Case StudyOverview
Name: Dr. Ing. Konrad Haller
Company: EDV - Dr. Haller & Co. GmbH
Location: Plauen - Germany
Industry: Traffic engineering software and services
Product: CorelDRAW® Graphics Suite

All Roads Lead to Plauen
With more than 20 million traffic signs comprising 650
different instructions, traffic on Germany's highways andstreets usually flows pretty smoothly. But setting up andmonitoring this forest of signs is a huge challenge for thecountry's town planners and highways departments. Added
to that are changes that need to be made quickly to divert
traffic around roadworks and other temporary blockages.
So it's no wonder that there was a huge opportunity here
for the company, Dr. Haller & Co., with its traffic-related
software based on CorelDRAW. In fact, Dr. Haller is themarket leader today.
“Things really started moving in 1995,” remembers Konrad
Haller, the company's CEO, a mathematician with a doctoratein IT. “That was when the government introduced its new
guidelines for securing roadworks on city streets and highways.”
The idea behind the regulations was to keep traffic movingaround the roadworks and to increase the safety of bothmotorists and construction workers. With typical German
precision, the rules defined the exact type of roadblocks, lights
and markings to be used, as well as the minimum distanceSignpost next to the Brandenburger Tor

between the traffic and the roadworks. There was even a congress to present the extensive new rules to all concerned. “Wewere there,” notes Haller, “because my son – who was still astudent at the time – had developed a piece of software basedon CorelDRAW 4 that enabled town and highway planners toautomate their roadwork plans on the computer.” With a glowof pride, he adds: “There were about 300 companies there, allinvolved in safety for roadworks sites – and they pounced on
the product like there was no tomorrow. It just flew off theshelves – and we suddenly realised we were on to a winner.”
Today, the company has over 25 staff, and along with its
roadwork planning product, it provides software modules todesign traffic signs and road markings. The company now
works with the latest version of CorelDRAW Graphics Suite.
Road signs for Europe and Dubai
Konrad Haller already had a few ingenious inventions to hisname – some highly specialized applications developed withCorelDRAW. “One of these was designed to optimize musicalinstruments for a better sound. In 2000, we even won an award
for a CorelDRAW-based program to optimize the curvature ofa violin body,” he recalls. But over the years he had more highway departments, town planners and engineering consultancies among his customers than violin manufacturers. “Today,
there are about 20 companies making traffic signs in Germany– and they're all customers of ours.” His name is beginning totravel further afield too, with orders coming in from sign makers
in Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia and Greece. The company evenhas enquiries from Dubai about designing traffic signs.
Although Dr. Haller's typical customer, core business and teamhave changed over the years, one thing has stayed constant:Corel software. Why? He finds it's easy to adapt and extend –and those are two key benefits for him.

Manufacturing of a traffic sign on a special printing machineCase Study

Computer-aided draft of a land-use plan for road signage in Dubai

Following the existing guidelines, new signposts have been drafted for signposts in Austria“Using CorelDRAW's application controllers, we've always beenable to develop special functions and tailor solutions to customers' exact needs,” he says. The firm's already done that forwell over 3,500 users in Germany alone. Dr. Haller is especiallyproud of the feature that he and his team integrated into
CorelDRAW two years ago, which has been available ever since.
“When users position their cursor over an object, they see achoice of functions, like turn, straighten etc.. It helps them gettheir work done five times faster!”FIFA regulations, too. They managed it thanks to the efficiency
of CorelDRAW. Besides the speed, he sees another advantage
in the product's price point compared to competitive products– as well as the fact that it's really easy to learn and is compatible with Windows applications.
Constant dialogue with customers
But Dr. Haller's not resting on his laurels – and the future'slooking very promising. “There's been a very powerful printing
machine on the market for the last couple of years that canprint large traffic signs in one go on a highly reflective foil – itprints directly onto the prism film,” says Dr. Haller. “We wereasked to design the controls for this very innovative – and very
expensive – new machine. This included things like color
management, contour mapping, labeling the different parts –and we did everything with CorelDRAW X5”. One thing that
he was really pleased about was that he could test the software
solution directly on the machine. After all, Dr. Haller's always
been convinced that constant dialogue with customers is theonly way to produce a software solution that one 100 per centmeets their needs.

Screenshot of a map displaying traffic markings. It shows a crossing in Sachsen-Anhalt

The speed advantage was really useful for one special event –the football World Cup, which was held in Germany in 2006.
“In the space of just one month, we had to design all the new
signposts for the Stuttgart stadium, which had been renamed,
then send the designs to the sign makers for immediate manufacture.” And they had to be made exactly in accordance withCorel Corporation
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