R-Biopharm AG is one of the leading biotechnology companies in Germany. R-Biopharm AG’s product portfolio ranges from analytical devices in clinical diagnostics to nutrition care products and food and feed analysis. With its technically sophisticated products, the former hidden champion from Darmstadt has developed into one of the most relevant players in this market with over 1,400 employees worldwide. In order to develop to this level, however, a great deal of specific know-how is required. R-Biopharm has not only successfully built this up in recent years, but has also increasingly digitalized it.
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Figures, data & facts from R-Biopharm Source: R-Biopharm
One of the challenges that the employees faced every day – particularly in sales and in the maintenance of the devices – was easy access to the expertise that was stored in various systems.
This includes, for example, accessing the right documentation such as certificates or guidelines in order to make them available to the customer. Another example is information that is stored in collaboration tools such as Teams and Outlook, where it is very difficult to find.
As a result, this meant a certain amount of frustration for employees and a high level of internal research effort in order to access the right know-how. This meant that research could take tens of minutes and sometimes even longer.
The collaboration between R-Biopharm and amberSearch
The technical set-up and onboarding
Individual teams in the Food & Feed Analysis division and the SAS division (System Development, Application and Service) found the search for internal information particularly time-consuming. Once the problem had been identified, the decision was made to work with amberSearch. In an initial phase, amberSearch went live for individual teams in F&F Sales, R-Biopharm IT and SAS (System Development, Application and Service). Right from the start, various data sources such as Teams, Outlook (personal and shared mailboxes) and network drives were connected. The technical connection to the internal IT systems was implemented in coordination with the IT department of R-Biopharm within half a day.
The connection of amberSearch was actually as easy as originally discussed and enabled us to quickly activate the solution for the users. After the quick set-up, we were particularly impressed by the speed at which user feedback was incorporated into the amberSearch software. You can tell that the team puts its heart and soul into the project and takes customer requests seriously.
Nader el Azabi, Head of IT at R-Biopharm
Despite the early stage of the amberSearch software at the time of its introduction, the added value was quickly realized and the potential for further development could be seen. In addition, the amberSearch team incorporated the feedback from R-Biopharm into the further development of the software. The rapid implementation of the feedback was another advantage of working with amberSearch.
Added value
amberSearch was accepted very quickly. It was exciting for me to see that a certain language soon became established in our internal meetings. When it came to obtaining information, at some point it was just a matter of saying: ‘Have you ever looked at amberSearch?
James Szimeth, Sales Director for the Asia-Pacific region
A practical example: James Szimeth needed a document from a few years ago for a customer. He knew roughly what was in it, but not where exactly it was stored.
“In the past, I would have had to click through various systems and folders and would probably have asked one or two colleagues for help, so the search process would have taken me 45 minutes just for this one document.Today, I simply use amberSearch and can find the document within a minute,” reports Szimeth.“We had this ‘aha’ effect several times, which is why we decided to use amberSearch on a long-term basis after an initial phase of collaboration.
As part of the extension, we also rolled it out to all employees in the departments involved.”
Assessment of the collaboration through amberSearch
Discussion of new projects Source: R-Biopharm
“I was particularly pleased with the openness of the R-Biopharm team towards new solutions, which is certainly not a matter of course,” says Bastian Maiworm, Co-Founder of amberSearch. This openness was the basis for the good cooperation and enabled an open feedback culture.
Another challenge that the amberSearch team was not aware of from the outset during the roll-out was the complexity of the roll-out in the sales team across continental borders, as additional languages and various sub-access rights management systems had to be managed.
“For us, scaling amberSearch was the next logical step.We are delighted that we were able to successfully take this step with R-Biopharm, our only international customer at the time,” says Philipp Reißel, also co-founder of amberSearch.
What did we learn from the project?
One of the biggest learnings for the amberSearch team was the importance of onboarding and the integration of amberSearch within the existing IT landscape in order to facilitate the change for the employees. For this reason, amberSearch has invested heavily in these areas in recent months and has developed a complete help page and a Teams app, among other things. Further investment in these areas is planned for the future.
General description of amberSearch
Nowadays, a lot of time is spent searching for the right document or the right information.
Not only do you waste a lot of time searching yourself, but often colleagues are distracted from their work, which is also annoying and frustrating for the searcher.
As a result, employees lose time for value-adding work, decisions are made on a poor basis and the employee experience is not of the desired quality.
With amberSearch, an intelligent, comprehensive search engine has been developed that searches internal company data with the UX that users are used to from the web. Gone are the days when you had to click on dozens of filters to find information yourself!
Photo source: R-Biopharm AG