After a test period, the textile group now leans everyday on the Internet market.A success for Etexx which is, for the moment, testing the following phase : the electronic hub.
/www.etexx.com">Etexx, the online marketplace of the textile industry, enters an operational phase. After a year for the development of the site, after all the efforts for the development of a content and e-business solutions, the start-up from Nice begins to enter the production phase with customers who use their services everyday. This stage has just been passed with the Promod group (267 shops, 2.500 employees) which has chosen the Etexx Business Center solution in order to optimise the exchange of information with their providers.
The ordering process managed via Etexx
After having tested the solution during four months with three companies, the Promod group, which is present in 7 countries, is gone further : Etexx Business Center is now used by 21 users, who are buyers for the most of them. So, such buyers now use the marketplace from Nice to consult the providers' catalogues, to find products (cloth and accessories), to order. In brief to manage the whole ordering process.
'Our force is our capacity to renew and to propose more and more collections to our customers, with more and more new products during the year,declared Régis Vroman, the person in charge of purchasing at Promod. In case of success of a model or a collection, we have to manage the stocks of each shop in an optimum way'. As Promod has information about the products which are manufactured by their providers and about the state of the production, they will be able to anticipate the chain cleavages with a precise view of clothing stocks.
The special prize of the entrepreneurs' show in Paris
In the same way as users, Etexx has launched a 'provider' test with Berning in Germany, the biggest European manufacturer of jeans' buttons. The company from Nice has finalized what they call an electronic hub, which is an interconnection between computer systems of providers and users. For the moment, the system functions with an Internet navigating system and a Web interface. In this new phase, the user, without leaving the interface of his own computer system, will be able to connect himself at his providers'. The validation of this system is in progress with the Carreman company, the European leader of wool and cotton products.
Etexx, which is finalizing an investment of 120 million francs for the moment, has just been awarded a new prize : 'the special prize' of the entrepreneurs' show. Decided by eleven national economic newspapers, this prize will be awarded during the show, in Paris, on Thursday February 1st 2001. this is another acknowledgement sign for a company which is not two years old.