2025-05-04
“We were amazed by the speed, accuracy, and ease of the new system. It’s letting us grow without adding overhead.”
A leading provider of office supplies in Switzerland, has built a strong reputation for reliability, efficiency, and product variety. Remarkably, the company managed a high volume of daily transactions and significant annual revenue with a lean team of just three individuals—made possible through an impressive degree of operational automation.
However, as the business continued to grow, limitations in its legacy backend infrastructure—specifically a Magento 1 e-commerce platform and an outdated accounting system—posed significant barriers to further scalability, integration, and innovation.
Despite the company's operational success, its reliance on legacy technology created mounting friction that threatened scalability and efficiency. The root cause: a fragmented and outdated backend environment, primarily driven by Magento 1 and a non-integrated accounting system.
Key challenges included:
Lack of modern APIs The absence of robust APIs made data synchronization between systems unreliable and error-prone.
Data inconsistencies Customer profiles and pricing information frequently fell out of sync, resulting in inaccurate records and missed opportunities.
Limited operational visibility The legacy tools provided no meaningful insights into real-time performance or business metrics, making strategic decision-making difficult.
Inefficient debugging and monitoring Troubleshooting was cumbersome and manual, often creating workflow bottlenecks and downtime risks.
The client’s mandate was clear: implement a modern, integrated architecture that would enable real-time data flow, reduce manual intervention, and support sustainable business growth.
Selecting the right ERP system was a pivotal decision for the client. Operating with a lean team and managing a high volume of eCommerce transactions, they required a platform that was not only robust and feature-rich, but also intuitive and easy to manage. After evaluating multiple ERP solutions, the client chose Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central for its strategic advantages.
Business Central offered competitive pricing, seamless integration with the broader Microsoft ecosystem, and a user-friendly interface—key considerations for a small but agile team. Perhaps most importantly, it delivered a true all-in-one ERP experience, eliminating the need for fragmented tools and reducing the complexity of their technology stack.
During the evaluation phase, the client explored a range of ERP platforms. Many were disqualified early due to high licensing costs or long, resource-intensive implementation cycles that didn’t align with the client’s lean operating model.
Others fell short in terms of usability or lacked critical features, such as real-time data synchronization, customizable reporting, or easy data import/export workflows. To facilitate a well-informed decision, our team configured a sandbox instance of Business Central, enabling the client to explore key features and workflows in a live environment. This hands-on experience helped build confidence and internal alignment around the platform’s suitability.
Business Central emerged as the ideal choice for several reasons. First, its deep integration with Microsoft 365 tools like Excel and Outlook offered a familiar environment, reducing the learning curve and accelerating adoption. The platform’s fully cloud-based architecture was also a major advantage, relieving the client of infrastructure management responsibilities such as server maintenance or software updates.
One feature that particularly impressed the team was Business Central’s ability to edit records directly in Excel. This capability made it easy to manage large data sets, such as pricing catalogs or customer lists, using tools the team was already comfortable with—further enhancing day-to-day efficiency.
The only initial hesitation stemmed from Business Central’s relatively limited adoption in the Swiss market. While traditional accounting tools still dominate locally, the client's comparison clearly revealed the limitations of legacy systems. Business Central’s flexibility, automation features, and forward-looking architecture ultimately outweighed concerns about market familiarity.
The project involved a full digital transformation—migrating the client’s eCommerce platform from Magento 1 to Magento 2 (Adobe Commerce) and integrating Business Central via a serverless, event-driven architecture.
At the core of the solution were Azure Function Apps, which orchestrated data flow between Business Central and Adobe Commerce. These lightweight services were paired with Azure Service Bus, which enabled real-time communication and ensured immediate updates across systems.
Data synchronization was comprehensive:
This serverless architecture provided not only scalability and real-time responsiveness but also eliminated the need for ongoing infrastructure maintenance—an important consideration for a lean team.
To support seamless integration, we designed a custom architecture using Azure-native services. Azure Function Apps handled all logic for extracting, transforming, and delivering data between Business Central and Adobe Commerce. Azure Service Bus acted as the backbone for real-time, event-driven communication—ensuring that every change in inventory, pricing, or customer status triggered an immediate update across platforms.
This design offered three key benefits: high reliability, minimal operational overhead, and built-in scalability to accommodate future growth.
The integration was built to support both real-time responsiveness and high-volume data handling. Over 50,000 products were synchronized from Business Central to Adobe Commerce, with daily updates to inventory and pricing.
Customer records were kept consistent across platforms through a bidirectional sync model. This eliminated duplication, prevented data drift, and ensured that customer-facing systems always had accurate information.
The full implementation was completed in just three months—a testament to the team’s planning, agility, and technical expertise. The project followed a structured methodology:
Discovery and Planning We began by mapping out the client's existing workflows, identifying integration points, and aligning data models between Magento and Business Central.
Development and Configuration A sandbox environment was configured for early feedback. We then built and tested the API connectors, customized workflows, and tailored data structures to match the client's unique requirements.
Testing and Validation End-to-end scenarios—such as order processing, dropshipping logistics, and dynamic pricing—were thoroughly tested to ensure accuracy and performance.
Go-Live and Post-Launch Support The launch was smooth and seamless, with live monitoring and support in place to address any issues immediately.
This project was not a simple data sync—it was a complete digital transformation. With the new architecture in place, every eCommerce transaction in Adobe Commerce now triggered immediate updates in Business Central. Inventory levels were automatically adjusted, customer records were kept clean and consistent, and pricing updates could be rolled out across platforms in real time.
The result was a unified, automated sales and operations workflow—delivered without the need for third-party middleware or ongoing manual intervention.
To align the system with the client’s business model, both Adobe Commerce and Business Central were customized extensively.
In Adobe Commerce:
In Business Central:
Given that no off-the-shelf connector was used, we developed a robust, secure API layer within Magento. This included:
This approach ensured flexibility, resilience, and full control over the integration logic.
A key differentiator in this project was the complete avoidance of third-party connectors or services. Every integration was built in-house, using:
This resulted in a tightly integrated, future-proof system that minimized cost, reduced complexity, and supported long-term scalability.
Synchronizing complex data sets—products, pricing, inventory, and customers—posed a significant challenge. Any inconsistency could impact sales, reporting, or customer experience.
Solution: We implemented real-time monitoring and alerting using Azure Application Insights. Every synchronization step was logged, and alerts were configured for failures or unusual delays. This gave the team full transparency into system operations and enabled rapid issue resolution.
Using Magento’s standard REST APIs required careful handling of schema expectations, authentication protocols, and error states.
Solution: Custom-built Azure Function Apps were used to call Magento’s APIs with robust error handling, retries, and schema validation. This ensured resilience and compatibility without overcomplicating the stack.
The client’s high order volume and dynamic pricing made it essential to keep both systems responsive, even during peak times.
Solution: Using Azure Service Bus for asynchronous, event-driven processing allowed for real-time updates without impacting performance. Message queuing and retries ensured consistency even during temporary disruptions.
Despite a high degree of automation, switching to a modern ERP system was a major change for a team of three.
Solution: We provided hands-on training, live demos, and a sandbox environment to build confidence. Clear documentation and ongoing support ensured a smooth transition.
The transformation was both immediate and long-term in impact. With the new system in place:
The client expressed high satisfaction with the project outcome and quickly began exploring new opportunities for growth.
“We now spend less time fixing problems and more time growing the business.”
“This changed the way we work. We finally have a system we can trust and grow with.”
Encouraged by the results, the client has since initiated new digital initiatives, including expanding their dropshipping network, integrating Power BI for advanced reporting, and evaluating marketing automation tools.