facility supports feature-to-feature online comparison of products over the Internet, with extensive drill-down capabilities according to customer technical requirements.

"Our clients could drill down according to their criteria, not ours," says Evans.

ProductServer also provides a browser-based authoring environment for building and maintaining e-catalogues via the Internet, allowing product attributes to be modified after catalogue publication without affecting underlying system performance.

The solution was implemented in nine months, a time scale that had more to do with Molex`s decision to analyse its e-commerce catalogue needs thoroughly than with Saqqara`s project implementation requirements, says Evans.

"We already had the static HTML pages to sustain marketing until we rolled out the solution, so we elected to analyse our needs thoroughly. We identified required parameters for each type of component and then accumulated, cleansed and standardised the data. This was the time-consuming aspect of the implementation, because we were dealing with massive amounts of data from all corners of the world."

After introducing the Saqqara search engine to its website, Molex introduced a Web publishing system that allows technical content authors, using an interface from integrated application software e-business company BroadVision, to enter product content into the ProductServer catalogue database running on Oracle.

Molex`s implementation of CommerceSuite has yielded several benefits:

• .         The catalogue now supports multiple languages.

• .         It enables immediate product updates, immediate access to feature-rich, accurate, timely and standardised product details resulting in increased sales and shortened sales cycles, while cutting costs and improving product management efficiency.

• .         AnalysisServer enables Molex to assess browsing behaviours so improvements to content can be implemented.

• .         Most importantly, quality product information on more Molex products is reaching previously unknown customers faster than ever before.

Molex is confident that it has realised a substantial return on its investment.

"The primary benefit of the Saqqara solution is that it allows customers to easily find the information needed to make informed buying decisions," says Evans.

Saqqara CommerceSuite 4.0 is now available in SA through Saqqara`s South African distributor, commerceSWITCH.

"The Molex implementation is a classic case of how CommerceSuite meets the most demanding requirements of online cataloguing," says Philip de Bruin, MD of commerceSWITCH. "This success story shows how to achieve an effective catalogue solution that impacts positively at multiple levels of organisational marketing."