How to become a digital pioneer

bridgingIT is a digitalisation consultancy in Germany with around 700 employees at ten locations throughout Germany. They support clients in their change projects. The consultancy was honoured as Germany's most digital company. But how did it become Germany's digital pioneer? The cloud solution Workplace Pure from Konica Minolta made a contribution. Thanks to it, brigdingIT has now been able to make the last area cloud-based and digitise the remaining paper-based processes. By modernising the infrastructure and bringing it up to date, they could also reduce effort and costs.

Which German company is best at transforming into the digital world? The SZ Institut, the think tank of the Süddeutsche Zeitung, a German newspaper, wanted to find out. Together with Statista, more than 3,000 companies with a location in Germany were scrutinised. At the top of the resulting „
Top Digitale Unternehmen 2023/24
“ ranking – ahead of major global corporations from 26 different B2C and B2B sectors, from automotive to online retail to IT consulting – is a comparatively lesser-known digitalisation consultancy: bridgingIT.

Away from the print server structure

”I believe in ‘Practice What You Preach’,” says Thomas Arens, Head of IT at bridgingIT. ”We support our customers with change and digitalisation projects. So, we also have to be digitally optimised ourselves.” Most recently, the aim was to modernise and streamline even the last paper-based processes. ”We wanted to get rid of our print server structure, which was previously used to manage print services. This required a connection to the print server from everywhere, which is time-consuming and expensive and prevented us from switching to a cloud-only structure.”

Printer fleet is now cloud-ready

The first step was to replace the entire printer fleet – bridging IT has around 700 employees at ten locations throughout Germany – with modern multifunctional devices from Konica Minolta. This standardisation alone made them easier to use and reduced operating costs. However, the next step was exciting. This is because the devices are cloud-ready and can therefore be connected to Workplace Pure, a platform for cloud services also from Konica Minolta.

Which processes become simpler and faster

”This cloud solution has enabled us to further digitalise our document processes and make them more efficient,” says Arens. It offers extensive functions such as Cloud Print, FollowMe Print, Secure Guest Print and more. Workplace Pure has significantly changed day-to-day work: there are significant time savings when processing incoming mail, for example. Thanks to the integrated Scan-to-SharePoint solution, colleagues can scan incoming invoices directly to the accounting department or other mailboxes. Many employees in turn work from home and can now prepare documents from there – or while travelling – and then print them out collectively at any office location. Even with predominantly digital processes, a signature via DocuSign is not always sufficient. In the HR area or for bank documents, ‘blue ink’ is still required. 

The ‘Top Digital Company 2023/24’ award is based on a survey of over 33,000 employees, who provided information on the condition of the respective company's internal infrastructure, openness to new methods and other aspects. A good result is therefore only possible with a high level of employee satisfaction. Workplace Pure contributes to this by making work processes simpler and faster.

High data protection requirements

bridgingIT works with many customers in strictly regulated sectors, such as banks. ”We therefore have particularly high requirements for data protection and data security,” says Arens. ”For example, the underlying infrastructure must be located in Germany and certified accordingly.” Workplace Pure fulfils all these requirements. The certifications in the areas of energy and environmental management are also well received by the IT manager: ”We can be sure that we have an environmentally conscious partner at our side in Konica Minolta.”

The solution is convincing both technically and commercially. ”As we are an IT service provider ourselves, we place particularly high demands on our partners in this area, such as Konica Minolta,” says Arens: ”The fact that we are so well digitalised has also been helped by the Workplace Pure solution from Konica Minolta. Thanks to it, we were able to digitalise paper-based processes.”

Challenge

• Replacement of the complex and expensive on premise print server structure and achieve the goal of a cloud-only infrastructure
• Modernise and streamline the few remaining paper-based processes

Solution

• Replacement of the entire printer fleet with modern multifunctional printers (MFPs) from Konica Minolta
• Implementation of Workplace Pure and functions such as Cloud Print, FollowMe Print, Secure Guest Print and Scan-to-SharePoint

Benefits

• Easier use and reduction of operating costs
• Further digitalisation and more efficient design of the remaining paper-based processes
• Significant time savings in the processing of incoming mail
• Mobile printing from anywhere
• High level of data protection and data securityEnergy and environmental management certifications