About the Company
Shimano, a Japanese multinational company founded in 1921, is widely recognized for its high-quality cycling components, including wheels, brakes, and shifting systems. With a workforce of over 5,000 employees, Shimano serves markets globally, producing a diverse range of products for the cycling industry. The company’s apparel development team, located in Shimano’s European office, manages the entire process of creating cycling apparel lines for global distribution.
WFX has transformed our apparel development process, centralized all our data and saved us significant time. The virtual showroom and automated care label generation have been particularly game-changing for our global team.
Evert-Jan Haarhuis
Manager Product Development & Custom Clothing, Shimano
Challenges they faced
When Shimano shifted apparel development from Japan to Europe, they faced significant challenges in maintaining global data consistency and complying with complex regulatory requirements. The decentralized nature of data management, previously handled through Excel, led to data errors, inefficiencies, and miscommunications.
Additionally, meeting stringent international labeling standards was particularly labor-intensive, as care labels had to be translated into 23 languages manually. Without a real-time collaboration tool, coordinating product information across multiple regions also became increasingly challenging, highlighting the need for a centralized, scalable system.
Impact after implementing WFX
Consolidated all product development data into one system, enabling real-time access and cross-regional synchronization.
Automated label creation in 23 languages ensured compliance while reducing manual effort and regulatory risk.
100% web-based platform eliminated the need for on-premise servers, allowing global access without dedicated IT infrastructure.
Virtual showroom enabled early sharing of new collections with stakeholders, improving visibility and accelerating sales engagement.
Cost-effective implementation suited Shimano’s smaller team, requiring minimal setup and ongoing support resources.
Always-updated cloud platform provides latest features without disruption, keeping operations aligned with best-in-market tools.
