Ottobock is one of the world's leading manufacturers of prostheses and orthotics. Ottobock has stood for innovation in orthopedic technology for over 100 years — with the aim of giving people with disabilities a better quality of life, freedom of movement and independence. Founded in 1919 as a pioneering company, Ottobock is committed to para-sports worldwide and has supported the Paralympic Games with technical expertise and passion since 1988. Humanity, reliability and inventiveness continue to shape the actions of the family-run company today. The Ottobock Clinical Services Network, more than 400 care centers worldwide, offers cutting-edge and customized orthopedic treatment and rehabilitation solutions all over the world.
We dreamed of a uniform appearance at the individual process levels and developed our own style guide, which enabled us to successfully implement this.
Ottobock uses the Aeneis BPM software to create uniform and transparent processes worldwide. By investing in professional process management, the company is consistently pursuing the goal of further strengthening its customer orientation through the highest quality of products and services.
The project clearly shows that consistent and sustainable process management helps to overcome the challenges of digitization and globalization and at the same time improve customer satisfaction.
As with many fast-growing medium-sized companies, Ottobock's international expansion also led to new challenges. Locations are being created all over the world to be closer to customers and to ensure the highest quality. But every country has its own legal requirements, cultural characteristics and processes. As a result, processes diverge from one another, responsibilities become unclear, roles are missing, processes become opaque and inefficient.
With Aeneis, Ottobock was able to standardize and efficiently implement key requirements worldwide.
Digitalization also brings new requirements. Different data, information and communication channels, digital business models and increasing customer expectations for speed and flexibility in service and production make the situation more complex.
Ottobock recognized that these challenges could only be overcome with centralized, clear and coordinated process management. For this, it is crucial that all employees know exactly their tasks and responsibilities in the process.
After a thorough review of various options, Ottobock chose the BPM Suite Aeneis as a suitable process management platform to successfully overcome current and future challenges. Particularly in the heavily regulated environment of medical device manufacturers, there are clear software requirements. Certain functions must be tested for the necessary validation. This includes the control of electronic signatures in the workflow, in particular during approval and blocking processes, as well as a sophisticated concept for user rights and training.
For Alexandra Dzimalle, Business Process Architect at Ottobock, validation was a central part of the evaluation:
“For us, a stable basis is important to rule out unpleasant surprises in the future.”
Anyone who decides to use a BPM software is also making a decision in favor of the company that develops the software. Especially when using it for the long term, it is important not only to evaluate the software itself, but also to look closely at the manufacturer. The company's economic stability, innovative strength and future visions play a central role. Intellior has been successfully active on the market since 1993 and supports companies of all sizes. These include both small companies and large international corporations in a wide variety of industries.
Medical device manufacturers are subject to strict legal requirements. For this reason, all processes and the associated information must always be documented and managed in accordance with regulations and with clearly defined responsibilities. To ensure this, Ottobock attaches particular importance to clear responsibilities and areas of validity right from the start. For this reason, when creating a new process, a management representative is always involved.
“We work at a central port for our management systems, such as quality management, risk management, data security, compliance, occupational safety, etc., and integrate them into a so-called process-oriented integrated management system (IMS)”
Robin Schmalz, Business Process Application Owner of Aeneis in the process management team.
Introducing new software that interferes with the way employees work is always a challenge. The aim was therefore to successfully introduce the Aeneis BPM software at Ottobock and at the same time to establish a long-term process orientation in the workforce.
Ottobock quickly succeeded in gaining acceptance among those involved in the process through clear structures and understandable benefits. This acceptance led to enthusiasm, as employees recognized the concrete added value: Processes were not only accelerated, but each task is now clearly and comprehensibly assigned in Aeneis.
An example: What used to only exist as a text instruction is now concurrent information with clearly defined fields of information. This information is divided into small, easy-to-use components. They can be linked to each other as well as to processes and tasks. This creates a transparent and comprehensively evaluable digital twin of business processes.
Thanks to a central, consistent process map and user-friendly process models based on BPMN 2.0, all employees have a clear overview of Ottobock's entire value chain. In doing so, all processes and tasks that were previously documented in quality management or other management systems were transferred into a coherent process landscape.
“We dreamed of a uniform appearance at the individual process levels and developed our own style guide, which enabled us to successfully implement this,”
according to an Ottobock employee, application owner.
Ottobock has already made great progress, but the transformation of the company is not yet complete. The role concept is a central challenge. It is about defining roles clearly and uniformly and assigning them to employees in a structured manner. The technical map in the personnel management system and the processes for maintaining and distributing the data are currently still in the concept phase.
The BPM team at Ottobock works very successfully with intellior. There are permanent consultants at intellior who know the projects in detail and provide expert support. Solutions are developed together and continued step by step. Not only is the professional advice convincing, but also the close networking with other customers. Solution-oriented workshops complement the offer and ensure consistently good results.
Suggestions from customers were also accepted and implemented. This includes, for example, a simple connection via Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS) or reasonable substitution rules for workflows when employees are temporarily unavailable.
In addition to the extensive options for individual customization, intellior has also incorporated some of these improvements into the Aeneis BPM suite in general.
After one year of use at Ottobock, 800 users are already actively working with Aeneis, 190 of them as modelers. The process organization is therefore already very lively and well established.
