Integrated ERP at a mobility services company: workshop, warehouse and documents
A mobility services company with over 200 employees upgrades LIGEST and integrates it with its workshop application and with IMAGE for document management.
The client
An Italian company providing mobility and local public transport services, with over 200 employees and a structure that coordinates administrative, operational and technical activities.
Beyond standard business processes, the organisation manages vehicles, maintenance, a spare parts warehouse, workshop jobs and relations with customers and suppliers, and needs its ERP to communicate with vertical applications for each area.
Key results
- Upgraded ERP with established customisations kept
- Automatic link between ERP and maintenance application
- Warehouse data shared between systems
The starting point
The company had long used LIGEST and LICOGE, with many customisations developed over the years. In 2019 it needed to move to a more up-to-date version, keeping its customisations and ensuring compatibility with the new server and database infrastructure.
Vehicle maintenance and rentals were handled by a separate workshop application with its database on Microsoft Azure, while LIGEST ran on the company’s own infrastructure: the two systems had to exchange items, availability, job issues, customers, suppliers and maintenance jobs.
Document management also needed to evolve: some documents were simply saved on the server, whereas structured archiving was required and, for some types, digital preservation.
Key challenges
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01
Management system to upgrade
The ERP contained customisations developed over the years, which had to be preserved in the move to the new version without disrupting business processes.
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02
Separate applications
LIGEST handled administration and warehouse, the workshop application handled maintenance and rentals: a structured link was needed between two databases and two technology environments.
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03
Warehouse availability
The workshop needs to know which items and spare parts are available in each depot, including quantities on order, requested or already reserved for other jobs.
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04
Materials on jobs
Warehouse issues must be linked to maintenance jobs, with item, quantity, date and value of each movement.
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05
Unstructured documents
Some documentation was kept as plain files on the server, with no archive organised by document type and ready for digital preservation.
The solution
Labinf Sistemi supported the company in modernising and integrating its information system, working both on the central management system and on the links with vertical applications.
LIGEST and LICOGE were upgraded while preserving existing customisations and moving applications and data to the new infrastructure, with testing, workstation checks and go-live support.
Data flows between ERP and workshop
- Warehouse item master data
- Stock by item and depot
- Quantities on order, requested and reserved
- Material issues to jobs
- Customer and supplier records
- Open jobs in the workshop
- Vehicle or asset on each job
To connect LIGEST, installed on site, with the cloud-based workshop application, a two-way web service integration was designed: LIGEST provides warehouse, item and business partner data, while the workshop exposes the jobs associated with each vehicle. Each application keeps its specialist functions while working on consistent, shared information.
IMAGE for structured archiving
The project also covered IMAGE, the Labinf document management system, upgraded to its latest version. The document types to be archived were configured, defining for each one the information that must accompany the document.
A connector between LIGEST and an accredited external provider automatically sends documents intended for digital preservation.
The benefits
- Upgraded ERP with established customisations kept
- Automatic link between ERP and maintenance application
- Warehouse data shared between systems
- Faster visibility of spare parts availability
- Material issues tracked by job
- Jobs linked to the vehicles being serviced
- Synchronised customer and supplier records
- Less manual re-entry of data between applications
- Structured document archiving
- Integrated digital preservation
An approach that does not replace specialist applications, but integrates them into a coherent information ecosystem.
In short
The company has turned an information system built up over time into an integrated ecosystem in which ERP, warehouse, maintenance, jobs and documents exchange data through structured flows. Each application keeps its specific features, with less fragmentation.
