Lohmann & Rauscher GmbH & Co. KG
Lohmann & Rauscher (L&R) is a leading international supplier of medical and hygiene products with over 5,700 employees and locations in 29 countries. In view of the enormous amount of data from over 56,000 SKUs, manual price planning in Excel was increasingly reaching its limits. Complex calculations, a lack of transparency and the high cost of making changes made a centralized solution necessary.
Together with celver, L&R implemented a smart K4 extension to the existing analytics system in the Qlik Cloud. The new solution enables flexible, automated price planning and changes based on a standardized data model - directly integrated into the familiar BI environment. Further details can be found in the complete case study.
The Company: Lohmann & Rauscher GmbH & Co. KG
People. Health. Care.
At Lohmann & Rauscher (L&R Group), people and their health have always been the focus. The product range of this leading international developer, manufacturer, and supplier in the medical and hygiene sector spans high-quality products and services for wound management, sanitary pads and bandages, as well as surgical kits and hygiene products for the operating room. The high quality standards for its products—particularly with regard to outstanding functionality and therapeutic efficacy—have a long tradition at L&R, which was founded in 1998, as the history of its predecessor companies—the German firm Lohmann and the Austrian firm Rauscher—dates back to the 19th century. Since 1998, the two have operated together as the L&R Group, with a turnover of approximately 813 million euros (in 2024) and over 5,700 employees (2025) worldwide.
The facts at a glance:
✓ Flexible pricing and change management processes
✓ Unified, centralized database
✓ Real-time data
✓ High user-friendliness thanks to the continuation of the structure and logic of the previously used Excel solution
The Challenge
Excel Planning at Its Limits
In the past, pricing for SKUs (stock-keeping units) and services was often handled in other programs, such as Excel. Due to the complexity of the company and the calculations involved, this process became too cumbersome and slow. “Integrating new master data or price changes, as well as calculating their impact, was difficult,” report Lea Schmidt, L&R Digitization Officer, and José Manuel Novoa Tumbeiro, L&R Controller for Strategic Procurement.
No centralized overview
Only a few employees had a complete overview of the spreadsheets. To gain insight into price trends, they had to familiarize themselves with the logic and underlying formulas each time. This made it easy for errors to occur or for formulas in the cells to be accidentally overwritten. Lohmann & Rauscher was therefore looking for a centralized solution for its price planning and adjustment processes.
The Solution
Smart planning extension for the analytics system
“We looked at various planning solutions,” Lea Schmidt explains the selection process. “But we didn’t really want a complex, new system. We wanted the transition to be as simple and user-friendly as possible. We wanted to retain the structure and logic of our existing Excel solution as much as possible.”
“The corporate group had already implemented Qlik Cloud for its analytics needs in the past. This led to the idea of simply adding price planning capabilities via an add-in within this solution. Working together with the experts at celver, a corresponding architecture was designed and implemented. Qlik serves as the central platform, acting as the BI host, while database management is handled by the existing SQL Server. K4 Analytics was integrated for the processing and management of planning data. The software solution integrates seamlessly into existing BI platforms and supplements them with the missing planning component. Additionally, dbt Labs is used to seamlessly integrate master data from various sources, particularly SAP.”
The project was divided into two main phases: First, pricing planning was implemented, followed by the complementary price change processes. Both subprojects are based on a unified data model that combines data from SAP and SQL and makes it available on a daily basis. “Updating the data used to be a tedious process that required in-depth knowledge of the tables,” explains José Manuel Novoa Tumbeiro. “Today, all it takes is the push of a button to get the latest information.”
Automated processes and workflows
The automated, role-based authorization model ensures that all users in Purchasing and Controlling can access the data that is relevant and approved for them. This is a major advantage in terms of compliance and data protection. The new solution also offers greater convenience when it comes to approval processes: for example, price changes exceeding 5,000 euros require approval from the team or division manager.
The solution also makes it possible to simulate price changes and their impact on negotiations with suppliers. Exchange rates are also automatically factored in via K4 Analytics. The shared database for the "Price Planning" and "Price Change" subprojects ensures consistency and transparency throughout the entire process. The price planning implementation was carried out in collaboration with celver within just six months; Lohmann & Rauscher handles the subsequent maintenance of the solution itself. The rollout of the price change took an additional five months.
Flexible price planning and change processes
With the new pricing and price change solution, the L&R Group has been able to significantly increase efficiency and flexibility in planning. A key advantage is the partial automation of processes: whereas previously various Excel spreadsheets had to be manually consolidated, this step is now fully automated. This not only saves time but also minimizes the risk of errors. The centralized, unified database ensures consistent and transparent data, which builds confidence in the figures.
Data-driven decisions
The solution’s flexibility is particularly evident when prices change. “We can now implement a 10 percent price adjustment top-down per plant with just a few clicks,” says Lea Schmidt, explaining the difference from before. At the same time, the effects can be easily analyzed using integrated simulation functions—for example, by creating worst-case and best-case scenarios. Important decisions can thus be made based on data in the best interests of the corporate group.
Another key factor in the project’s success was the solution’s user-friendliness. By retaining the familiar Excel structures, users were able to make the transition without requiring extensive training. Leveraging the existing data and BI infrastructure for the K4 integration further facilitated this transition. Overall, the new solution has not only increased the efficiency of pricing planning and change processes but has also significantly improved transparency and the quality of decision-making.
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