“We have a shared architecture with other Sonae companies, and we have now become independent with a more modern, scalable and cloud-first technology stack,” Felipe Ferreira, the person in charge of digital transformation, told JE. The retailer works with consulting firms Accenture, EY and Deloitte, technology companies SAP, Outsystems, UiPath and Atlassian, as well as telecoms operator NOS.
Worten’s digital transformation plan includes “everything and more,” such as an online store. The retailer is working with about a dozen consultants and technology companies to modernize operations, which includes making the architecture of its information systems independent of that of the group it belongs to, Sonae. The process of “decoupling” the software should continue for another year and end by the end of 2025, the person in charge of digital transformation at Worten told the Journal Económico (JE).
“We are in the final stage of the systems architecture migration program. We have a common architecture with other Sonae companies, and we are now autonomous with pile Technological [conjunto de tecnologias ou linguagens de programação para desenvolver aplicações] More modern, scalable and Cloud first“This allows the development time – the programming itself – to be much shorter,” explained Felipe Ferreira.
It’s a shift that will allow the company to stop relying so heavily on the group’s technological tools and make internal data collection and analysis more flexible. The digital transformation specialist recalls that there are “companies entering our markets” and “changing the rules of the game” in an instant, with the platforms listed as Amazon, AliExpress, Timo and Shein. Therefore, Worten found in changing technology, business culture and work methodology (Agile), a way to increase flexibility and maintain competitiveness.
Felipe Ferreira asks two questions: How can a company in a small country like Portugal remain competitive? What is the role of digital transformation and artificial intelligence in this competitiveness? “We have no other choice: either we really want to transform ourselves, using digital as something that drives this transformation, or companies are doomed, because the world is volatile, complex and ambiguous. The main priority for companies must be to make them a flexible, evolving and adaptable ‘animal’, so that He can adapt to what happens and not depend on it,” he answers then.
“Worten is a retailer. It moves products – and now also services – from manufacturers to consumers. All markets play in this tournament, on a much larger scale than us, so we realized, very early on, that we had to be as good or better.” We knew we had to be ready.
Even management software (ERP – Enterprise resource planning or ERP) is converted to SAP. “It’s a more distributed architecture. We’re able to take specific parts for a specific function and then update them pile technology faster. These are processes that take a long time, but have very satisfactory results.
In addition to German company SAP, Worten works with consulting firms Accenture, EY and Deloitte, technology companies Outsystems, UiPath and Atlassian, as well as telecommunications operator NOS. the tool Business analysis (BA) from Microsoft (Azure).
Last year, the focus on RPA – robotic process automation and “microcode” involved an investment of €60,000 for licenses. The goal was basically the same: to create an automation center. It’s the result? Savings of 53,657 hours per year for employees (worth €966,000), and a reduction of €62,000 in outsourcing and reskilling costs.
In 2022, for low-end programming, there was an investment of €60,000 in licensing (€39,000) and development (€21,000), centralizing data and freeing up 17,441 hours per year for employees, which equates to a value of €314,000. However, in the second year of the pandemic, the allocated capital exceeded this barrier: 90 thousand euros.
Asked about the amount for 2024, Felipe Ferreira admitted that it is also around 60 thousand euros. “The budget in these areas remains quite fixed and our goal is to start spreading this knowledge throughout the organization. In other words, this investment has largely focused on setting up the automation center, where we have six people working on automation, but the goal is to make the knowledge of this center profitable.” to the rest of the organization.
Currently, this automation center covers five areas in Worten: Services, Digital, Stock, Supply Chain, and Commercial, but there are other areas that should follow the same automation steps (in particular, PowerApps), namely Customer Support, Store Control, Sales, People and strategy, according to Head to Digital transformation.
