regio iT

regio iT GmbH is the largest regional IT service provider in North Rhine-Westphalia and is based, among other locations, in our hometown Aachen. Additionally, it is a driving force for digitalization in NRW and beyond. This makes it a reliable partner for public clients such as municipalities, schools, energy providers, waste management companies, and non-profit organizations.
The services offered range from strategic and project-based IT consulting, integration, IT infrastructure, and full-service in four areas of expertise: IT service and operation, administration and finance, energy and waste management, education and development.

Since 2017, we have been supporting regio iT in the maintenance and upkeep of their webshop. At the beginning of 2023, we successfully transitioned the shop from Magento Commerce to the B2B shop software avanta.

As regio iT offers a diverse portfolio for various public entities (from schools to waste management companies), their shop system needs to be flexible. Therefore, our common goal is to provide a user-friendly shop that achieves a correspondingly high user acceptance: avanta, with its built-in features, makes it possible to meet the needs of the diverse customer groups of regio iT.

We have improved user acceptance together through several measures: The most important aspect was to enable customers to place quick and uncomplicated orders. Long approval processes and orders via email, fax, or phone should become the absolute exception.

avanta provides the perfect basis for this: It does not enforce a strict approval workflow but works dynamically. Due to this flexibility, the processes match the working reality of the customers. Approval steps needed by a school but not by a city administration can be easily skipped. Additionally, customers can see the current status of the order approval and which departments it has already passed through. This transparency saves time-consuming follow-ups. Order requests in the shopping cart can also be forwarded directly to the responsible colleagues for approval: digitally within the shop system without cumbersome printouts.

But that’s not all. Catalogs with custom categories and products can be specifically tailored to the clients, making selection quick and easy. Special prices for different customer groups are also possible.

Due to the varying needs of regio iT's customers, we also implemented various payment methods. To create more transparency, we created a leasing module and made it compatible with avanta to create more transparency. Leasing rates are now displayed directly on each product page.

The connection of the internal ERP system to the B2B online shop is essential: regio iT relies on the industry giant SAP in version S/4HANA for its ERP.
Through the SAP Integration Suite developed by regio iT, all necessary information is transmitted bidirectionally via API. This includes, among other things, product creation, real-time prices, availability, and the transfer of orders from the B2B online shop to SAP. Since the store team is now spending significantly less time entering data manually, they can focus more on providing customer care.

In this context, the connection to Icecat is also a particular highlight. Icecat is a service in the hardware and software business that hosts and delivers product specifications. This provides a crucial advantage in the data maintenance of an online shop: in the avanta shop, products can be created with just SKU, price, and quantity at hand.
All other product data, such as descriptions, product details, or images, are automatically complemented via Icecat. For sales staff and customer service, this means fewer manual, error-prone entries and more time available for customer support.