Automating data collection and processing contributes to creating a data-driven environment for area sales. "HULFT Square" contributes to fostering a DX culture through secure cloud connectivity.

AGC Glass Products Inc., a leader in the architectural processed glass industry, has been utilizing the information in mission-critical system, core system for its daily sales activities, but the scattered data made it difficult to utilize the data quickly. Therefore, as part of creating an environment for data-driven sales activities, the cloud-based data integration platform (iPaaS) "HULFT Square" was adopted as the foundation for data integration to collect and process necessary data from inside and outside the company.

Benefits of implementation

A project has started to create a data-driven environment required for area sales.

AGC Glass Products Inc. plays a central role in Japan and Asia within the AGC Group, which boasts a world-leading market share in architectural flat glass. The company manufactures and develops high-value-added architectural glass, such as energy-saving Low-E double-glazed glass and laminated glass that contributes to disaster prevention, safety, and security, used in various buildings including office buildings, houses, and condominiums. It is committed to creating products that meet the needs of living environments and lifestyles. Currently, the company is promoting its group medium-term management plan, "AGC plus-2026," with the goal of becoming "an excellent company that contributes to the realization of a sustainable society through the provision of unique materials and solutions, and that continues to grow and evolve" by 2030.

Amidst rapid changes in the business environment, such as a declining population and diversifying customer needs, the area sales department, which continues to engage in proposal activities with customers, urgently needed to shift from a sales style that relied on traditional experience and know-how to data-driven management. "With the increasing number of digitally native young people, there was a greater need than ever before to develop sales activities based on data," recalls Yasuhiro Otori, Section Chief of Sales Section 1, Sales Department 1, Sales Headquarters. However, although various data, including mission-critical system, core system, were being used, the information was scattered throughout the company, meaning that a lot of time was being spent on collecting data for materials to be shared at regular sales meetings and creating reports using Excel, etc. Therefore, in order to utilize data, it was necessary to streamline tasks such as information gathering and material creation, and create an environment where time could be spent on high-value-added tasks, including proposal activities.

Furthermore, discussions about the future of area sales progressed in an environment where sales activity-related information, such as customer negotiation history, was not centrally managed. "As members from various positions gathered for lively discussions, we talked about what area sales should be like in the future, and the need for a data-driven environment came up as a topic of discussion, as we were not handling data effectively," says Hiroshi Fukutome, Manager of the DX Strategy Team, Planning & Strategy Group, Business Planning Office, Construction Glass Asia Company, AGC Inc., who is promoting company-wide DX tailored to the field while coordinating with the DX being advanced by the corporate side. In particular, since the reports that were created by each area sales team across the country were not standardized, they decided to proceed with standardizing the information necessary for data analysis while making use of the characteristics of each area.

HULFT Square offers the flexibility to adapt to changing environments and secure connectivity.

A project was launched, primarily involving key members from the five regional sales teams across the country. After discussing standard business processes, they began creating the necessary infrastructure to support them. While using BI tools to display aggregated figures and show the difference from the budget was considered, a highly flexible environment that could easily adapt to changing trends was required, including text information such as daily activity reports on set action goals. Therefore, an environment that could flexibly data integration with mission-critical system, core system and other systems was needed, based on the no-code development cloud service "kintone."

That's when they turned their attention to data integration platform "HULFT Square." "Even if we created a container for daily use with 'kintone,' the operation wouldn't run smoothly if the sales team had to manually update the information that was updated daily. We felt that an ETL function that could automatically collect and process information from the internal system was essential, and we thought that 'HULFT Square,' an iPaaS that can be used in the cloud just like 'kintone,' was the best option," says Fukutome.

However, given the company's commitment to creating a secure environment, the ability to use "AWS PrivateLink," which allows secure access to the AWS environment where their mission-critical system, core system operate, was a prerequisite. "HULFT Square" was deemed the optimal solution for the company because it facilitates connection via "AWS PrivateLink" and has a kintone connector. "Not only was it able to effectively offload processing in kintone, which has API restrictions for external integration, but it was also able to process large amounts of data from mission-critical system, core system, which was a major plus," said Mr. Fukutome. The fact that the system department had been using file transfer middleware "HULFT" internally for some time also contributed to their positive evaluation.

Achieved 270 hours of efficiency improvements per month, significantly contributing to the cultivation of a DX (Digital Transformation) culture.

The newly established information infrastructure is being used by over 70 area sales representatives nationwide. They utilize the reports not only for their daily work but also for weekly and monthly sales meetings and area-wide reporting sessions. "HULFT Square" is responsible for data integration with surrounding systems and information processing and aggregation to create these reports. The reports include figures necessary for sales management, such as sales and profits by item and product, as well as external information such as construction and housing start statistics published by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, and records of daily sales activities.

While development is currently outsourced, the company is considering in-house development in the future, given that "HULFT Square" allows for low-code development.

Specifically, information in mission-critical system, core system, which is deployed in "Microsoft SQL Server", is acquired by "HULFT Square", processed as daily aggregate information, and deployed in "kintone". In addition, "HULFT Square" is also responsible for the processing of sales activity history entered into "kintone" and external information imported into "kintone", which is then aggregated and returned to the reporting application. The information on "mission-critical system, core system" alone amounts to tens of thousands of lines every day, and it is difficult for "kintone" to process such a large amount of information. Fukudome explains, "HULFT Square performs the basic processing, while 'kintone' handles the registration and display of information. Currently, "kintone" has an interface for importing external information in CSV format, which is then manually imported, and the information is compiled and reported by "HULFT Square." In the future, however, the company hopes to create a system that allows direct collection from the outside using "HULFT Square.

The company reports that it has achieved approximately 270 hours of efficiency improvements per month by establishing a new business infrastructure that enables data utilization. They also highly value the fact that time previously spent on creating reports can now be allocated to higher value-added tasks, including proposals to customers. Furthermore, it is important to note that this digitalization has fostered a DX culture within the company. "Our highly perceptive young members no longer take what they are currently doing for granted, but instead think about how they can make things easier using digital technology. This was a top-down initiative, but we have created an environment where we can expect the idea of adopting DX to spread from the bottom up," says Mr. Otori.

It has the potential to broaden the scope of solving challenges in area sales and to serve as a common platform for the entire company.

This initiative has fostered a foundation for promoting DX (Digital Transformation) on the ground, leading to the progress of multiple data utilization projects aimed at solving on-site problems. Further development of "HULFT Square" as a platform for data collection and processing is expected. "Recently, we've been increasingly incorporating new technologies, including integration with generative AI," says Mr. Otori.

Specifically, we expect that the use of "HULFT Square to streamline data processing will expand, starting with CRM-like approaches that centralize customer information of business partners, which is currently managed individually by sales representatives using "Excel" spreadsheets.

Furthermore, there are not many company-wide examples of securely linking data with mission-critical system, core system using "AWS PrivateLink," so this is attracting considerable attention as a success story. "We also reported on this initiative, including "HULFT Square," in our group DX announcement, and we would like to introduce it in more detail to any departments that are interested," said Mr. Fukutome.

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