Skip to content
Search to learn about InterSystems products and solutions, career opportunities, and more.

Digital Transformation at CFAO Improves Customer Satisfaction, Creates New Revenue Channels

InterSystems Data Platform Technologies Fuel Connected Solutions

Woman Shopping

COMPANY: CFAO

CHALLENGE: The company had to address multiple data management challenges spanning interoperability, customer experience, ecommerce, and supporting physical shopping malls.

OUTCOME: CFAO has been able to unify commerce, improve customer satisfaction, and create new revenue channels. IT has become a key strategic contributor to the company’s success.

CFAO is a 4.2 billion euro logistics company based in France that does business in 36 African countries, 7 French overseas territories, Denmark, Portugal, Italy, India, and Vietnam. With 140 operational subsidiaries, CFAO found it difficult to be as responsive as they wanted. “We lacked sufficient transparency into our process flows,” says Anthony Gillaizeau, IT Manager at CFAO. “We couldn’t quickly track ordered products, the status of orders in the various systems, and so on.”

To meet these challenges, CFAO leveraged InterSystems data platform capabilities in a number of new, connected solutions.

Project Hubic Eliminates “Blind Spots”

CFAO implemented an application called Hubic to integrate various internal and partner applications (CRM, POS, ERP, etc.) and create composite business processes. InterSystems business activity monitoring capabilities provides real-time visibility into the status of every process. In addition to gaining insight into their own lines of business, CFAO makes the information available to partners and customers. Now, customers have their questions answered in real time in a self-service manner.

Another advantage of the Hubic project is that it is much easier for CFAO to integrate new applications and business partners. “A new integration used to take up to six months,” says Gillaizeau. “Now we can do it in two days.”

Digital Help Desk Answers Questions Faster

CFAO gives their digital help desk staff more complete insight into their existing knowledge database by leveraging InterSystems semantic analysis capabilities. Questions are answered more accurately, and the average response time to questions has dropped from two hours to five minutes. Plus, the improved system has shortened the training time for help desk staff.

Forex Application Automates Currency Exchange

Anthony Gillaizeau, IT Manager, CFAO

CFAO has operations in over 40 countries around the world, and must pay their business partners in local currency. The company’s Forex application uses InterSystems data platform technology to aggregate and filter relevant financial data from various systems, present the data in specific formats, and identify any discrepancies in exchange rates. It also automates compliance with European Market Infrastructure Regulation (EMIR) requirements.

Previously, the work to check the exchange rates and perform the related hedging and EMIR regulatory compliance activities was handled manually. With the Forex application, these processes are now automated, reducing manual involvement from four hours to less than ten minutes per day.

CFAO Retail Powers Brick-and-Mortar Outlets in Africa

Leveraging their strength in distribution and logistics in Africa, CFAO is partnering with Carrefour, one of the world’s largest retailers, to open more than 80 retail shopping centers. Three types of outlets in the shopping centers — convenience stores, supermarkets, and hypermarkets — will give customers access to international brands that have traditionally had difficulty penetrating the African market. InterSystems technology provides the integration backbone for CFAO Retail.

Data Platform Approach Helps Elevate the Role of IT

Gillaizeau is very pleased with the technology they get from InterSystems. “We view InterSystems data platform as a powerful and comprehensive ‘Swiss army knife’ for development,” he says. “InterSystems provides all the capabilities we need to meet our business demands, in one seamless environment. We’ve successfully developed and implemented a number of projects. As a result, IT has become a trusted strategic partner to CFAO’s business units.”

Other Success Stories You Might Like

Digitalization in the textile industry
InterSystems IRIS has been the data platform foundation of the company's products for almost 20 years
Optimizing the Supply Chain
Customers rely on InterSystems technology to improve business results by enabling better decision-making and providing accurate real-time visibility and traceability across their supply chains.
Inventory Management
Mondial Tissus is a market leader and the largest network of fabric and sewing supply stores in France. Portraying itself as a 39-year-old start-up, it operates a network of 100 stores serving eight million customers each year. Its sales floors are conceived as inspirational spaces filled with a large assortment of sewing and knitting products.
Digitial Transformation
As Japan’s largest wholesaler of cosmetics, daily necessities, and over-the-counter pharmaceuticals, PALTAC plays an indispensable role in moving 50,000 items from 1,000 manufacturers to 400 retailers operating 50,000 stores, when and where they’re needed. PALTAC has long focused on internal development work — which accounts for 70% of all its information systems — to give its supply chain capabilities a competitive edge.
The InterSystems IRIS data platform provides the infrastructure for the development and easy deployment of updates to the pharmacy software awintaONE® Containers are revolutionizing agile IT development environments as an innovative option for deploying and homogeneously managing software solutions. A good example of this is provided by awinta GmbH, the market leader for pharmacy software in Germany. For the continuous development of its awintaONE software, the company relies on containerization as part of the InterSystems® solution portfolio. This makes it possible to solve all programming requirements “out of the box” and provide pharmacy users with the most modern merchandise management system in the industry.
Digital transformation for logistics and supply chain management is not for the faint of heart — particularly in retail, where there are webs of diverse systems and mountains of raw, unconnected data. But there is a way to create a comprehensive, seamless view of an extended retail enterprise. InterSystems partner snext, headquartered in Paris, was founded on a futuristic vision of supply chain operations that maximizes customer experience and profitability while conserving resources.

Take The Next Step

We’d love to talk. Fill in some details and we’ll be in touch.
*Required Fields
Highlighted fields are required
*Required Fields
Highlighted fields are required

By submitting your business contact information to InterSystems through this form, you acknowledge and agree that InterSystems may process this information, for the purpose of fulfilling your submission, through a system hosted in the United States, but maintained consistent with any applicable data protection laws.



** By selecting yes, you give consent to be contacted for news, updates and other marketing purposes related to existing and future InterSystems products and events. In addition, you consent to your business contact information being entered into our CRM solution that is hosted in the United States, but maintained consistent with applicable data protection laws.