Location/Region: Montréal, CAN
Industry: International Non-Profit
Apps implemented: CRM, Sales (which, in the case of the WFH, is used to manage donations), Purchase, Inventory, Quality, Surveys, Project and Studio
Software
Replaced: Spreadsheets and another ERP
Size of the company: 70
Hosting type: Odoo Online
Every vial of treatment product counts when it comes to saving lives. For the World Federation of Hemophilia (WFH), ensuring that life-saving treatments reach patients with hemophilia around the world is not just a mission: it’s a lifeline. Behind every successful shipment lies precision, traceability, and trust.
With Odoo, the WFH has transformed its humanitarian logistics into a seamless operation that supports over 35,000 patients across 78 countries, bringing the federation’s vision of “Treatment for All”, for a world where all people with inherited bleeding disorders have access to care, regardless of their type of bleeding disorder, gender, or where they live, closer to reality.
The WFH was established in 1963 by Frank Schnabel, a Canadian businessman born with severe hemophilia A. He believed that patient organizations could be much more effective and do more to represent the interests of people living with bleeding disorders if they worked together. The first WFH Congress was held in Copenhagen, Denmark, on June 25, 1963, and was attended by representatives from 12 countries. Now, the WFH and its global network of national member organizations (NMOs) represent the interests of people with hemophilia and other inherited bleeding disorders in 151 nations.
The WFH Humanitarian Aid Program works to improve the lives of people with inherited bleeding disorders (PWBDs), giving them a quality of life that previous generations would not have thought possible. The Program operates based on three key action pillars: supporting outreach and identification, improving quality of life, and enabling sustainable care. These pillars drive our main support activities: delivering donated factor and nonfactor replacement therapy, conducting training events and providing logistics support.
Since the expansion of the Humanitarian Aid Program in 2016, the WFH has become the largest distributor of donated treatment products in the world, providing tens of thousands of people living with a bleeding disorder access to care and allowing the introduction of prophylaxis and elective surgeries in dozens of countries around the world. Since the inception of the program in 1996, a total of 2.2+ billion of factor and 12.2+ million mg of non-factor replacement therapy have been donated worldwide.
"We are now providing treatment to help support close to 35,000 patients around the world. Our goal is to ensure that people with hemophilia everywhere have access to treatment, not just those in developed countries."
Before Odoo: Complex Logistics, Manual Systems, and Limited Visibility
Before adopting Odoo, the logistics of the WFH were handled through mostly manual processes: “They didn’t even use Excel,” recalls Ampartzidis. When he joined the organization over a decade ago, he immediately saw the need for a digital transformation.
"I practically told them this just won’t work at all. You can’t take a big operational step without proper software, without a solution that gives you KPIs, traceability, and proof of control.”
At the time, the organization managed one warehouse; today, there are three, all handling pharmaceutical products with serial and lot number traceability requirements. As donations grew, so did expectations from WFH partners, who required signed quality agreements and robust systems for tracking, compliance, and reporting.
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“You cannot sign a quality agreement with a pharmaceutical company without being able to prove that you know where the products are, where they are being shipped, and who is using them,” Ampartzidis notes.
The WFH first tried another ERP solution before transitioning to Odoo. The shift came after two years of struggling with software that wasn’t flexible enough for the organization’s unique needs.
Why Odoo Became the Right Solution
The WFH first heard about Odoo through a professional contact. “Somebody outside that we were talking with told me, ‘Look into Odoo,’” recalls Ampartzidis. That suggestion changed everything. Today, the organization runs the Odoo apps, all tailored to its humanitarian operations: CRM, Sales (which, in the case of the WFH, is used to manage donations), Purchase, Inventory, Quality, Surveys, and Project. That last module, for instance, has been customized to monitor workshops and capacity-building activities, expanding Odoo’s functionality beyond logistics.
Additionally, Odoo’s integration capabilities have enabled the WFH to connect with Power BI dashboards via API, making it easier to visualize data and share performance metrics across departments and with donors. The impact has been measurable. “It’s an improvement of 35%, mainly in time saved,” he explains. “We see fewer mistakes, and when they happen, it’s easier to find, locate, and fix them. You can do it yourself in a couple of minutes.”
Among all Odoo features, one stands out for Ampartzidis: Odoo Studio. “If my team needs a new field on the invoice or the packing list, I can go into the form, create it, and test it immediately. You don’t have to call someone or open a ticket. Some things you can easily fix on your own.”
That flexibility extends to the Contacts app, which allows the WFH to manage thousands of records (doctors, ministries of health, and patient organizations) across 76 countries. “It’s very clean and easy to understand,” he adds.
The Inventory module has been a game-changer in ensuring traceability of serial and lot numbers, while Quality helps the organization create and follow up on incidents and corrective actions. Combined, these modules allow the WFH to meet stringent pharmaceutical compliance standards while supporting global operations efficiently.
The ability to integrate with Power BI further enhances visibility. “Even if we don’t get the report directly from Odoo, we pull the data with other companies we’re working with, and it’s working fine,” says Ampartzidis.
What’s Next: Extending Traceability to Patients
Looking ahead, the WFH plans to expand its digital transformation by developing a patient-facing app that will allow individuals to monitor their treatment usage and connect directly to WFH’s supply data.
“Ideally, we want an end-to-end link: how much we have, how much we ship, how much is being used, and what’s the stock at the end user,” says Ampartzidis.
In parallel, the WFH aims to replicate its Odoo implementation model beyond India, where a partner organization already uses Odoo for inventory and will soon integrate accounting, into Egypt and other large countries.
"Now we have a case study. We did it, it worked, and anybody else would be interested in using the system too because then we get immediate visibility into how they’re doing their in-country distribution."
From Montreal to Mozambique, the work of the WFH is a testament to how technology can serve humanity. With Odoo, they’ve achieved traceability, compliance, and operational transparency, all critical in a field where every shipment can change a life. If your organization handles complex humanitarian logistics or health programs, Odoo can help you achieve the same clarity, flexibility, and control that powers the WFH vision of Treatment for All.
About the WFH Humanitarian Aid Program
The WFH Humanitarian Aid Program improves the lack of access to care and treatment by providing much-needed support for people with inherited bleeding disorders in developing countries. By providing patients with a more predictable and sustainable flow of humanitarian aid donations, the WFH Humanitarian Aid Program makes it possible for patients to receive consistent and reliable access to treatment and care.
None of this would be possible without the support of Sanofi and Sobi, their Founding Visionary Contributors; Bayer, CSL Behring and Roche, their Visionary Contributors; Grifols, their Leadership Contributor; and Takeda, their Contributor. To learn more about the WFH Humanitarian Aid Program, visit www.treatmentforall.org.
