Emanuele Parlato is the Director of Sales and Marketing at Blue-Zone GmbH, a cloud-native software company that develops its IP solutions for SAP environments. Originally from Italy, Emanuele now lives in Rosenheim, Germany, with his wife and two boys, aged nine and six.
When he’s not driving Blue-Zone’s sales and marketing efforts, Emanuele loves making music. He plays guitar in a cover band, performing hits from the 1960s to the 2010s. “We play music from The Beatles to Imagine Dragons,” he says. Emanuele also enjoys cooking, eating great food, and exploring new places with his family.
Expanding Global Reach for Cloud-Native Solutions
Emanuele joined Blue-Zone in mid-2021. Just six months into his role, Blue-Zone became part of the All for One Group, one of the founding members of United VARs. This acquisition, as Emanuele explains, “Marked a shift in Blue-Zone’s strategy and opened the doors for further international collaboration.”
Blue-Zone joined the United VARs network in October 2023, recognizing it as the ideal organization to support its international growth. “We are the developers, not the consultants. We trust in a strong role distinction: United VARs members are the consultants who know the customers, while we focus on building scalable cloud software.”
This clear distinction allows United VARs partners to focus on consulting and understanding local customers while Blue-Zone continues to deliver global, scalable software solutions. The partnership enables Blue-Zone to participate in global-scale opportunities that would otherwise be difficult to access.
“To build a global network of partners one by one takes a long time,” Emanuele notes. “For us, joining United VARs accelerated our entry into partner organizations across the world. For VAR partners, developing your IP is no longer optional—it’s the key to setting yourself apart in a crowded market.”
Accessing New Markets through Collaboration
Being part of the United VARs alliance has allowed Blue-Zone to collaborate on large-scale international projects. Emanuele highlights a recent opportunity with a global electronic component manufacturer that needed an invoicing solution for multiple countries. This project's complexity is exactly what Blue-Zone excels at. "We have agile software that works in many countries, and we need the local expertise of United VARs partners to implement it successfully,” Emanuele says.
This kind of collaboration allows Blue-Zone to provide comprehensive solutions that combine its scalable software with the localized knowledge and expertise of United VARs partners. It also enables Blue-Zone to participate in projects that may have otherwise been beyond reach.
“This global reach and expertise give us a competitive edge in bidding for complex international projects,” Emanuele says, adding that the invoicing solution was for a major global manufacturer in the electronics sector. “Without the United VARs network, these opportunities would be difficult for us to pursue.”
Emanuele highlights that collaboration is a key part of Blue-Zone’s success. By working with partners who deeply understand their local markets, Blue-Zone can scale quickly and effectively. This partner-to-partner collaboration is a significant advantage of being part of the United VARs network. “By collaborating with Blue-Zone, VAR partners can dedicate their efforts to consulting, confident that they have robust, scalable solutions backing them every step of the way.”
Consulting partners can either invest in building a product team or tap into partner solutions for faster growth. This flexibility allows VAR partners to focus on consulting while relying on stable, scalable solutions from partners like Blue-Zone, streamlining their operations and enhancing their offerings.
Enhancing Customer Solutions with Complementary Expertise
One of the key benefits of being part of the United VARs network is the opportunity to combine strengths with other members to offer more comprehensive solutions to customers.
Emanuele highlights Blue-Zone’s collaboration with 2BM, another United VARs member, “We are working closely to bundle IP and create meaningful packages for United VARs reselling partners. With ‘Get your SAP mobile,’ we have created a joint bundle of apps creating differentiation potential within the SAP S/4 HANA world.”
‘Get your SAP mobile’ was an online webinar hosted by Blue-Zone and 2BM Software in May 2024. It showed how mobile applications can dramatically improve efficiencies in areas like sales, customer service, warehousing, production, and plant maintenance. The webinar also explored the role of mobile, IoT, and AI within SAP environments and equipped attendees with actionable strategies for boosting operational efficiencies.
Combining different IPs and expertise allows United VARs members to deliver more value to their customers. By working together, Blue-Zone and its partners can offer more complete solutions, enhancing the customer experience. “This collaboration strengthens our offering to each of our customer bases,” Emanuele explains.
The local expertise of United VARs partners is also critical when implementing Blue-Zone’s scalable solutions in different countries. By tapping into the knowledge and experience of local partners, Blue-Zone ensures that projects run smoothly and are tailored to the specific needs of each region. “It’s crucial to have partners who understand the local market, the language, and the culture,” Emanuele adds.
Delivering Scalable Solutions for Enterprises and SMEs
While Blue-Zone serves global enterprises, Emanuele stresses its commitment to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The United VARs network allows Blue-Zone to offer affordable alternatives to more extensive SAP solutions, making advanced technology accessible to more businesses. This is particularly meaningful in the context of SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition and GROW with SAP.
One such offering is Blue-Zone’s Factory Kit, a cost-effective option for SMEs looking to digitize their manufacturing processes. “SAP’s Digital Manufacturing Cloud (DMC) is a great product, but it’s too much for some SMEs,” Emanuele explains. “Our Factory Kit makes it easier for small businesses to move from paper-based processes to digital solutions. This allows SMEs to take their first steps into digital manufacturing without needing complex and costly systems.”
Blue-Zone’s ability to offer flexible solutions for SMEs demonstrates the company’s commitment to making digital transformation accessible for businesses of all sizes. By working with United VARs partners, Blue-Zone can deliver these solutions to a broader range of customers, ensuring that even smaller companies benefit from advanced SAP technologies.
Embracing the Future of SAP Solutions
As part of the United VARs network, Blue-Zone is at the forefront of SAP’s evolving strategy, particularly in the public cloud space. The company is developing scalable extensions based on SAP BTP that complement SAP’s standard offerings, aligning with its ‘keep the core clean’ philosophy.
Emanuele encourages partners and customers to adopt a cloud mindset, emphasizing the importance of sticking to standard processes rather than transferring every process from old systems into the cloud. “It’s important to focus on speed and cost-effectiveness in ERP projects,” he advises. “Resist the urge to modify everything. Embracing the standard will save time and money.”
Looking ahead, Blue-Zone is also exploring AI integration into its products, anticipating that AI-driven features will be added within the next fiscal year. While the company is still in the early stages of AI adoption, it closely follows SAP’s technology and evaluates how to incorporate it into its solutions. “We are testing AI features and exploring how they can be built into our products in a way that benefits multiple customers,” Emanuele says.
This forward-thinking approach, combined with the global reach and local expertise of the United VARs alliance, positions Blue-Zone to continue driving digital transformation for businesses of all sizes worldwide.
About Blue-Zone
Blue-Zone GmbH is a manufacturer of software applications, with over 20 years of experience in the end-to-end automation of business processes. The products, such as the service and sales app POLUMANA®, network data, systems and things, with the goal of making companies more efficient and successful. The company is headquartered in Rosenheim (Germany) and employs more than 50 people at two locations. As a strategic partner of companies such as Microsoft or SAP, blue-zone GmbH supports its customers worldwide. Certified partner companies ensure efficient software implementation for end users across industry boundaries.
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