Zalando: Accelerating fashion’s digital future with a smarter, faster, and leaner ERP landscape
Learn how Zalando moved toward a future-ready business foundation in the cloud with the help of SAP ActiveAttention services. Download the DocumentINTERNAL – SAP Only (delete if public)
Zalando: Accelerating fashion’s
digital future with a smarter, faster,
and leaner ERP landscape
Zalando SE has grown from being an e-commerce pioneer to building a leading pan-
European ecosystem for fashion and lifestyle e-commerce in less than 20 years. The
company connects thousands of brands to customers across Europe, from global fashion
players to local heroes and beauty specialists. Now present in 25 countries and backed by
a network of 12 fulfillment centers, Zalando is a place where 52 million people come to
shop each year.
In meeting the diverse demands of its customer base, the company’s technology
landscape had grown increasingly inflexible because of the weight of custom code that
slowed operational tasks. Committing to standardizing its architecture on a clean core to
accelerate its journey toward a more efficient and future-ready IT landscape, Zalando
harnessed deep expertise and continuous collaboration with experts to lead the way. Picture credit | Zalando SE, Berlin, Germany. Used with permission.
Zalando: Accelerating fashion’s
digital future with a smarter, faster,
and leaner ERP landscape
Zalando SE has grown from being an e-commerce pioneer to building a leading pan-
European ecosystem for fashion and lifestyle e-commerce in less than 20 years. The
company connects thousands of brands to customers across Europe, from global fashion
players to local heroes and beauty specialists. Now present in 25 countries and backed by
a network of 12 fulfillment centers, Zalando is a place where 52 million people come to
shop each year.
In meeting the diverse demands of its customer base, the company’s technology
landscape had grown increasingly inflexible because of the weight of custom code that
slowed operational tasks. Committing to standardizing its architecture on a clean core to
accelerate its journey toward a more efficient and future-ready IT landscape, Zalando
harnessed deep expertise and continuous collaboration with experts to lead the way. Picture credit | Zalando SE, Berlin, Germany. Used with permission.
INTERNAL – SAP Only (delete if public)
“Thanks to premium engagements from SAP Services and
Support, we accelerated our journey toward a more
efficient and future-ready SAP landscape. By
completing the retirement phase for our legacy systems,
we've successfully removed 2,987 custom objects. This
represents a major step in realizing the core benefits we
set out to achieve.”
Anju Jha, Head of ERP Engineering, Zalando SE
Zalando SE
Berlin, Germany
https://zalando.de
Industry
Retail
Employees
>15,000
Revenue
€10.6 billion
Products and services
Fashion, accessories, and
lifestyle products
Featured solution and services
SAP BTP, SAP Services and
Support, and SAP ActiveAttention
~3,000
Custom code objects
removed
30,000
Custom code objects
being enhanced for
migration
Before: Challenges and opportunities
Acceleration toward a more efficient and future-ready SAP landscape by embarking on a clean core
initiative
Why SAP
• A flexible foundation for development, automation, and integration that supports the clean core
approach offered by SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP)
• A strong engagement model from premium engagement offerings from SAP Services and Support,
providing access to and collaboration with experts
• Expertise from SAP ActiveAttention services to guide the way to remove obsolete code, helping the
company achieve its strategic and operational goals for simplifying its legacy ERP architecture
After: Value-driven results
• Minimized system complexity, making future system upgrades faster and more efficient while also
reducing manual interventions and technical debt, enhancing day-to-day operations
• Enabled more agility in adapting to business changes and adopting new innovations from SAP
• Enhanced performance and stability by helping eliminate unnecessary modifications
• Helped simplify upgrades and minimized maintenance of obsolete code, reducing operational costs
• Laid the groundwork to support ongoing digital transformation goals and achieve the necessary
benchmarks for performance and compatibility with a future-ready SAP landscape
• Continued migration preparations by using established interfaces and models to adopt new solutions
Fashioning increased strategic agility by taking a major step in its
clean core initiative with SAP ActiveAttention
99338enUS (25/10) © 2025 SAP SE or an SAP affiliate company. sap.com/terms-of-use
“Thanks to premium engagements from SAP Services and
Support, we accelerated our journey toward a more
efficient and future-ready SAP landscape. By
completing the retirement phase for our legacy systems,
we've successfully removed 2,987 custom objects. This
represents a major step in realizing the core benefits we
set out to achieve.”
Anju Jha, Head of ERP Engineering, Zalando SE
Zalando SE
Berlin, Germany
https://zalando.de
Industry
Retail
Employees
>15,000
Revenue
€10.6 billion
Products and services
Fashion, accessories, and
lifestyle products
Featured solution and services
SAP BTP, SAP Services and
Support, and SAP ActiveAttention
~3,000
Custom code objects
removed
30,000
Custom code objects
being enhanced for
migration
Before: Challenges and opportunities
Acceleration toward a more efficient and future-ready SAP landscape by embarking on a clean core
initiative
Why SAP
• A flexible foundation for development, automation, and integration that supports the clean core
approach offered by SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP)
• A strong engagement model from premium engagement offerings from SAP Services and Support,
providing access to and collaboration with experts
• Expertise from SAP ActiveAttention services to guide the way to remove obsolete code, helping the
company achieve its strategic and operational goals for simplifying its legacy ERP architecture
After: Value-driven results
• Minimized system complexity, making future system upgrades faster and more efficient while also
reducing manual interventions and technical debt, enhancing day-to-day operations
• Enabled more agility in adapting to business changes and adopting new innovations from SAP
• Enhanced performance and stability by helping eliminate unnecessary modifications
• Helped simplify upgrades and minimized maintenance of obsolete code, reducing operational costs
• Laid the groundwork to support ongoing digital transformation goals and achieve the necessary
benchmarks for performance and compatibility with a future-ready SAP landscape
• Continued migration preparations by using established interfaces and models to adopt new solutions
Fashioning increased strategic agility by taking a major step in its
clean core initiative with SAP ActiveAttention
99338enUS (25/10) © 2025 SAP SE or an SAP affiliate company. sap.com/terms-of-use