the challenge

To create, launch and maintain retail e-Commerce sites in multiple countries before the competition. Timing is crucial in order to capitalize on the 2000 holiday selling season. The sites must be accessible to support high volumes of visitors 24/7, and must be language and currency specific.


bol.de
bol.de		 BOL countries
bol.com

the strategy

arvato systems integrated and customized Oracle technology to create one core platform that could be customized for each country. Portals were launched and optimized in 8 countries (Germany, Switzerland, France, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Italy, Spain, and Japan) in time for the 2000 holiday season. For Japan, we extended the code to include multi-byte technology, enabling the system to display Japanese kanji characters. We also created an XML solution that allows each application to be deployed on multiple mobile platforms.


jp.bol.com
jp.bol.com

awards

  • Best German e-Commerce site, Forrester Research 1999
  • Computerworld Smithsonian Laureate. For visionary use of information technology in business & related services. 2000
  • Cebit best of show award, 1999
  • Innovation of the Year Award, PC Magazine. 1999

the results

Now BOL is a leading and highly sophisticated collection of retail e-Commerce sites in Europe and Asia. BOL has served 16 countries in 9 languages, including Japanese and Chinese. The BOL brand is widely recognized by the general public, brand awareness in some countries is as high as 40%. Hundreds of thousands of people access the BOL sites every day.


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