FRANK WALDER migrates from NAV to Business Central with BE-terna Fashion

Innovation meets tradition

Since 1953, the heritage brand FRANK WALDER has stood for high quality womenswear, exceptional quality, and a passion for the perfect fit. Frankenwälder E. Held GmbH & Co. KG has grown from a traditional hand embroidery business into an internationally successful family owned company in the textile industry. Since 2016, TUZZI has also been part of the Frankenwälder family.

From its headquarters in Münchberg, Bavaria, FRANK WALDER and TUZZI distribute womenswear in more than 40 countries worldwide. Around 180 employees at the company's headquarters, an in house pattern making department, more than 150 shop in shop locations, and a growing ecommerce channel enable the company to serve customers across all sales channels.

Preventing Technological „End of Life“ 

Since 2012, FRANK WALDER has been using Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 together with BE-terna Fashion. The solution was implemented in collaboration with what is now the BE-terna team and served the company successfully for many years. Over time, however, the system reached its technical limits. 

Microsoft support came to an end, and modern integrations and mobile access became increasingly limited. At the same time, the highly customized solution was no longer updateable. FRANK WALDER and TUZZI therefore looked for a modern ERP platform that would receive long term support, remain technologically up to date, and provide the flexibility for future custom development.  

Since FRANK WALDER and TUZZI had already been working successfully with BE-terna for many years, both the implementation partner and Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central were quickly chosen. As the direct successor to Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Business Central offered familiar system logic, allowing employees to quickly find their way around the new system. The BE-terna team had in depth knowledge of the company's business processes, the existing NAV environment, and the capabilities of Business Central, providing an ideal foundation for the modernization.

Building a modern ERP platform

The migration involved far more than replacing an ERP system. Key priorities included:

• Consolidating seasonal product data: In the legacy system, identical products were created as new items for each season. This resulted in duplicate item master data and error prone inventory transfers.
• Balancing standard functionality with custom development: The company wanted to stay as close as possible to the BE-terna Fashion standard while retaining the flexibility to develop company specific functionality. The internal development team played an active role throughout the project and worked alongside BE-terna to further enhance the solution.
• Simplifying procurement processes: The historically grown procurement module was replaced with standard Business Central functionality. Today, planning is based on production orders rather than sales orders, creating more accurate and efficient processes.

Project phase	Duration	Objectives and results
Initiate	2 months	Requirements workshops to define the project scope and develop the milestone plan before formal project approval.
Implement	14 months	Agile implementation, migration of master data, business documents, and inventory, along with the rollout of streamlined procurement processes.
Prepare	2 months	Three days of intensive integration testing, video based training for around 100 active users, and the final go or no go decision before production.
Operate	3 months	Go live, hands on support after launch, and a seamless transition to ongoing support to ensure the company is ready for future updates.

Delivered almost exactly on schedule

Despite demanding testing phases alongside day to day business, the project was completed successfully. The final go live was delayed by only one month due to the vacation period and a small number of additional requirements. With a total project duration of around 18 months, the implementation remained almost entirely on schedule. The go live itself went smoothly, and users quickly embraced the new system thanks to its familiar business logic and modern user interface.

   "Our goal was to establish a future ready ERP system that remains fully updateable without    limiting our ability to develop our own functionality. Together with BE-terna, we achieved    exactly that while successfully leaving years of technical debt behind."

- Markus Flessa, IT-Software / IT- Development, FRANK WALDER

With Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central and BE-terna Fashion, both fashion brands have established the foundation for a modern, fully updateable ERP platform. Together with BE-terna, they simplified years of accumulated complexity, standardized key business processes, and retained the flexibility to meet future business requirements.

The company has already completed its first regular update cycle, confirming the project's most important objective: Future functionality can now be adopted through standard updates instead of complex migration projects.