Starting point
SAP describes parts, the store needs a finished product
SAP describes production. Each product breaks down in it into thousands of items, from screws to panels, with materials, assembly rules and prices. That record serves the factory well, but it cannot go straight into a shop. A store with a 3D configurator needs the opposite: a finished product with a full set of options and colours that customers can view and change on screen. Those options add up to millions of combinations. The data had to be translated from the language of production into the language of the store without losing the rules that say which parts fit together.
What we did
An application that assembles products from SAP parts
We co-built an application that sits between SAP and the store with the 3D configurator. It pulls production data, assembles products from it and prepares them for display in 3D.
- 1
Pulling data from SAP
The application pulls the items that describe production from SAP: parts, materials, assembly rules and prices. This is the starting point for everything the customer later sees in the store. The application is built on Laravel and Node.js with an MSSQL database, and every further processing step starts from here.
- 2
Assembling complete products
From individual items the application assembles complete products with every allowed configuration. It follows the assembly rules recorded in SAP, so the store only shows variants that can actually be made. Every option and every colour has its place in the finished product.
- 3
Turning parts into 3D models
The application turns individual product parts into the 3D models, materials and meshes the configurator works with. A customer in the Magento 2 store never sees a list of SAP parts, only a finished piece of furniture whose upholstery and options they can change on screen.
- 4
Queues rather than processing on the fly
With thousands of items per product and millions of variants, nothing can be calculated at the moment a customer opens a page. That is why all processing runs on queues. Pulling data, assembling products and preparing 3D models happen in the background, and the configurator receives finished results.
Outcome
Customers configure furniture backed by SAP data
From thousands of items in SAP the application assembles finished products and millions of variants that customers explore in a 3D configurator. Production data and what the store shows come from the same source, and the variants respect the rules for combining parts. At this scale all processing runs on queues in the background, and the configurator receives ready products and 3D models.
- Products assembled automatically from SAP data
- Parts turned into 3D models, materials and meshes
- Processing on queues, away from store traffic
