How Mediq scaled automation across Europe

Healthcare operations leave little room for error. Across Europe, Mediq supports hospitals, care institutions, clinics, the defense industry and patients through complex supply chains and service processes that must work reliably every day. And as the organization expanded across markets and systems, that operational complexity increased.

Automation had already proven its value in pockets of the business. Early initiatives, launched as far back as 2018, demonstrated that Robotic Process Automation (RPA) could reduce manual effort in several areas of the business but also relieved the burden on Mediq’s customers. But these early successes also revealed a limitation: automation was fragmented.

“We could see the potential,” explains Jasper Severs, Process Excellence Director at Mediq. “But it was happening locally, driven by individuals. If something delivered value in one country, there was no easy way to reuse it elsewhere.”

Operating across multiple European markets, Mediq needed a new approach—one that could support scale, quality, and compliance consistently across the business in a highly regulated healthcare environment.

From experimentation to a Center of Excellence

By 2024, Mediq had reached a tipping point; scaling those early automation successes across a growing, multi-national provider of medical products and services required a more structured approach. With years of experience at Mediq and a deep understanding of its operations, Severs recognized that fragmented progress would limit long-term impact.

“At some point you have to ask yourself,” Severs reflects, “why should something that works well in one country be limited to just that country?” That question became the catalyst for change. In response, Mediq formally established a group-wide Center of Excellence (CoE) for automation in 2024, a dedicated function designed to bring structure, governance, and scalability to automation across the organization.

From the outset, Mediq worked closely with UiPath and automation partner Tacstone Technology to shape the CoE. Tacstone supported the team in defining development standards, sharing best practices, and building the technical foundations needed to scale.

What we focused on was helping Mediq put the right structure in place so automation could grow consistently, without impacting control or quality.

Ebert Knol · Managing Partner at Tacstone

Rather than centralizing automation in a single location or function, Mediq designed the CoE as a shared capability for the business. Today, it supports automation across supply chains, HR, finance, customer service, and other areas of the business with solutions running in the Netherlands, Germany and the Nordics.

By the end of 2024, the CoE oversaw around 55 automations, saving 55,000 hours of manual work in a single year. Just as importantly, it created a consistent way of working—ensuring automations were reusable, governed, and aligned with business priorities as demand continued to grow.

“What matters most is the foundation,” Severs adds. “Standards, skills and governance are what allow automation to scale responsibly, especially in healthcare.” With that foundation in place, Mediq was ready to scale automation further—and to confront the practical challenges that come with growing a CoE in a complex, regulated environment.

The realities of scaling a Center of Excellence

Standardization quickly emerged as one of the CoE’s first and most important challenges. “When we took ownership, we saw automations built in different ways, with different levels of documentation,” Severs explains. “In many cases, knowledge lived with individuals rather than the organization.”

As the CoE assumed responsibility, the focus shifted to creating structure at scale. Existing automations were reviewed and streamlined, standards were introduced, and documentation became a priority. All as a way to ensure continuity as teams evolved and demand increased. The aim was to embed knowledge into the organization while continuing to deliver value.

In parallel, Mediq took the opportunity to mature its automation platform by migrating from an on-premises environment to the cloud. This marked a natural next step in the CoE’s evolution.

It wasn’t just a technical change. It influenced how we develop, test, and govern automation—and helped establish a more consistent, scalable way of working.

Jasper Severs · Process Excellence Director at Mediq

Another shift followed naturally: ownership. As automation expanded, it became clear that success depended on close collaboration between the CoE and the business. Processes could not simply be handed over; they needed active ownership from the teams closest to the work.

Severs adds, “While the CoE drives the automations, the business owns the process. That balance is what allows automation to scale in a sustainable way.”

Together, these lessons now define how the CoE operates—with clear standards, shared ownership, and a focus on long-term impact. With that foundation in place, Mediq was ready to show what a mature CoE could deliver.

Delivering impact with Document Understanding

One of the clearest demonstrations of Mediq’s Center of Excellence in action is its use of Document Understanding—a solution that brought together scale, complexity, and immediate business value within a highly regulated healthcare environment.

Across its European operations, Mediq processes large volumes of sales orders received as PDFs from institutional customers. These documents arrive in different formats, languages, and layouts, often generated by customer-specific systems. Accuracy is non-negotiable: every order must be processed correctly to ensure compliance, continuity of care, and timely delivery.

Historically, extracting and entering this information into SAP, the enterprise system Mediq uses to manage orders and core business processes, was a manual, time-intensive task. “It’s a critical process,” Severs explains. “Orders have to be correct but manually handling this volume simply wasn’t sustainable.”

Working closely with Tacstone, the team designed a solution that extracts key data from incoming PDFs, validates it using human-in-the-loop controls, and matches order lines against Mediq’s master data before posting them into the system. This approach ensured automation could scale without compromising quality or regulatory requirements.

Crucially, the solution was designed to support people, not replace them. Automation removed repetitive data entry work, allowing employees to focus on more complex cases. “This was about protecting quality and capacity in a demanding healthcare setting,” Severs notes, “not reducing headcount.”

The initial solution was scoped for more than 50,000 documents per year. Today, around 35% of that volume is processed automatically, with an accuracy rate of 98%. A second Document Understanding solution, covering an additional 17,500 documents, is now preparing to go live, extending the benefits further across the organization.

Beyond efficiency, the solution has also strengthened data quality. By systematically validating extracted information against its systems, the process surfaced inconsistencies and gaps that had previously gone unnoticed, improving downstream operations across supply chain and finance.

Evolving automation responsibly

With a strong Center of Excellence in place and proven results across core processes, Mediq is now focused on the next phase of its automation journey—one defined by responsible innovation and long-term value.

The CoE has begun exploring agentic automation, starting in controlled, internal environments such as HR, where teams handle large volumes of unstructured employee questions that often require both access to knowledge and follow-up actions. Using UiPath’s Agent Builder and Maestro, Mediq is testing how agents can support these requests while keeping people firmly in the loop.

This measured approach reflects Mediq’s regulated operating environment. “For us, it’s about understanding the technology first; how it behaves, where it adds value, and how it fits within healthcare,” Severs explains. “Only then do we think about scaling it further.”

To help guide this evolution, Mediq is also using communications mining to better understand patterns in incoming requests and interactions across the business. From Tacstone’s perspective, the pace and breadth of Mediq’s use of UiPath Solutions stand out.

As Knol puts it, “They’re almost filling the whole bingo card; classic RPA, Document Understanding, Insights, Test Automation, early agentic pilots. All while building governance and investing in people. Doing all of that in such a short period of time creates a strong foundation for what comes next.”

Mediq continues to partner closely with UiPath and Tacstone, using their expertise to explore new capabilities and ensure innovation remains aligned with regulatory requirements and business priorities.

For Severs, the journey has reinforced a practical lesson about how automation succeeds at scale. He explains, “If you invest in it properly, show how it works, you can then talk facts, not opinions.” Early proof points create confidence across the business and allow teams to think strategically.

When building a CoE you have to remember, you’re not just addressing today’s challenge; you’re laying the foundation for future opportunities. Think of it as setting the stage for what’s yet to come: let’s achieve this now so we can unlock even greater possibilities later.

Jasper Severs · Process Excellence Director at Mediq

Automation at Mediq is not about replacing people or pushing technology for its own sake. It’s about strengthening processes, supporting employees, and ensuring the organization can continue delivering the right healthcare solutions efficiently and reliably to its customers.

With a mature CoE, automation and a disciplined approach to innovation, Mediq has turned complexity into capability, positioning the business to evolve with confidence in the years ahead.