Somany modernizes legacy systems with digital logbooks across Hindware and AGI Greenpac

The company

Somany Impresa Group is a diversified conglomerate composed of Hindware Limited, Hindware Home Innovation, and AGI Greenpac Limited. Its portfolio spans plumbing products, kitchen appliances, glassware, and container glass manufacturing.

While the group’s subsidiaries have expanded rapidly over the years, their operational backbone struggled to keep up, signaling the need for a fresh approach.

The challenge

Before Zoho Creator, the group used a mix of various SaaS tools, including SAP S/4 HANA, in-house software, and custom applications, to manage operations. Their key workflows included shop floor logbooks, field contractor expense management, price approvals, and claim management.

However, these critical workflows still relied heavily on manual processes. For instance, like many manufacturing units, Hindware and AGI Greenpac depended on logbooks to track daily activities, machine readings, production data, and maintenance checks across their shop floors. These were traditionally paper-based, making them scattered, error-prone, and difficult to search, share, or analyze.

Customizing their existing systems was time intensive and lacked the flexibility needed to keep up with changing needs, making operational agility a constant hurdle.

To solve these challenges, the group needed a platform that could become a central hub for digitizing workflows across their subsidiaries. That’s when they began evaluating low-code and no-code platforms to shorten development cycles and respond faster to business needs. This paved the way for Zoho Creator.

The solution

After assessing multiple platforms, Somany Impresa Group chose Zoho Creator for its agility, customer support, and ease of use. In just one year, they had over 50 custom apps up and running across their subsidiaries.

Each subsidiary applied Creator to its most pressing needs. Here’s a closer look at these key applications:

Digital logbooks

By leveraging Creator, Somany Impresa built over 200 digital logbooks for AGI Greenpac to track operations via mobile devices, covering machine readings, maintenance, production, and more. These eliminated paper dependency, reduced errors, and enabled complete digitization across key shop floors.

Contractor expense management

Hindware used Creator to handle its contractor expense submissions. Before, to submit travel and expense receipts, field agents first had to compile them in Excel, print the files, and courier them to the central office. Now, they simply upload expenses directly into the app and get them approved. This simple change eliminated paperwork, decreased delays, and significantly reduced effort for both contractors and internal teams.

Price approval application

Hindware periodically updates its product pricing. Previously, this involved tedious manual work with Excel sheets and paperwork. To eliminate this, they built a price approval system that automated the entire workflow.

Users can now upload updated price lists, which are then routed to the right stakeholders for review and approval. Once approved, the prices are automatically updated in their SAP system. If the uploads fail, stakeholders are immediately notified. This not only reduces errors but also ensures real-time synchronization with SAP.

Claim management

For over 12 years, Hindware dealers relied on a legacy platform called My Connect. Instead of replacing it entirely, Hindware built a new claims management app on Zoho Creator and integrated it seamlessly with the existing system.

Now, when dealers raise claims, they simply submit invoices, photos, and damage details through My Connect. This data is automatically pulled into Creator and routed through a blueprint-driven process.

From there, claims are assigned to surveyors (field vendors) who verify the details using a mobile-friendly portal. Once surveyors submit their reports, the claims move forward for review and a detailed inspection by executives and department heads, who then update the status. All updates are automatically reflected back in My Connect.

This new system improved visibility, sped up resolution times, and made the entire claims process mobile-friendly for field staff.

Benefits and ROI

Zoho Creator helped the group deliver transformative results, including:

• A 90% reduction in development time: “We were able to develop apps in hours, not days,” says Srinivas Nandimalla, Head of Digital Transformation.
• Complete digitization across multiple shop floors: “Thanks to Zoho Creator, we achieved 100 percent digitization,” adds Anjaiah.
• Seamless integration with SAP: "Most of our data resides in the master module of SAP. With the help of Zoho Creator, this data can be synced across platforms whenever required," says Anjaiah.
• Stronger data security through IP-based access restrictions: "This is an amazing feature in Zoho Creator. We wanted certain forms to be accessible only from specific IP ranges. Creator made that simple,” adds Anjaiah.

The speed of development has also wowed internal teams. Anjaiah recalls:

Looking forward

Moving forward, the group plans to identify and digitize every remaining manual workflow, particularly on shop floors yet to be modernized. They’re also excited to explore new Zoho Creator capabilities, such as Agentic AI, to further enhance operations.