How a Global Protective Packaging Leader Built Real-Time Order and Customer Visibility with Microsoft Fabric

Learn how a global leader in protective packaging and automation partnered with Nihilent to modernize its data platform on Microsoft Fabric and Power Platform - unlocking Customer 360 visibility, real-time order tracking, and KPI-driven decision-making across complex supply chains.

Service

Data & Analytics, Enterprise Data Platforms, and Microsoft Fabric

Vertical

Manufacturing (Protective Packaging for Food, Fluids, and E-commerce)

Region

Global (Multi-Region Manufacturing, Distribution, and E-commerce Fulfillment)

Tech Stack

Microsoft Fabric, OneLake, Fabric Lakehouse, Spark Notebooks, Dataflow Gen2, Delta Lake, ADLS Gen2, Power BI, Power Apps, Power Automate, Dataverse

How a Global Protective Packaging Leader Built Real-Time Order and Customer Visibility with Microsoft Fabric

Client Overview

The client is a North America-headquartered global packaging and containers manufacturer, best known for its protective packaging solutions that keep food, liquids, and e-commerce shipments safe in transit. Its portfolio includes automated packaging systems, cushioning materials, and digital solutions that support a more resilient and less wasteful global supply chain for thousands of brands.

As the business scaled across regions, channels, and product lines, data about customers, orders, and operations became increasingly fragmented across multiple systems, making it difficult to build a consolidated Customer 360 view or track orders end to end in real time. The leadership wanted a modern platform that could support operational reporting, AI and machine learning use cases, and self-service order visibility for business users without overloading support teams.

Business Challenges

The client faced several data and insights challenges across customer analytics, opportunity-to-order performance, and order visibility.

Disconnected Customer Data Landscape

Multiple systems held overlapping customer records, with no single source of truth and high duplication.

Limited Support for AI and Analytics

Existing data pipelines and architecture could not reliably support future AI, machine learning, and advanced analytics workloads.

Fragmented Opportunity-to-Order Insight

Data for the opportunity-to-order process was scattered, lacked historical context, and had no centralized, KPI-centric dashboard.

Lack of End-to-End Order Visibility

Users depended heavily on support teams for order status because data sources were disparate and not synchronized in real time.

Insufficient Governance and Data Pipelines

Data pipelines, reporting layers, and access controls lacked structured governance, impacting quality, maintainability, and security.

How Nihilent Addressed This

Nihilent designed and delivered an integrated Microsoft Fabric and Power Platform solution that addressed Customer 360, opportunity-to-order analytics, and real-time order visibility on a single, modern architecture.

Customer 360 Lakehouse on Fabric

Nihilent recommended a Lakehouse approach on Fabric instead of relying solely on Fabric Warehouse, aligning with the client’s strategic direction and reducing dependency on T-SQL while enabling a layered data architecture. Synapse-based transformations were converted into Spark-based Fabric Notebooks, and Dataflow Gen2 was combined with notebooks to build efficient ETL between bronze, silver, and gold layers without duplicating raw data.

Opportunity-to-Order Insights With Power BI on Fabric

For the opportunity-to-order workstream, Nihilent created a unified data model in Microsoft Fabric using Parquet and Delta Lake, supported by an automated pipeline that moved data from ADLS Gen2 into OneLake using a bronze-silver-gold Delta architecture. An interactive Power BI dashboard was then designed with seven to ten key KPIs and drill-through capabilities, providing real-time insight into the opportunity-to-order process for business stakeholders.

Order Visibility with WIMO and OTO Using Power Platform

To improve order tracking, Nihilent implemented a bronze-silver-gold transformation pipeline in Fabric and integrated it with Power Apps and Dataverse to support Where Is My Order (WIMO) and Opportunity-to-Order (OTO) modules. Power Apps screens captured and stored linking data in Dataverse, Fabric shortcuts and virtual tables connected Fabric and Dataverse, and Power Automate sent notifications on data loads and process status to stakeholders.

Key Results & Outcomes

360-Degree Customer Visibility

Unified customer data across systems created a consolidated Customer 360 view that supports operational reporting and strategic decision-making.

Single Source of Truth Without Duplication

ADLS shortcuts and shared master datasets ensured a single source of truth for customer data while avoiding unnecessary data duplication.

Performance and Scalability for Advanced Analytics

Spark-based transformations and the Lakehouse architecture delivered optimized performance and scalability for current and future AI and machine learning use cases.

Real-Time Opportunity-to-Order Insight

A KPI-rich, interactive Power BI dashboard now provides real-time opportunity-to-order analytics, improving monitoring and actionability across workstreams.

End-to-End Order Visibility and Self-Service Tracking

Users can search and track orders down to the schedule line level directly through WIMO and OTO screens, without relying on support teams.

Governed and Future-Ready Data Framework

Layered workspaces, centralized architecture, and secure integration between Fabric, Dataverse, and Power Platform created a governed, scalable foundation for broader rollout.

Key Takeaways

For a global protective packaging leader, solving data and visibility challenges meant unifying customer and order information across platforms while enabling business users to act on insights in real time. By combining a Microsoft Fabric Lakehouse, Spark-based transformations, and deep integration with Power BI and Power Platform, Nihilent helped the organization move from fragmented reporting and ticket-based order queries to governed, self-service insights that support both operational excellence and AI-ready innovation.

Talk to our experts today