Flexware: Building a Culture of Product Innovation in a Service Company

GlobalLogic and Method partnered with Flexware Innovation, a Hitachi Group Company, to assist with market research and development of LIFT 3.0 intralogistics software, the first standalone product that Flexware has developed. This collaboration aimed to enhance its user experience, efficiency, reliability, and market fit.

Challenges

Flexware Innovation, now part of the Hitachi Group, is an industrial engineering and integration firm. Two years ago, they embarked on a significant initiative to develop LIFT 3.0, their new intralogistics software.

As this was their first experience of stand-alone product development, Flexware’s core problem was understanding their new product’s market fit. They wanted to define their target customers, identify their pain points, understand how LIFT 3.0 would integrate into existing technical ecosystems, and assess their willingness to buy. Furthermore, they needed to compare LIFT 3.0 to competitive solutions and determine effective go-to-market strategies.

To address these challenges and ensure a successful go-to-market strategy, Flexware sought external expertise in modern product design.

What is LIFT 3.0 by Flexware Innovation?

 This intelligent material movement software is designed to connect and orchestrate automated vehicles and enterprise systems (like ERP) in manufacturing and warehousing operations. It aims to eliminate silos, reduce manual work, and optimize material flow. 

LIFT 3.0 addresses the lack of communication between disparate systems with robust integration capabilities, drag-and-drop workflow automation, and real-time monitoring and alerts, increasing connection and efficiency. 

Value Created

Method guided Flexware through a structured 12-week process to identify, test, and validate opportunity hypotheses, leveraging decades of experience in consulting on digital strategy, experience design, and modern product development.

This systematic approach, formalized by Method based on their prior innovation program collaboration with Hitachi’s innovation teams, resulted in the creation of an “innovation playbook”. This playbook serves as a repeatable framework for understanding and validating ideas and defining a go-to-market approach. 

GlobalLogic significantly contributed to the LIFT product by developing and implementing a robust quality assurance strategy and enhancing the LIFT 3.0 UX/UI. We boosted the platform’s value by optimizing front-end performance and streamlining QA processes. GlobalLogic’s engineering team’s UI development led to an improved user experience. Through a blend of manual and automated testing, we increased the platform’s reliability, ensuring consistent performance and minimizing errors.

Impact

GlobalLogic’s collaboration with Flexware significantly advanced the stability and performance of LIFT 3.0. By enhancing the platform’s front-end and streamlining QA processes, the engagement resulted in an improved user experience and a more reliable, efficient platform. Our partnership with Flexware not only improved their product’s reliability and user experience, but it also helped Flexware optimize the cost of software development and accelerate their time to market.

Beyond the technical enhancements, the partnership’s biggest impact was providing Flexware with a crucial “gut check” and realignment on how to define their go-to-market approach. Our collaborative approach focused on not just delivering an outcome but also on teaching Flexware to improve their innovation capabilities. This included providing a product playbook to help Flexware’s team members understand how to operate effectively as a product team and replicate the innovation process internally. This playbook was seen as a valuable resource for onboarding team members and improving their effectiveness in the innovation cycle, empowering Flexware for long-term success in further digital product developments.

LIFT by Flexware Innovation optimizes manufacturing and warehousing material movement by integrating automated vehicles with existing ERP systems, eliminating data silos, minimizing manual labor, and streamlining material flow.

Our partnership with Flexware not only improved their product’s reliability and user experience, but it also helped Flexware optimize the cost of software development and accelerate their time to market.