Content
New thesis on the Unitec case, submitted at Ca' Foscari University in Venice, awarded with the highest mark.
The thesis in Italian language is available in zip format in the download area 
Graduate
Davide Brolese
Ca' Foscari University in Venice
"Foreign Trade"
Unitec Web Tools – History and Development
Summary
1. Unitec Introduction
Unitec was founded in 1988, after its founder Vincenzo Marino had dealt with the industrial world for over 10 years.
These considerations showed that the massive development of industrial automation in the eighties required an expansion of the supplier base, caused by the geographical distribution of the necessary technologies.
For example, lasers had to be sought in the USA, molds in Turin and machine tools in Germany.
The importance of this matter implied a profound change in the supply chain management environment, not only for investment goods but also for all parts involved in the maintenance of plants.
In this case, the analysis led to the connection between the large industry in Germany and the emerging automation pole in Italy, whose most attractive city is Turin.
Due to language and logistics, companies needed both technical and commercial support in procuring these items, which were available but involved a great deal of time and resource expenditure.
There was a lack of possibility to create procurement pools, as items were purchased separately from various suppliers in many countries.
This led to the fact that processing and supply chain management costs were often higher than the value of the item itself, with an effort that was a multiple of its value.
From the consideration of all these factors of inefficiency, the idea of supply management was born, which allowed Unitec customers to revolutionize their purchasing systems and, as a direct consequence, lower both costs and prices.
This idea enabled Unitec to consolidate procedures, purchase products directly from the manufacturer, resulting in lower prices, and pass these savings on to customers.
The idea found immediate approval and, thanks to word-of-mouth propaganda in the industrial automation sector, Unitec became an important supply company in a short time, later expanding into other language areas.
Another fundamental factor of the company's success was the persistence in understanding that the market is undergoing continuous development and is undergoing it.
This allowed Unitec to adapt to the corresponding growth and make the company a pioneer in the dissemination of commercial information.
2. E-Catalog History
Unitec has always believed in the potential of information technology, as shown by the development of the e-catalog: its foundations were laid in 1993, with attempts already made in previous years.
At that time, the network concept was not as widespread as it is today: it was still an instrument only for large companies.
The potential of this tool was fully revealed by the exchange of information, which was projected and implemented in a sequential cycle to achieve the result with logical progress, as conceived by the workflow expression.
This continuous process improvement helped Unitec to become paperless: in 1999, documents and archives took up a lot of space in the company's offices, while today there has been a drastic reduction and paper documents find their justification only in no longer sensible digitization.
The intensive computerization made it possible to switch administrative systems based on documents to an electronic workflow, which guarantees a fast response speed, a drastic reduction of errors, and, as a direct effect, a higher level of service.
In 1997, Unitec Services & Web S.r.L was founded, the Unitec division that deals with computerization.
The foundation of the new company was the applicability of the network, which gained interesting application perspectives with the spread of the Internet.
So the environment was very attractive, and the company caught the attention of nine investors who were willing to bet on it.
The first supply platform launched by Unitec was Netsourcing (www.netsourcing.it), which followed a customer interface philosophy based on supply integration.
It allowed customers to send offers, place orders, and interact with Unitec's staff, but achieved only modest success. Although it was on the Internet, it was a closed system, as it required registration and private identification.
Following this direction, a new and less closed application was created in 1999: Estimates On Line (Preventivi On Line, www.preventivionline.it).
Although it required registration, it was built with a different philosophy, represented by a higher degree of immediacy, which allowed the website to achieve greater success than Netsourcing.
It now has several thousand subscribers and offers a point of reference for the industrial spare parts sector, with 540,000 items and over 3,000 manufacturers, as well as some complete manufacturer directories.
The purpose of the website was to give customers an idea of expenses when they want to start a maintenance activity; prices are updated, even if they are long-standing, through an automatic statistical updating process, which creates a real support base for maintenance engineers.
They can use this information for their Aktivit activities and send a request to Unitec when they complete the online operations cycle.
Both Netsourcing and Preventivi on Line pursued customer loyalty, which was the custom at the time.
This means not only collecting information through internet page visits but also making the website a point of reference for ordering.
In the year 2000, the Internet speculation bubble swept away e-commerce companies that lacked the necessary skills to remain in the new competitive scenario.
Outstanding companies clearly outlined the new future standards, i.e., complete user opening, comprehensive service, and above all their user-friendliness.
Based on the new guidelines, Unitec launched the third generation of websites: after Netsourcing and Preventivi On Line, E-Catalog was next in line.
It aimed at a global reach without registrations, as web development required.
With E-Catalog, a new specialization arises: this time, the philosophy consists of not offering the hundredth marketplace with the same automated response system but supporting pure automation
