“Northdoor’s responsiveness and genuine enthusiasm to support us are key to a time-sensitive business like LKQ UK and Ireland.”
Simon Martyn, Group IT Director, LKQ UK and Ireland
Business challenge: non-disruptively upgrade a mission-critical ERP system handling tens of thousands of orders daily across 250+ locations.
Technical challenge: temporarily expand data storage by 3X using a swing-volume approach.
Why Northdoor: trusted infrastructure partner to LKQ UK and Ireland for more than 10 years; deep expertise in mission-critical migrations; strong understanding of business challenges and priorities.
Our impact: on-time, under-budget delivery of complex in situ ERP upgrade with zero disruption to business activities; project success led to LKQ UK and Ireland engaging Northdoor Managed Application Services to maintain customer portals, eliminating a single-point-of-failure risk.
This case study covers an in situ ERP upgrade for LKQ UK and Ireland, delivered on time, under budget, and with zero disruption to business activities.
Growing into new markets
LKQ UK and Ireland (LKQ UK&I) is the leading integrated group in the automotive aftermarket, combining four market-leading businesses, including LKQ Euro Car Parts, LKQ Digraph, and LKQ Leisure and Marine, as well as its bodyshop division, covering passenger car and commercial vehicle parts, consumables, equipment, training, static and touring caravans, motorhomes and marine sectors. The company operates a network of more than 250 branches throughout the region and employs more than 8,000 people.
A subsidiary of LKQ Corporation, LKQ UK&I has been following in the footsteps of its parent company in expanding into the green parts market to support sustainability and cost-effectiveness. In parallel, LKQ UK&I has recently acquired LKQ Electriq, specialising in the repair of batteries and other components of electric cars, supporting the growing presence of electric vehicles on UK and ROI roads.
Keeping millions on the road
In the aftermarket parts sector, just-in-time operations are key. If delivery takes too long, customers will simply buy parts elsewhere. LKQ UK&I has perfected logistics—in certain locations, the company can deliver a part to a retailer in just 20 minutes from the moment of an invoice being raised. A highly available IT infrastructure is crucial to this success.
“Multiple customer sales orders are raised every second throughout the day, so any downtime for our IT systems has a major impact on revenue and customer satisfaction,” says Simon Martyn, Group IT Director at LKQ UK&I.
For close to a decade, LKQ UK&I has relied on a highly customised enterprise resource planning (ERP) system for order processing, financial processes, and stock management. The UK&I Business was on an old bespoke version of the ERP platform. The decision was made to upgrade to the latest standard ERP platform. This was to ensure the business remained on a future proofed and supportable platform.
Re-affirming a long-term partnership
To ensure the success of this mission-critical transformation project, LKQ UK&I chose to work with the Northdoor Managed Services team.
“Northdoor has looked after our infrastructure since 2011,” says Simon Martyn. “The company has been with us through several upgrades, and has proved itself as a real benchmark case in customer service. The team knows our business well and has our backs. We didn’t need to look elsewhere for this project.”
Tackling a complex migration as one team
Over the course of 18 months, LKQ UK&I and Northdoor worked closely together to upgrade the existing Klipboard ERP One instance to V21 in situ. First, the teams provisioned new servers to conduct rigorous application and database regression testing, ensuring the new version of the ERP was compatible with the customisations that LKQ UK&I chose to keep. Northdoor then worked on identifying and resolving potential issues to ensure the system could handle the growing production workloads.
To complete the in situ upgrade, it was known that the Klipboard system would temporarily require three times the available data storage capacity. To meet this demand, Northdoor implemented a swing-volume methodology, using rented data storage to elastically expand capacity from 15TB to over 45TB and then shrink it back down when no longer needed.
Thorough testing ensured that when it came time for the go-live, no hotfixes were required and business continuity was maintained across more than 250 locations. Paul Collis-Smith, Technical Systems Manager at LKQ UK&I, comments: “The success of the go-live was the result of all the effort and collaboration between LKQ UK&I and Northdoor leading up to it. We treat Northdoor as an extension of our team and rely on the team for everything ERP-related, from support and technical expertise to simply being a sounding board for our ideas.”
After the switchover, LKQ UK&I implemented a period of hyper-care during which business users could contact the team to rapidly triage problems. Northdoor supported the LKQ UK&I team with troubleshooting during this phase, helping ensure that there were no major disruptions.
Modern, future-proof platform
The successful upgrade to Klipboard ERP One V21 positions LKQ UK&I to continue scaling its business while maintaining the system stability necessary for delivering tens of thousands of orders a day from branches or regional fulfilment centres. The project was completed on time and significantly under budget, enabling LKQ UK&I to reinvest in further modernisation efforts. And, most significantly, the transformation gives the company a clear path to the mandated transition in 2030.
“Northdoor’s responsiveness and genuine enthusiasm to support us are key to a time-sensitive business like LKQ UK and Ireland,” comments Simon Martyn.
Martin Summerhayes, Managed Services Director at Northdoor, adds: “The V21 migration for LKQ UK and Ireland stands as a landmark example of how we handle mission-critical infrastructure, or what our clients rightly call their ‘crown jewels’. The successful execution of this major migration is a great example of what our managed services team delivers when it really matters, and a result the whole team are rightly proud of.”
The success of the transformation also encouraged LKQ UK&I to engage Northdoor Managed Application Services to maintain ancillary systems such as customer portals. These custom-built applications were previously dependent on the knowledge of one subject matter expert, creating a significant risk to operations. With Northdoor taking over responsibility, LKQ UK&I has eliminated this single point of failure and the need for complex, drawn-out training or handovers in the future.
Facing the future with confidence
As LKQ UK&I prepares for its future ERP transition, Northdoor will support the company through continuous operational streamlining. For example, Northdoor’s transformation has unlocked a path for LKQ UK&I to scale back its server fleet, boosting operational efficiency and cutting costs for power and maintenance.
“Whatever we throw at Northdoor, the same level of service is maintained,” concludes Simon Martyn. “The team take it on the chin and stay open and honest, and have been this way since day one. They embody what we wish every supplier to be like.”
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