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UX behind the scenes: How micro frontends expand the business model

Together with codecentric and Innodrei, we supported Kampf, the leading manufacturer of roll-cutting and winding machines, on its journey toward Industry 4.0. In addition to eye-catching features and a user-centric approach, new sales opportunities also emerged.

Tablet showing the home screen of the Kampf maintenance app: greeting, “Our brand new Maintenance App” banner and favorites

Kampf takes digital transformation seriously.

No one here shies away from bleeding-edge software. And the company knows: without UX, there’s no good software. Ideal conditions for us. But one challenge remained: we spoke different languages. We quickly set aside

abstraction and theoretical explanations and gave even more space to the pragmatic, hands-on approach that’s already standard at UX&I. On the other hand, Kampf learned to rethink software and put users at the center. User story mapping, personas, and “jobs to be done” helped us methodically achieve a shared understanding and clearly define our goals. We worked flexibly and continually adapted the scope to the circumstances.

Large Kampf slitting and winding machine in a factory hall, with a banner reading “Highest level of productivity” and the Kampf logo in the background
“UX is a crucial factor for our applications, and without UX&I, we wouldn’t have been able to pull this off.”
Maik Krüger Strategic product management at Kampf Schneid-und Wickeltechnik GmbH & Co. KG
Can this be done in a user-friendly way?

Can this be done in a user-friendly way?

Our task was to transform two existing applications for managing and operating the machines into easy-to-use products: ones that look good and can be further developed in-house.

Here’s how we helped Kampf

Micro frontends

Micro frontends

Instead of a monolithic architecture, we opted for micro frontends, and in doing so, we inadvertently enabled a new business model: Thanks to the modular architecture, new apps can be developed for specific purposes, easily added, and marketed individually. This paved the way for cross-selling and upselling individual licenses.

What are micro frontends?

As microservices gain traction on the server side, front-end developers are increasingly taking advantage of micro frontends. The underlying concept is that a system is not built as a single, large monolith, but rather consists of many small applications. This makes work processes significantly more flexible, reduces complexity, and ensures more robust overall systems.

Optimized information architecture

Optimized information architecture

The organizational and navigation structure is crucial to the user-friendliness of the complex applications the@vanced and my@vanced. After all, international production lines must be managed, replacement parts must be found quickly, real-time metrics must be readily available, maintenance must be scheduled, and so on. We completely reorganized the functionalities from the ground up, defined clear navigation principles, and introduced filter functions to improve searchability.

Man in a yellow T-shirt and red glasses arranging pink sticky notes on a gray wall in an Industry 4.0 workshop
The eye plays a part, too

The eye plays a part, too

How do you make machine performance, sensor signals, or winding quality visually appealing? The schematic representation of machines and monitoring overviews has been a core requirement from the very beginning and has kept our UI experts on their toes.

Paving the way for happy users

We delivered the visually and conceptually complete user interfaces, including the design system, on time. In just half a year, we laid the foundation for the development of the applications and for Kampf to continue developing them independently.

2020–2021

Martin Flachmann
“Our collaboration with Kampf was very results-oriented. In just half a year, we laid the foundation for the development of the applications together. Kampf is open-minded and forward-thinking, and it’s just a pleasure to work with them.”
Martin Flachmann Former senior UX consultant at UX&I

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Nadine Pieper, senior UX consultant at UX&I, smiling with glasses and arms crossed in the office

Nadine Pieper Senior UX consultant · Berlin

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Nadine Pieper
Hias Wrba
Patrick Oselka
Claudia Schönwälder
Mato Sauer

Your call with

Nadine Pieper

Senior UX consultant

Berlin

Your call with

Hias Wrba

Product coach

München

Your call with

Patrick Oselka

Managing director at UX&I

Düsseldorf

Your call with

Claudia Schönwälder

Senior UX consultant

Hamburg

Your call with

Mato Sauer

Customer empowerment lead

Frankfurt