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Why Legacy Systems Are Killing Your Product Launch Speed and What to Do About It

Your engineers are ready. Your prototype is solid. Sales has interest from key customers. But your product launch stalls out—not because of the product, but because no one can find the right data.

Sound familiar?

If you’re using an ERP like NetSuite or Linnworks to manage product data, you’re not alone. These platforms are great at inventory and operations—but they’re not built for fast, scalable product launches. And in the world of industrial manufacturing, that can put you at a real disadvantage.

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Launch Delays Aren’t Always About the Product

Most delays we see today aren’t technical—they’re operational. Product teams are waiting on:

  • Technical specifications buried in PDF folders
  • Marketing descriptions that need five rounds of approvals
  • Compliance documents stuck in someone’s inbox
  • Distributors chasing missing data
It’s a game of email ping pong and spreadsheet stitching just to get one SKU launch-ready. Multiply that across product lines or international markets, and the bottleneck gets bigger. The more you grow, the slower things get.

Why ERPs Like NetSuite and Linnworks Hit Their Limit

ERPs are built to manage orders, stock, and financials. They’re great at keeping your warehouse and finance team aligned. But they were never designed to handle:

  • Complex variant structures
  • Channel-specific product descriptions
  • Datasheet creation
  • Localization for global markets
NetSuite might store a few product attributes. Linnworks can track inventory levels. But neither can automate content generation, manage assets like images and documents, or syndicate data to multiple channels. If you’re using your ERP as a content hub, you’re pushing a square peg through a round hole.

The Fix: Digitising Product Data in Manufacturing

Modern manufacturers are getting ahead by digitising product data—not just storing it. That means moving beyond ERP into systems purpose-built for product content.

A Product Information Management (PIM) platform helps manufacturers:

  • Centralize all product content in one place
  • Manage attributes, specs, and compliance documentation across variants
  • Automate product sheet creation
  • Push accurate data to sales channels, websites, distributors, and catalogs

Instead of re-creating product content for every launch, your teams work from a centralised product data system. No duplicate work. No missed fields. No delays.

What PIM for Industrial Components Looks Like in Action

Let’s say you’re preparing 50 new SKUs for launch next quarter.

Without PIM:

  • Engineering and marketing are working in parallel but disconnected
  • You need to format and QA every sheet by hand
  • Compliance documents need to be chased down and matched manually

With PIM:

  • You use templates for datasheets and digital product pages
  • Teams update their piece in a shared structure
  • Final content is validated, approved, and published across all channels from one place
You’re not just speeding up launch. You’re removing risk, improving accuracy, and giving every team the data they need—without duplicate effort.

It’s Time to Modernize Your Launch Stack

If your team is stuck in NetSuite or Linnworks trying to pull together specs, images, and PDFs to launch a product, it’s time to rethink your stack. These tools are valuable—but they aren’t built to manage rich product content at scale.

Product Information Management for manufacturers fills that gap. It’s the system that gets you from “ready to go” to “live and selling” faster than you thought possible.

Want help building the business case or exploring how a PIM could fit into your tech stack? Let’s chat.

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