Misc SAP Consulting Success Story Book

SAP CONSULTING SOLUTIONS FOR SUCCESS
SAP CONSULTING SOLUTIONS FOR SUCCESS DECEMBER 2003
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Manufacturing Industries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Alpha Copy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Aventis Pharma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Bharat Petroleum Corp. Ltd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Brose Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 CJ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 Codornu Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 Degussa AG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 Dow Corning Corp. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 Forbo Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Goodrich Corporation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64 Henkel Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 Infineon Technologies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Janssen-Cilag . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 Loewe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 Marico Industries Ltd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 Multibrs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92 NATO Helicopter Industries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 Philips Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 Ratiopharm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104 Royal Dutch/ Shell Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 Schwarz Pharma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 Swarovski . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
Contents
CONTENTS
Service Industries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 American Eagle Outfitters / The Childrens Place . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 Belgacom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130 Bell Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134 BKW FMB Energie AG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 Canada Post . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142 CenTrade . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Danone Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156 Fraport AG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 GASAG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166 is:energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170 LINZ AG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174 Metro Cash & Carry International GmbH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178 SFR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182 Tele Atlas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188 UTA Telekom AG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192 Financial & Public Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198 Banco Urquijo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200 Bank of Ireland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206 BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214 City of Biel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218 City of Ghent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222 Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture, and Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226 Hospital Britanico de Buenos Aires . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232 Hospital San Jos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236 HVB Real Estate Capital . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242 Interpolis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246 State of Berlin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250 University of Basel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254 University of Nebraska. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
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GOOD ADVICE
In these tough times, achieving lasting business success is far from easy. Decision makers need effective ways of managing change, minimizing business risks, maximizing ROI, and reducing TCO. This is where SAP Consulting comes in with the expert advice and assistance you need to master these and other challenges. As part of the SAP Customer Services Network (SAP CSN), SAP Consulting helps you derive maximum business value from your SAP systems today and in the future. Leveraging our industry- and solution-specific expertise, our extensive hands-on experience, and our partner network, we quickly and cost-effectively deliver the knowledge and solutions you need to succeed. SAP Consultings comprehensive services cover the entire solution life cycle from design and implementation through to operational support and ongoing business process optimization. Whats more, we provide a point of contact to all the other SAP CSN service offerings, as well as to SAP developers and partners. And our network of over 9,000 consultants and some 120,000 certified partners ensures truly global reach. But theres more to SAP Consulting than simply delivering services. In line with SAP CSNs vision of empowerment, we help you to achieve real selfsufficiency through knowledge transfer and proven best practices. This puts you firmly in the drivers seat, enabling you to establish the in-house skills and structures needed to support your SAP environment yourself cost-effectively, flexibly, and securely. This selection of recent customer success stories demonstrates how SAP Consulting has helped businesses around the world succeed. We are sure you will find this insight into our customers experiences relevant to the challenges you face. Sincerely,
Henning Kagermann Chairman and CEO of SAP AG
Richard Stewart Senior Vice President, SAP Consulting
Introduction
ALL THE ADVICE YOULL EVER NEED
SAP Consultings portfolio of services delivers expert advice and assistance across the entire life cycle of SAP solutions. From initial analysis and design through planning and implementation to ongoing operations, migrations, and upgrades, our services make sure you get the most out of your IT investment. In the first phase of a project, SAP consultants work hand in hand with you to plan and develop a strategy that is aligned with your companys goals. We also offer expert assessments and returnon-investment analyses, enabling you to pinpoint where IT investments will deliver the greatest value. By leveraging SAPs consulting expertise at an early stage, you benefit from made-tomeasure solutions that deliver the results you want. During the implementation proper, our consultants put your strategies into practice designing your specific business processes and solution architecture and rolling them out to your organization. Once your solution is in place, SAP Consulting provides ongoing process optimization to help you meet changing business requirements. Moreover, we offer cutting-edge services to review the quality and risk of any SAP implementation project regardless of whether it was led by SAP. With SAP Consulting, you have a point of contact to SAP developers, certified partners, and the comprehensive range of cutting-edge services from the SAP Customer Services Network (SAP CSN), including custom development, education, and ongoing support. Our portfolio comprises four seamlessly integrated core offerings, which are described on the following pages.
Introduction
THE FOUR KEY ELEMENTS OF OUR PORTFOLIO
Our four-pronged approach delivers the expertise you require at all stages of the life cycle of SAP solutions.
SAP STRATEGIC CONSULTING SERVICES: START AS YOU MEAN TO GO ON
Even the very best software cannot deliver true value if it is not closely aligned with your specific strategy and processes which is why you need sound analysis, planning, and design from the word go. Business and IT Strategy Consulting: Set Course for Success Our business and IT strategy consultants assist you with: Defining and fine-tuning your enterprises long-term strategy Aligning your IT landscape with your business strategy Planning effective business process optimization Business and Value Assessment: Pinpoint Value and Avoid Risk SAP Consulting enables you to connect investments to your specific needs. Our experienced consultants and certified partners work closely with you to: Develop a quantified value proposition for your IT investment Show precisely what will happen as a result of introducing new software or processes Present executives with a solid business case and governance model for proposed projects Assess potential risks by closely analyzing the IT solutions behind your key business processes and propose concrete action to mitigate risks Detail your actual IT costs, reveal key cost drivers and their causes, and provide a solid basis for cost-reduction decisions Identify areas for improvement, outline alternative approaches to reduce inefficiencies, and provide you with a clear picture of initial investment, total cost of ownership (TCO), and potential return on investment (ROI)
Introduction
SAP SOLUTION DELIVERY SERVICES: GET YOUR SOFTWARE UP AND RUNNING QUICKLY AND COST-EFFECTIVELY
SAP Consulting helps ensure that implementations are completed on time, within budget, and according to your expectations. Our experts provide advice on roll-out strategies, system architecture, systems integration, implementations, custom-specific development, and more. Solution and Architecture Planning/Solution Design: Plan for Success To match your solution precisely to your business, SAP Consulting can: Plan and design solutions to support your specific objectives Plan and design the right system architecture Develop an effective globalization and multinational strategy Create a detailed blueprint of your business processes to maximize the benefits of SAP implementation Make specific recommendations to ensure that your IT environment is robust, flexible, and scalable and that it delivers the functionality you require Solution Implementation: Master the Challenge of Introducing New Software SAP Consulting provides assistance throughout the implementation phase. Our services include: Expert configuration and testing, tailoring solutions to meet the precise needs of your organization Technical installation services that translate your technical blueprint into actual system settings A dedicated supply chain management service that is specifically designed to streamline critical supply chain management (SCM) projects Integration and Development: Link and Enhance Your Processes and Solutions Custom development and seamless integration of processes, applications, and technology can contribute significantly to achieving your business goals. We help you to: Develop and integrate truly made-to-measure solutions with custom programming Significantly reduce the time and cost involved in migrating legacy data Integrate your company-specific software with SAP and non-SAP solutions Deployment: Put It All Together To ensure that your system delivers the results you want in day-to-day operation, we: Review all aspects of your implementation prior to go-live Give you the tools and information you need to maximize the performance of your infrastructure following go-live Perform remote consulting to deliver rapid, cost-effective support from SAP experts
Introduction
SAP OPERATIONS SERVICES: ENABLE YOUR SOLUTION TO GROW AND ADAPT WITH YOUR NEEDS
In a fast-moving business world, change is the name of the game. With SAP Consulting, you have a partner who is committed to ongoing improvement. Our operations services encompass IT and key business drivers, helping you to quickly and effectively optimize your live systems and master the challenge of change. Solution Optimization: Boost Performance and Maximize Value Once your solution is up and running, SAP Consulting enables you to get the very best out of it by: Assessing the value of your live SAP solution and making sure it delivers the expected cost benefits and business improvements Assisting you with the standardization and management of your data Streamlining your business processes and maximizing the ROI of your SAP solution Proactively identifying and eliminating technical issues in your IT environment Evolution: Take Your Solutions to the Next Level Sooner or later, upgrading is an issue for every organization. To ensure that your changeover delivers maximum business benefit with minimum hassle, we provide specialized advice and support to: Upgrade your applications Ensure that your IT infrastructure grows with your business Smoothly migrate your SAP operating system and database to new platforms Handle the transition from SAP R/2 to SAP R/3 System Landscape Optimization: Match Your IT to the Challenges of Tomorrow To align your IT solutions with your business strategy and reduce the complexity of your systems, it is sometimes necessary to make significant changes to your system landscape. During such projects, our experts: Help you adapt your IT landscape to changes in your organization Address the complex issues involved in major changes to your IT environment Convert and harmonize data within your SAP solutions
Introduction
SAP LIFE-CYCLE MANAGEMENT SERVICES: TOTAL COVERAGE
The life cycle of a solution comprises many and varied challenges. We deliver expert, end-to-end support across all phases in the deployment and operation of your SAP software. Our consultants help you control quality and risk, handle organizational development and change, and successfully manage your IT projects and programs. Quality and Risk Management: Check That Your Project Is on Track and Keep It There SAP Consulting leverages its experience and expertise to provide you with effective quality and risk management. We ensure that your project achieves your strategic and operational objectives by: Identifying and managing the risks of your IT implementation Accurately assessing and enhancing the level of security of your SAP landscape Reviewing the progress of your IT project Monitoring the technical design of your IT solution Organizational Development and Change: Achieve the Results You Want Fast We work closely with you to implement changes smoothly and effectively. Our consultants assist you with aligning your IT infrastructure with your strategic initiatives and managing changes and enhancements to your IT infrastructure. Program and Project Management: Keep Tabs on Even the Most Complex Tasks When it comes to managing your IT projects, SAP Consulting provides a combination of strategic and tactical implementation services, as well as advice and insight. Our experts: Help you to monitor multiple program goals, anticipate problems, and increase the effectiveness of complex solution programs Give you access to expert advice and proven leadership throughout your SAP project Provide a single point of contact who understands your technical needs, and gives you ongoing reviews and feedback
SAP CONSULTING: YOUR GLOBAL CONSULTING EXPERTS
When you opt for SAP Consulting, you decide the role you want us to play. We can lead your project, share responsibility with partners, or provide targeted services and expertise ourselves. And because effective knowledge transfer is at the heart of our philosophy, you can count on acquiring the skills you require to take control of your IT solutions. With more than 9,000 consultants and 120,000 certified partners worldwide, we provide the truly global coverage todays companies require to succeed. To find out more, visit our Web site at http://www.sap.com/services/consulting.
Introduction
10 Manufacturing Industries
MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES
Manufacturing Industries 11
ALPHA COPY
ALPHA COPY ADDS THE mySAP CRM SOLUTION TO ITS SAP R/3 SYSTEM
Alpha Copy, a growing company, needs reliable software that is scalable enough to support its development. SAP software provides the scalability that Alpha Copy needs. Beginning with SAP R/3 for ERP, the company went on to implement mySAP CRM, to give it flexibility, better customer service, price-list control, and competitive advantage.
Founded in Greece in 1984 as a distributor of Minolta office equipment, Alpha Copy provides products and services for mobile telecommunications, digital office automation, digital satellite television, and in-room technology for the hospitality industry. The company has expanded its activities, becoming the exclusive Nokia distributor in Greece and vastly increasing its network of service and support centers in Greece, Cyprus, and Balkan countries.
BUSINESS CHALLENGE
Alpha Copy strives to offer prompt market supply of quality products and services while ensuring customer satisfaction in every business sector of interest. The company treats partners as extensions of its business, contributing to their goals for achievement and success. As its markets and business expand, Alpha Copys main concern is that, together with its partners, it can continue to offer efficient service that leads to customer satisfaction before, during, and after sales. In order to support its development plans, Alpha Copy chose to implement the SAP R/3 System for ERP in 1999. With SAP R/3, the company automated its accounting, sales, distribution, and human resources department functions. Following that, in order to support new customers, maintain central control, and meet ambitious goals for speed, flexibility, and reliable customer service, Alpha Copy required an information system to cover its new territories.
SAP SOLUTION
The upgrade to mySAP Business Suite solutions was based on the long-term, successful operation of SAP R/3 and its scalability to add components according to the growth requirements of the company. Alpha Copy implemented the mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) solution, utilizing these capabilities: e-selling, customer service and support (service request management and knowledge management), and e-services (self-help services and complaint management). With mySAP CRM, Alpha Copy set the following goals: Attain full visibility of its partners Offer its partners immediate and complete information over the Internet about every aspect of business, such as order and financial statements Allow its partners to enter the orders into Alpha Copys system and keep partners updated on current prices Provide after-sales service that allows entry, monitoring, and processing of any customer problem, whether it is communicated via the Internet, call center, fax, or Web shop visit Allow the organization of service and spare parts Serve Alpha Copys trading partners via the Internet, by offering them the option to work with an advanced, computerized system without requiring any partner investment Provide exact, real-time information concerning existing problems and their status quo to the company, its partners, and Nokia Optimize the efforts of existing personnel to collect the maximum information with minimum data entry Provide user-friendly interaction and ensure scalability as the company grows
BENEFITS
The following benefits that Alpha Copy expected to achieve by implementing mySAP CRM are now visible throughout the value chain of the company. E-Selling Initially Alpha Copy faced problems concerning reply time and service to its partners. With the e-selling capability, partners place orders on their own systems via the Internet and receive immediate information concerning availability, special prices, photographs, technical features, and order verification. That way, Alpha Copys personnel saves the time of entering orders received by fax, and mistakes are eliminated. Also, promoting products to partners is made easier by pop-up screens that are now automatically displayed when data is entered in the system. mySAP CRM has improved Alpha Copys communication with its partners and foreign branches. Mr. Nikos Kyriazis, financial controller of Alpha Copy, says, With [the] e-selling solution we can now serve them immediately and efficiently. There is no need for phone calls to be informed about a price, or information regarding their financial sheet or an order.
We have literally expanded our system to their companies through the Internet. After having secured a smooth and effective flow of everyday working activities, our personnel can now devote time to helping our partners solve important matters, which demand extra attention. In addition, our partners can now place orders in the system on their own, can be updated on availability, and can modify the order accordingly, while mistakes are eliminated. Complaint Management The complaint management capability enables Alpha Copy to record and monitor all customer complaints and requests and see them through to resolution. According to Kyriazis, With the complaint management [capability] we can systematically process all requests made by our customers. There are no longer forgotten problems or misunderstandings. Everything is recorded, while our customers can reach us by all modern means of communication telephone, fax, Internet, or a visit to one of our centers. Since everything is recorded, Alpha Copy is able to draw valuable statistics concerning the most frequent problems and to prevent them, as well as to communicate the information to Nokia to aid in product development. With mySAP CRM, Alpha Copy provides added value to its customers, partners, and suppliers.
Knowledge Management and Self-Help With the knowledge management and self-help services capabilities, question and answer information related to customer problems and queries is available to anyone concerned. Customers can access this capability directly through the Internet, or indirectly through the customer care line of Alpha Copy. E-Service E-service capability enables Alpha Copys partners to post service notifications directly to the central database, via the Internet. Now, if a device needs to be repaired at headquarters, no additional customer and partner data entry is needed. Entry time at headquarters is substantially reduced and wrong shipments are avoided. Kyriazis says: In the past, it took our partners about 45 minutes to enter about 50 devices. Our employees were obligated to reenter all data concerning the consumer device along with partners data. Entry mistakes or wrong shippings were noted many times. With service notification [capabilities], our partner enters the data and the description of the problem directly in our system. With mySAP CRM, the companys partners do not need to invest in software, and mistakes and misunderstandings are eliminated. Service Request Management With the service request management capability, Alpha Copys partners and personnel can monitor the repair process, job history, and spare parts used in a device. In addition, by using the pop-up screen, a technician is directly informed whether or not the warranty for the device has been extended. Kyriazis says, After-sales service is an important criterion for attracting new customers as well as keeping old customers satisfied. The cellular phone is a necessary device for its user. In contrast with other products, the customer must be able to solve his problem if possible within an hour. In order for that to happen, an exemplary solution for the service organization is also required as well as the companys commitment. With the capabilities offered to us by the service request management [function], our after-sales service ranks first in the Greek market by far.
Results The purchase and use of SAP software at Alpha Copy has scaled according to the growth of the company. Kyriazis says, In the beginning, SAP appeared immense to us. It offers many and new possibilities that may scare users away. Soon enough though, SAP [software] proved user-friendly. We started off with a very small investment. Soon we established the potentials and the advantages offered to us. To this end, SAP consultants played a significant role they acted and still act with professional courtesy, responsibility, and efficiency by offering us an exemplary application and proper guidance for our expansion. SAP empowers our personnel and helps Alpha Copy achieve its goals.
THE NEXT STEPS
AT A GLANCE
Hardware platform Operating system Database Number of users Compaq Microsoft Windows NT Oracle 50
The next stage for Alpha Copy will be to expand the use of mySAP CRM by implementing the business-to-consumer (B2C) capability, which is expected to improve partner and end-customer service even further. Moreover, it will help the companys marketing strategy and will reduce sales cycles, leading to savings of money and resources as well as greater customer and partner satisfaction. Alpha Copy is also planning to leverage structural data of mySAP Business Suite solutions, beginning with warehouse management capabilities for better logistic organization. Furthermore, the company will invest in the mySAP Business Intelligence solution to enable it to provide ample and direct reports from the system to higher administration, leading to faster decision making.
AVENTIS PHARMA ENTRUSTS SAP WITH UPGRADE

With a turnover of 4.79 billion, Aventis Pharma is the leading player in Frances pharmaceutical sector. A satisfied user of SAP R/3 since 2001, the company turned to SAP Consulting to help it upgrade to SAP R/3 Enterprise. In a comprehensive study, the consultants presented a clear assessment of the risks involved, and highlighted important improvements to be made to the companys export sales application. Aventis Pharma gave the project a green light.
With a turnover of 4.79 billion, 11% of the market share, and approximately 13,500 employees, pharmaceutical giant Aventis Pharma is no stranger to SAP software. Weve been using SAP since the beginning of 2001 for our financials system, called Diapason (1,500 users), and for managing our export sales (150 users), which we call Mercury, explains Patricia Brebion, head of IS finance at Frances leading player in the pharmaceutical sector. At the end of 2002, we decided to upgrade our SAP R/3 4.6B for two major reasons. First, this version would no longer be maintained by SAP as of 2004. Second, we wanted to standardize our various SAP applications and facilitate integration. Whether global, such as GOAL (the ERP application used by 23 countries in Europe) and CORE (system for managing finished product plants), or local, such as GIRHAF (Aventis Frances computerized HR management system), our recent applications in fact implement SAP R/3 Enterprise. Aventis Pharma wanted an external service provider to help it define an upgrade strategy, assess the risks involved (functional and technical), and determine deadlines, costs, and resource requirements, as well as potential benefits. The companys main focus included replacing its in-house solution for managing export sales with SAP standard software and then adapting it to the new pharmaceutical standard CRF21-Part 11 handled perfectly by SAP R/3 Enterprise. We didnt hesitate to call in SAP Consulting. Logically speaking, SAP consultants are in the best position to have detailed knowledge of the different versions and the improvements between them. In addition, we already had the opportunity to experience their skill and high degree of industry and product expertise.
In March 2003, Aventis Pharma signed with SAP for a tightly packed 26-day-long project that involved five consultants from SAP Consulting: two functional experts, a technical development expert, a technical architect, and a coordinator. The team defined the upgrade strategy, taking into account the various interfaces (84 inbound interfaces in total) and other technical aspects. In the final phase, the team made recommendations for system optimization, created a detailed schedule, and provided the company with an initial estimate of the costs and a basic plan of action.
IN-DEPTH STUDY
To ensure the project went as smoothly as possible, SAP experts conducted 24 interviews with a score of Aventis Pharma employees, selected for their business expertise (accounts payable or accounts receivable, fixed assets, direct sales, and so on) or information system skills. We all appreciated the SAP consultants capacity for listening and analyzing our varied requirements, underscores Brebion. Many of us werent sure if a thorough study could be conducted in so short a time. And yet, the study proved to be extremely detailed and pertinent. It confirmed the estimated deadlines/costs/resources that had been established by our IS finance team, gave a precise and clear assessment of the risks involved, and, as we had strongly expected, highlighted important improvements to be made to the export sales application.
These improvements included, for example, the implementation of SAP R/3 Enterprise foreign-trade processing functions, which would replace the companys homegrown Mercury application. The study also showed the possibility of automating
SAP consultants are in the best position to have detailed knowledge of the different versions and the improvements between them. In addition, we already had the opportunity to experience their skill and high degree of industry and product expertise.
Patricia Brebion, Head of IS Finance, Aventis Pharma
certain manual processing tasks (transport time management) and of adopting the best pharmaceutical practices specified by CFR21-Part 11. It also identified improvements that could be made to the companys financials system (better invoice checking, automation of bank reconciliation, use of cash pooling, mass transfer of fixed assets, and so on).
AN EASIER SELL WITH SAP
AT A GLANCE
Assignment Comprehensive upgrade study (SAP R/3 4.6B to SAP R/3 Enterprise) 2 applications for financial accounting and export sales 26 days
Thanks to SAP Consulting, Aventis Pharma managed to successfully migrate Diapason (without having to adapt functionality) and Mercury (which involved some improvements) by the end of spring 2003. The project involved multiple software integrators, as well as SAP experts. Still in progress, the project is running according to the strict schedule recommended in the study. Its very hard to sell a migration project to general management or to employees, says Brebion. Its price tag does not offer any highly visible improvement in terms of service, unlike the implementation of a new module, for example, and the risks involved are not nil. However, having the SAP stamp on our upgrade and the benefit of an expert view did a lot to help promote the project within the company, reduce fear of risks, and convince users of the potential benefits.
Functional scope
Duration Number of SAP consultants
BHARAT PETROLEUM CORP. LTD.

BHARAT PETROLEUM CHOOSES SAP SOLUTION MANAGER TO ENHANCE KNOWLEDGE AND SUPPORT ITS CUSTOMER SUPPORT CENTER
Bharat Petroleum, the $9.5 billion petroleumrefining and marketing company, was the first public-sector oil company in India to implement SAP R/3 cross-industry solutions, along with software from the SAP for Oil & Gas portfolio. The company chose SAP Solution Manager, which offers all the tools, content, and methodologies a company needs to implement and optimize its SAP solutions. With enhanced user knowledge, employees have become more efficient and professional which has helped increase Bharats competitive edge.
When Indias Bharat Petroleum Corp. Ltd. (BPCL) deployed the SAP R/3 enterprise-wide resource planning solution the infrastructure backbone of mySAP Business Suite across 337 locations within 16 months, the $9.5 billion petroleumrefining and marketing company needed a robust, integrated approach to support and enhance the expertise of its 3,000-plus SAP users. Based in Mumbai, Bharat Petroleum was the first public-sector oil company in India to implement enterprise-wide resourceplanning solutions, along with software from the SAP for Oil & Gas portfolio. Whats more, the implementation project claimed the further distinction of being the largest and most ambitious SAP project in India. To deliver high-quality support and enhance its user knowledge base and business processes supported by the SAP solutions throughout the organization, BPCL established an SAP competency center (CC), which is far more than a backend help desk. BPCL recognized very early that the knowledge levels of users who were suddenly exposed to a process-based system needed to improve dramatically, says Shrikant Gathoo, general manager for enterprise-wide transformation at Bharat. We needed a supporting structure, process, and tool to make this happen. To address these issues, Bharat Petroleum implemented SAP Solution Manager which functions as the technology backbone to integrate a companys internal support organization, its users, and SAP services. Knowledge development, and not just issue resolution, was the key driver for implementing SAP Solution Manager in BPCL, says Gathoo.
CUSTOMER-FOCUSED REORGANIZATION
As a leader in many of its markets, Bharat Petroleum faced price deregulation and stiff competition from several players, two of them being government-owned firms. Anticipating these developments well in advance, BPCL embarked on a restructuring program that culminated in the formation of
Knowledge development, and not just issue resolution, was the key driver for implementing SAP Solution Manager in BPCL.
Shrikant Gathoo, General Manager for Enterprise-wideTransformation, Bharat
a more customer-focused organization. We realized that success can only come with a total reorientation and change in approach, with customers as the focal point, says Gathoo. Increasing globalization, new products and services, and innovative marketing have resulted in very market-savvy consumers. Bharat Petroleum has taken radical steps to keep itself attuned to the changing times, realizing that the future belongs to those who listen and adapt to their customers. The change in strategy underscored the companys need for a highly reliable, versatile, integrated solution. At that time, BPLC operated disparate legacy systems, which resulted in isolated islands of data. Simply put, the software could not keep pace with the companys growth. The transaction volumes have grown manifold from a few thousand in the early 90s, says Gathoo.
Once it had developed its strategic plan, the company began to evaluate enterprise business systems. After a cross-sectional team comprised of IT staff and company managers performed a critical analysis of several solutions, BPCL chose SAP. The team found that SAP provided the integration and flexibility Bharat Petroleum needed. SAPs local presence in India, which was critical to BPCL, proved to be another influencing factor in its choice of software. At the time, Bharat Petroleum also decided to implement SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW), a component of SAP Business Intelligence, a key offering within the SAP NetWeaver integration and application platform.
AGGRESSIVE IMPLEMENTATION PLAN
With an aggressive implementation plan and tight deadlines, BPCL faced several challenges: for example, it needed to support and map complex business processes existing in geographically dispersed locations and develop an IT network for online transacting. The success of the implementation depended on effective user training and proper support for employees from the moment of go-live. Enter the SAP CC. The center not only helped BPLC achieve quick deployment and user acceptance and respond to emerging issues, it helped extend knowledge across the entire enterprise.
BPCL carefully planned and executed its rollout of the SAP solutions by establishing four regional teams, with the support of SAP Consulting as project leader. Due to the close cooperation of SAP Customer Services Network members, including account managers and employees from SAP Active Global Support and SAP Global Custom Development Services, BPCL met its requirements quickly and efficiently. The rollout team members assisted users at each location, spending some 20 days at each one. A central team located at BPCLs Mumbai headquarters held responsibility for several prerollout tasks, including determining each sites unique process requirements to ensure the appropriate system configuration, uploading master data, determining necessary resources following the rollout, and planning and executing user training. The team also handled cutover activities such as stock and cash uploads, and provided remote support following deployment. Almost 20 locations at a time (the peak volume involved more than 30) went live every month after the initial rollout. The competency center played a critical role in supporting these locations after the rollout team members left.
FIVE AREAS OF FOCUS
The competency center was comprised of five teams that focused on process, configuration and development, user authorization, master data exchange, and training and change management. As the single point of contact for the entire organization, the process team supported existing processes, dealt with changes, and identified and implemented process improvements and controls. The configuration and development team had overall control of the SAP system; it maintained existing developments and configurations, and handled changes and improvements, transport controls, hot-pack upgrades, SAPs online support follow-up service, performance
Our objective is to enable the spread of knowledge using SAP Solution Manager as a self-service tool, so users can find solutions to repetitive or typical problems. . . . [SAP Solution Manager] has certainly made us more competitive.
Shrikant Gathoo, General Manager for Enterprise-wide Transformation, Bharat
tuning, optimization, and all product-related issues. The authorization team was responsible for creating authorization profiles for the various roles. The fourth team held responsibility for updating the various master data.
This team worked on mutually negotiated (with the businesses) time lines for updating data. The training and change-management team became deeply involved in the maintenance of skills and competencies within the competency center as well as the user community within the organization. The change management team focused on building total reliability of the system. BPCL chose to have an SAP expert in each location to help with any issues that might arise. One key user, called a location anchor (LA), was chosen at each rollout site and became highly conversant with the various business processes. The LAs helped resolve issues and functioned as key knowledge-transfer agents, remaining closely involved with both the CC and the 505 SAP Solution Manager users at 342 locations. The knowledge capital developed through the SAP implementation was very valuable, not merely in terms of SAP product knowledge, but, most importantly, in supporting and providing end-to-end quality business solutions at the pace needed in the fastchanging business environment, says Gathoo.
EMPOWERING KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER
In order to deploy knowledge across the enterprise while supporting users, BPCL needed an efficient technology solution to help it address and document issues, deliver timely responses and satisfactory service, track business process performance, and provide early warning and exception reports. In-house solutions such as e-mail folders could not meet BPCLs requirements. Thats where SAP Solution Manager came in. We chose SAP Solution Manager based on the fact that it suited our working environment completely, says Gathoo.
In April 2002, BPCL implemented SAP Solution Manager. Today, it integrates the content, solutions, and methods the company needs to implement, support, and operate its industry-specific and cross-industry software. As the technological backbone of the competency center, SAP Solution Manager helps BPCL detect critical issues in its core business processes before problems develop. Moreover, it provides user support, an internal solution database, and search capabilities through a link to SAP Service Marketplace and SAP remote support. An example: an LA enters a request by generating a notification from the SAP R/3 System, which automatically attaches relevant
SAP is very professional in its approach and ensures timely response to its clients. . . . We look forward to partnering with SAP to provide us with complete solutions for our industry.
Shrikant Gathoo, General Manager for Enterprise-wide Transformation, Bharat
information such as screen data, transaction code, program reference, and so on. The problem request is then transferred to the production server, which logs the issue into SAP Solution Manager. A CC employee allocates the issue to the appropriate support person, who responds within the agreed-upon timelines. The CC then closes the issue. However, the user can reopen the issue if the solution to the problem proves ineffective. Overall, BPCL has experienced great success with SAP Solution Manager. And as a result, the company made plans to implement SAP Solution Manager at every BPCL unit by the end of 2002. Bharat Petroleum also reaped the benefits of the integrated system in many areas of its operations, for example, tracking customer receivables and monitoring credit and inventory management.
And, aside from implementing upgrades of SAP Solution Manager, BPCL wants to use other features of the software. Our objective is to enable the spread of knowledge using SAP Solution Manager as a self-service tool, so users can find solutions to repetitive or typical problems, says Gathoo. BPCLs unique approach earned the company recognition from SAP, which certified the petroleum companys standards. In fact, BPCL became the first oil and gas customer in the South Asia Pacific region to obtain this certification.
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE
AT A GLANCE
Software
SAP Solution Manager SAP R/3 Software from

SAP for Oil & Gas portfolio SAP BW
Hardware
Hewlett-Packard; IBM Intel Server HP-UX, Windows NT, Linux Oracle 3,100 (SAP R/3); 600 (SAP BW) 7 months (SAP Solution Manager)
Operating system
Database Number of users
SAP Solution Manager has brought a wealth of benefits to Bharat Petroleum. It has certainly helped us become more competitive, says Gathoo. By enhancing the know-how of users and their use of the overall SAP e-business solution, employees have become more efficient and professional. Our multipronged efforts are designed to create competitive advantage by turning users into knowledge workers, Gathoo notes. For example, armed with more knowledge, employees at BPCL can now deliver better customer service, partly because the quality and completeness of transactions have improved substantially. And through the use of query tools and notes, employees can provide vital feedback to help improve activity planning, training, related processes, and so on. Plus, the elimination of many redundant tasks helps the company increase the strength of its field sales staff by enabling them to provide more personalized attention to customers all of which leads to greater customer satisfaction. The company also expects to obtain a return on its $18 million technology investment within three years. According to Gathoo, the SAP experience has been nothing short of positive. SAP is very professional in its approach and ensures timely response to its clients, says Gathoo. Business scenarios and requirements change fast and the dependency on SAP support and product development is also increasing daily. We look forward to partnering with SAP to provide us with complete solutions for our industry.
Length of implementation Implementation partner
SAP India Pvt. Ltd.
BROSE GROUP
JUST-IN-SEQUENCE SOLUTION WITH SAP FOR AUTOMOTIVE SUPPORTS LEANER, MORE COST-EFFECTIVE MANUFACTURING PROCESSES
The Brose Group, a worldwide supplier to the automotive industry, is setting standards in just-in-sequence (JIS) production. Each component reaches the customer at the right time, in the right sequence, and in the appropriate version. Based on the industry solution SAP for Automotive, JIS processing is being implemented at various Brose locations in line with its global rollout. The result: inventory levels are never overstocked, processes are leaner, and customers enjoy customized configurations.
Automobiles are no longer developed and assembled by the manufacturer in their entirety. In todays market, the majority of components and parts come from suppliers who are also taking responsibility for an increasing number of tasks in production, development, and logistics, which were previously owned by the manufacturer. Thats where the core competencies of the Brose Group come into play as a worldwide supplier to the automotive industry for window regulators, door systems, seat adjusters, and closure systems. The Brose Group has approximately 7,000 employees involved in developing, designing, producing, and supplying highly intelligent mechanic and electronic systems in 26 locations across the world. The business volume of the Brose Group more than doubled to 1.8 billion from 1996 through 2002, and this growth was accompanied by a significant expansion in justin-sequence (JIS) production. To make sure that the assembly process runs efficiently, the right components and assemblies must always be in the right place at the right time or as the industry calls it just-in-time (JIT). Another aligned process is just-in-sequence (JIS) delivery, which takes into account the correct sequence of components. In a highly complex manufacturing process that can include over 5,000 individual parts to make up a car, integrating JIS can make a significant difference in process control. For this reason, Brose began production using SAP for JIS processing in 1999 at its first plant; now production plants are being put into operation virtually in series. This has been made possible by the standardization of the IT environment, which began approximately three and a half years ago with the implementation of SAP R/3.
In light of our rapid growth, our heterogeneous IT environment was no longer able to meet our demands, especially as we opened new locations, says Christian Ley, department manager of the logistics central application system at Brose. Broses international orientation meant that only a global IT partner would be considered and one with proven know-how and a mature integrated solution. We knew when we decided on SAP that we had found a partner that understands the automotive market. We rely on a partner that is open to innovation, not just for JIS production, but also to implement other new processes, such as e-commerce, or sequenced delivery schedules for the supplier, Ley explains. SAP Consulting provided first-hand knowledge of SAP solutions. This decision proved to be strategic: Through the close cooperation between SAP Consulting, product development, and support, we now have an IT solution that secures our investment in the long-term, explains Uwe Herold, Brose IT manager.
JIS USING SAP FOR AUTOMOTIVE
JIS was originally implemented as a pilot project at a new plant in the Brazilian city of Curitiba. The pilot project set the standards for the whole company, because in this plant, one solution was able to map all processes for the first time. Christian Ley says: We wanted to implement an integrated and flexible JIS solution, which was capable of handling multiple languages. Other locations were to profit from the IT architecture tested in Curitiba. Today, this architecture is the master prototype for all other rollouts. The aim was to create a best-of-breed solution for the rapidly expanding supplier. Therefore, Brose and SAP joined forces to develop a tailor-made JIS module.
This module is integrated in SAP for Automotive, which for Curitiba includes SAP solutions for sales and distribution, materials management, production planning, quality management, financial accounting, and controlling. Ley explains why this software is especially suited to be the basis for the worldwide implementation of JIS processes: It is up-todate, flexible, and standardized. The master prototype developed in Brazil is now being rolled out systematically at the individual production plants. Visualize our prototype as being
We knew when we decided on SAP that we had found a partner that understands the automotive market. We rely on a partner that is open to innovation, not just for JIS production, but also to implement other new processes, such as e-commerce, or sequenced delivery schedules for the supplier.
Christian Ley, Logistics Department Manager, Brose Group
modular, says Ley. If we build a new plant or migrate to an existing one, we have approximately 100 maximum processes to choose from. We combine these according to a standardized plan. The master prototype contains numerous processes for the purchase order alone from the Internet purchase order for office material to the procurement of serial parts. The characteristics that are specific to each customer or country determine the maximum processes that are chosen in the end, or whether additional development is required.
BROSE AND SAP: JOINT EFFORTS LEAD TO OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT
Brose and SAP employees jointly developed the prototype under the project management of SAP Consulting. The SAP consultants provided implementation support and process consulting, which also covered technical queries, and carried out end-user training. Thanks to the project experience of the SAP specialists, the project adhered to schedule and budget. Christof Lutz, SAP project manager, says: Our consultants and the Brose experts worked openly, flexibly, and constructively together.
In this atmosphere of trust, we created an implementation module that the customer can use as a basis for the long term. A fixed team of Brose employees is responsible for the implementation project worldwide. This team consists of IT experts and key users, who carry out the analysis and implementation, before familiarizing the users with the processes. We place a high value on developing know-how internally; after all, our employees have to be able to deal with the system confidently after going live, without having to rely on outside help, says Ley. Moreover, the IT projects at the supplier provide an opportunity for personal development and employee advancement. In the meantime, the implementation team can look back on a run of successes. The rollout strategy proved itself last year with a project duration of six months in Puebla, Mexico. The implementation time in Meerane, Germany, was reduced even further to 19 weeks. The plant went live with the solution in November 2001, and now serves as the model for JIS production at Brose.
KEEP IT SIMPLE
AT A GLANCE
Company name Industry Challenge Brose Group Automotive Improve assembly processes by adopting just-in-sequence methodology
Implementation partner Solutions
SAP Consulting
Implementation highlights
SAP for Automotive with JIS solution SAP R/3 JIS rolled out globally to Brose plants Succeeding rollout Reduced cycle time,
implementation times dropped from 6 months to 19 weeks
Benefits
The policy for the Meerane plant is keep it simple. Ley explains, Production is extremely customer-related, and synchronized with the production of the manufacturer we supply. For example, the assembly of a door system starts at the same time as the production of the corresponding vehicle. The call for the doors takes place electronically at Brose. The workers on the assembly line use the printout of the production order as an assembly plan. The required variants of vehicle doors are assembled on four assembly lines and delivered only a short time after completion a time-critical but extremely lean process.
It is up-to-date, flexible, and standardized.
Christian Ley, Logistics Department Manager, Brose Group
inventory, and operational costs Flexible solution that can be individually tailored for customers One solution was able to map all processes for the first time
The employees need the SAP system only when a transport rack is completely full to trigger inventory postings and shipping processes. In this way, the production workers contact with the SAP system is reduced to a minimum. Sticking to the essentials is therefore an indispensable ingredient in Broses recipe for success. This is true for the individual JIS plants, as well as for the whole rollout strategy, which has the project name speed: speed is gained by traveling with lightweight baggage.
mySAP SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AT CJ

ADDRESSING SUPPLY CHAIN PERFORMANCE ACROSS A DIVERSE CONSUMER-GOODS PORTFOLIO
Formerly known as Cheil Jedang, CJ is the largest food company in Korea. The company also engages in a diversified set of business activities including pharmaceuticals, entertainment media, home shopping, and logistics. CJ had fiscal year 2001 revenues of 1.96 trillion Korean won ($1.70 billion) and currently employs 4,000 people, has 11 manufacturing facilities, and comprises 29 domestic affiliates and a network of overseas investments. CJ was initially established in 1953 as a sugar refinery. The company has since grown to lead the Korean food market, maintaining its 48% share of domestic sugar sales, developing its brands images, and emphasizing flour, cooking oil, seasonings, and processed foods. Through the application of innovative biofermentation technology, CJ has become a world leader in the production of food and animal feed additives. CJ is also working to apply its synthesis and fermentation expertise to broaden its range of medicines. In 1993, CJ was spun off from the Samsung Group. The company subsequently pursued additional commercial activities such as entertainment and home shopping, laying a foundation for global growth through diversification, brand development, research investment, and management independence. Though CJ had built a foundation of diversified businesses through the 1990s, the company was adversely affected by the Asian economic crisis toward the end of the decade. About 25% of CJs total revenue is spent on imported materials, and the devaluation of the Korean won substantially increased raw-material costs and reduced competitiveness. Moreover, demand was reduced in CJs core Korean markets, lowering revenue and further slowing the momentum the company had achieved to fund research, advertising, and other growthgenerating programs.
While the economic situation in Korea had caused a reduction in profitability, CJ saw the downturn as an opportunity to focus on its core competencies and invest for long-term growth. CJ diverged from the more conservative, cost-focused paths chosen by its rivals and instead concentrated on improving quality, launching new products, and building brands. The company carefully reviewed its portfolio, pursuing new investments and divesting businesses that did not meet growth or profitability targets. Moreover, CJ recognized that despite the inherent lack of uniformity across its businesses, there were common needs for more efficient processes, better access to information, and improved response to the external environment. In particular, CJ acknowledged that addressing inventory costs and improving customer service would require focusing on its supply chain operations. CJ determined that it needed to focus on improving order fulfillment, production planning, and procurement processes; increasing forecast accuracy across its businesses; ensuring that resource and production capabilities meet market demand by implementing sales and operations planning processes; and reducing the costs of its raw materials through widespread access to procurement information across organizations. CJ also initiated programs to collaborate with customers to better plan inventory replenishment. The company recognized that a broader e-business initiative would be paced by the stabilization of its internal supply chain processes. After a careful analysis of alternatives, CJ selected mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM) coupled with SAP R/3, SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW), and other SAP solutions to enable the reengineering of its associated execution and planning processes.
The SAP solutions provided a framework for implementing business processes for our diversified consumer goods portfolio that meet the standards of global best practices, says Yong Bum Kim, senior manager of CJs Digital Nervous System team, which is focused on improving CJs responsiveness across all businesses. After a false start with another vendors software solution, we realized that our vision for e-business solutions could only be accomplished with a solid systems platform within CJ. In order to achieve value-adding electronic connections with our customers and suppliers, we needed to achieve worldclass business processes within our own operations. The SAP solution has allowed us to avoid costly software customization to achieve this, because the standard SAP solutions incorporate best practices applicable to our range of processes.
IN DETAIL
Challenges and Objectives CJ had established a well-regarded position in Korea. The Korea Economic Daily and the Institute of Industrial Policy Studies ranked CJ seventh in brand power and 11th in brand asset value. CJ was also acclaimed as one of Koreas top 10 companies by Far Eastern Economist Review and by FinanceAsia. As the Asian economic crisis unfolded in the late 1990s, CJ focused on sustaining and enhancing its market positions; and since the company had a diverse portfolio, it recognized that it had a broad array of challenges. CJ focused on key objectives for process improvements in three business areas: Sugar, wheat, and oil Production of sugar, wheat flour, and cooking oil serves domestic demand, and these three businesses are the traditional cash generators of CJ. However, the markets are growing slowly. For example, sugar accounts for 30% of CJs corporate profit, but revenue is expected to grow only 3% per year. These businesses had tended not to take a rigorous approach to managing raw-material and finished-goods inventory because of the stable and certain markets for these products. Moreover, prices for key raw materials such as raw sugar and wheat grain had varied significantly due to fluctuations in supply conditions and exchange rates. The tendency was to build inventories of raw material to protect against price increases and to run production at full capacity to consume these raw materials. Key objectives for the sugar, wheat, and oil (SWO) businesses were to reduce inventory and rawmaterial costs, better balance supply with demand, and reduce production costs and thus increase profitability.
Bio Pharma
This global business comprises amino-acid-based products and antibiotics, and 70% of the revenue is from exports. Price competition is significant among the numerous offshore rivals. Profitability has been low, but the business is growing significantly, has opportunity for greater margins, and is important to the future of CJ. With a forecasting horizon of three months and make-to-stock production that takes into account per-product demand, business process development had been more rigorous in Bio Pharma than in SWO. Nonetheless, inventory management was acknowledged to be a key issue. In working to better manage its finished-goods inventory, Bio Pharma focused on ensuring product availability for customer satisfaction and growth, improving profit margins, and containing costs. Raw-material inventory was a focus for the same reason as in SWO to minimize the impact on the business of price fluctuations due to changing exchange rates and supply conditions. Key objectives for the Bio Pharma business were to reduce inventory and rawmaterial costs, improve product availability, and enhance customer service. Category Management Group The companys Category Management Group (CMG) businesses encompass processed foods, frozen foods, and household products. A key to growth of these businesses has been brand development and management of new-product introductions. Accordingly, each CMG business has a brand manager who focuses on ensuring that R&D, advertising, and related expenditures create and sustain products that are superior in taste, quality, safety, and convenience. Another key to growth was ensuring high levels of service to the distribution channels. Also, as with other businesses, containing the costs of inventory and procured materials was essential for profitability. Key objectives for the CMG businesses were to enhance brand images through improvements to customer service and product availability, to plan for high growth for some existing and new products, and to reduce operating costs in line with requirements in other businesses.
CJ Global Logistics Services (CJ GLS) provided transportation and storage services to the CJ businesses. In the late 1990s, CJ GLS had to deal separately with individual businesses and with the sales, production, and marketing groups from these businesses. Lack of coordinated planning and information access inhibited cost-efficiencies in vehicle scheduling, warehouse management, and other services that CJ GLS provided. Thus, CJs overarching objective was to consider the diversity of needs across its businesses and wherever appropriate put in place consistent business processes to address these requirements. By pursuing this course, CJ would reduce its internal logistics services expenses, inventory-carrying costs, and rawmaterial procurement outlay; and it would improve service in specific ways to meet the growth and profit opportunities of each business in its portfolio. Implementation Following the Asian economic crisis in the late 1990s, CJ recognized that inefficiencies and customer service problems were largely a result of its multiplicity of ad hoc business processes. The processes in place had evolved in response to many individual and independent requirements within distinct businesses at CJ. The processes were relatively inefficient because they were predicated on a lack of visibility into operations, tended to generate inaccurate information, and did not formally consider CJs interaction with the external world. CJ initiated a detailed evaluation of its operations to determine how best to improve efficiency, satisfy customer needs, and establish a set of processes for its diverse businesses. Following this evaluation, CJ started to implement a comprehensive e-business program in mid-2000 to address its cost-containment and customer-service objectives. The company recognized that its greatest opportunities for improvement lay in improving its interaction with customers and suppliers. However, after the initial implementation, the company realized that the external collaboration processes it had begun to implement under the e-business umbrella needed to be based on accurate data from its operations, and sound internal processes.
Accordingly, CJ decided to focus on improving its execution capabilities by reengineering its business processes covering order fulfillment, production planning, and procurement. The company also decided to implement sales and operations planning processes to balance supply and demand. CJ discontinued use of the non-SAP e-business software platform it had originally selected, evaluated various vendors, and selected SAP software as its enterprise system foundation because of the well-developed business process orientation of SAP solutions.
BW Historical and transaction data Sales order
SAP R/3 Sales and Distribution Sales info other divisions Delivery
Forecast by organization APO-DP Consensus forecast
Commitment APO-ATP (2003) Allocation S&OP data/plans from other divisions
SAP R/3 Materials Management
Production release
DP release
Capable to promise
Purchase order
Supply balancing
Production planning
Material requirements plan
Raw-material inventory
S&OP
Key material requirement
SNP plan APO-SNP
Detail scheduling
Schedule optimizer APO-PPDS
Production schedule SAP R/3 Production Planning
Finished-goods inventory
Figure 1: Supply Chain Planning and Execution Processes
CJ began implementing SAP R/3 in September 2000 to establish an execution process foundation, and subsequently selected and began implementing the SAP Advanced Planner & Optimizer (SAP APO) capabilities of mySAP SCM to support the sales and operations planning processes across businesses. CJ engaged SAP Consulting from Korea to take a leading role in managing the implementation, and the company initially focused on SWO, Bio Pharma, and CMG businesses during 2001 and 2002. The supply chain planning and execution processes put in place are shown in Figure 1, and the implementation program strategy is shown in Figure 2. Today, a total of six demand planners and two supply chain coordinators in the SWO and Bio Pharma businesses use the SAP APO capability of mySAP SCM. In CMG, 70 marketers use the system for demand-planning activities related to brand management, and 3 supply chain coordinators use the system for supporting sales and operations planning. The Production Planning and Detailed Scheduling (PP/DS) capabilities of SAP APO are initially being used by a total of 7 planners at 3 of the 11 plants in CJ. In 2003, SAP APO PP/DS will be implemented in the other manufacturing facilities. In addition to SAP R/3 and mySAP SCM, CJ implemented SAP BW to monitor relevant transaction data, information about supply and demand, actual financial results compared with the plan, and key performance indicators. CJ also implemented the Customer Interaction Center capabilities of mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) software. This mySAP CRM implementation enhanced CJs ability to receive, respond to, and analyze product and service claims submitted by its customers.
Through this implementation, CJ achieved results that supported strategically significant and measurable improvements in inventory, customer service, and procurement. For example: Forecast accuracy Forecast accuracy improved from 70% to 80% for horizons of one month, and the company expects to achieve 98% accuracy by 2003. Sales reporting Prior to implementation, information on sales progress had been available in daily reports covering the approximately 100 SKUs in the SWO, Bio Pharma, and CMG businesses. Since implementation, sales information has been available in real time, so adjustments to the plan can be made more readily. Procurement Seventy percent of purchase orders were released automatically from the mySAP SCM demand-planning system during 2002 (the first full year of operation), and the company expects to achieve a 90% rate by 2003. Production planning The production-planning cycle, which had encompassed 6 days of data collection, 3 days of what-if analyses, and 5 days of planning and associated negotiation, was reduced from 14 to 2 days. The faster cycle time also enabled CJ to adhere better to production schedules. Standard costing CJ moved from an actual costing system to a standard costing system to enable better monitoring and response to variances in labor, utility costs, and most importantly raw materials. Accuracy of standard costs was 98% during 2002 and is expected to improve to 99% by 2003. Financial closing cycle As a result of more precise operational data and shorter planning cycle times, CJ reduced its financial-closing cycle time from seven to four days.
CJ started to implement customer collaboration programs with the expectation that more comprehensive collaborative processes would be put in place in 2003. For example, CJ started a collaborative replenishment program with Carrefour, a retailer that distributes CJs CMG products in Korea. In this implementation, Carrefour sends inventory information to CJ, and CJ replenishes inventory based on a process that considers this stock information, safety-stock levels, preestablished reorder points, and existing supply plans. CJ also plans for Carrefours longer-term replenishment requirements by making use of the sales and operations planning process, and considering an 18-month planning horizon. This collaborative replenishment program is a precursor to full collaborative planning, forecasting, and replenishment (CPFR) programs that CJ plans to put in place with Carrefour and other retailers. CJ is also considering vendor-managed inventory (VMI) implementations with some retailers, including local discount stores. In addition to its plans for CPFR and VMI, CJ is planning the following implementations: Procurement CJ expects to implement SAP Enterprise Buyer, a component of mySAP Supply Relationship Management (mySAP SRM). This implementation will enable standardized procurement processes and allow further visibility across businesses into raw-material purchase expenses. This implementation will therefore permit CJ to further reduce the costs and increase the effectiveness of its procurement activity. Global available-to-promise The initial SAP implementation makes use of SAP availableto-promise (ATP) capabilities. The global ATP capability of mySAP SCM will be implemented to provide rule-based decision-making capabilities, taking into account inventory, constraints, and planned production information to accurately inform customers about the availability of standard and specialty products. The global ATP implementation will further enhance customer service through measurably increased order-fulfillment service levels.
SAP R/3 Go-Live 2001 Business area/function 3 M1 4 M2 5 M3 6 M4 7 M5 8 M6 9 M7 DP Go-Live 10 M8 11 12 2002 1 2 3 4
SNP, PP/DS, ATP Go-Live
M9 M10 M11 M12 M13 M14 M15 M16 M17 M18
DP Phase I
PF
FF
HH
BIO SWO
SNP PP/DS ATP
PF
FF
HH
BIO
SNP
PF
FF
HH
BIO
Phase II
PP/DS
PF
FF
HH
SAP R/3 ATP
PF
FF
HH Project Preparation Business Blueprint Realization Final Preparation Go-Live & Support
PF Processed Food CMG (Category Management Group) FF Frozen Food CMG HH Household Products CMG BIO Bio Pharma Products SWO Sugar, Wheat Flour, Cooking Oil
Figure 2: Implementation Strategy
Enhanced logistics capabilities

CJ will extend the standard processes enabled by SAP solutions to CJs global logistics group, CJ GLS. A warehouse management solution for the manufacturing plants storage area will be replaced with SAP warehouse management capabilities; the transportation-planning and vehicle-scheduling capability of mySAP SCM will be implemented to achieve more favorable routings; and global ATP capabilities will be implemented to improve customer service. The collection of new processes will enable consolidation of warehouses, reductions in storage and transportation costs, and development of new services such as door-to-door delivery.
Enterprise portal
CJ expects to implement mySAP Enterprise Portal technology, a component of SAP NetWeaver, to facilitate management and personalization of information across the companys diverse businesses. This implementation will heighten the level of standardization of business processes throughout CJ, enabling further performance improvements. Through its current and expected implementations, CJ is establishing a consistent set of processes across its diverse businesses, reducing costs, and improving customer service. CJ expects to continue on this path of improving profitable growth as it enhances its business portfolio.
AT A GLANCE
Strategic goals
Pursue global growth across diverse businesses
through selective investment and by streamlining business processes Enhance ability to respond to demand shifts in fast-moving consumer goods segment Improve delivery performance while reducing inventory Reduce costs of offshore procurement of raw materials by minimizing the impact of exchangerate fluctuations and other uncertainties
Approach CJ implemented a process innovation program across its diverse businesses following an economic downturn that affected Asian economies. The company first focused on improving its execution capabilities by reengineering its business processes covering order fulfillment, production planning, and procurement. CJ then implemented sales and operations planning processes to better balance supply and demand. Supporting actions included increasing forecast accuracy, analyzing its purchase costs, and shortening its productionplanning cycle. This approach was enabled by mySAP Supply Chain Management and other SAP solutions. Results achieved over the period 2000 to 2002
Reduced stock-outs by 41.2%; expects
to achieve a service level of 97% in order fulfillment by 2003 Lowered finished-goods inventory by 15.4% and raw-material inventory by 18.5% Reduced procurement costs by 5%; expects a total reduction of 10% by 2003 Increased gross margin by 2% as a result of the complete set of cost reductions Improved response time to customer claims by 50% and expects to achieve 24-hour turnaround by 2003
CODORNU
TRANSPARENCY IN DEMAND PLANNING WITH mySAP SCM
The Codornu Group, a family-owned wine-producing company founded in the 16th century and one of the earliest users of SAP R/3 in Spain, once again turned to the ERP software vendor to help manage its supply chain. Today, using the demand planning capabilities of SAP Advanced Planning & Optimization (SAP APO), a key component of mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM), Codornu can manage forecasts at different hierarchy levels and view the effects of changes, which can be grouped according to product families or disaggregated to the finest detail.
The Codornu Group is a family-owned wine producing company that was founded in the 16th century. In 1872, the company introduced cava to Spain for the first time using the traditional method, and a few years later began the first exports to Argentina and Cuba. At present, the Codornu Group is one of the main producers of cava and quality wines in Spain. It comprises 11 wineries, which are all situated in prestigious wine-producing regions in Spain (Cava, Peneds, Rioja, Costers del Segre, Ribera del Duero, Priorato, and Conca de Barber), as well as abroad (Napa Valley in the United States and Mendoza in Argentina). Furthermore, Codornu is the Spanish wine-producing group that owns the largest surface area of vineyards, with a total of more than 3,000 hectares (7,410 acres). Additionally, the group distributes internationally recognized products in Spain, such as wines from E&J Gallo, Campari, Cinzano, and various prestigious brands of Scotch whisky.
CODORNUS STRATEGIC COMMITMENT
In 1996, Codornu became one of the first Spanish companies to implement the SAP R/3 System. Since then, the system has been progressively introduced into different areas of the organization, completely covering the back-office processes including sales, production, materials management and purchasing, human resources, finance management, and controlling.
Once its back-office processes were running smoothly, Codornu again put its trust in SAP to help manage its frontoffice processes and Internet environment and began making
Once the back-office phase had been successfully covered, Codornu again put its trust in SAP by acquiring the e-business mySAP.com platform for the front-office and Internet environment. Its SCM, CRM, enterprise portal, e-procurement, and business information warehouse solutions allow Codornu to collaborate with its customers, suppliers, and business partners using the Internet and extranet.
Jaume Marin, Director of Internal Organization, Codornu
plans to implement mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM), mySAP Customer Relationship Management, mySAP Enterprise Portal, e-procurement with mySAP Supplier Relationship Management, and the SAP Business Information Warehouse (now a part of SAP NetWeaver). Codornus ultimate goal is to have the means to successfully collaborate with its customers, suppliers, and business partners using Internet and extranet technology and to ensure its continued success.
THE mySAP SCM PROJECT
Codornus first undertaking in the long list of proposed implementations was the mySAP SCM project, which brought the company face to face with technological and organizational challenges. Technologically, although Codornu was a pioneer in implementing state-of-the-art management tools, the mySAP SCM implementation involved new and unfamiliar processes. And on an organizational level, integrating the companys supply chain meant that all the departments involved would need to be bolstered. In particular, the company knew it had to strengthen its team responsible for demand forecasting: The team, which comprised marketing, production, and purchasing managers, took on a new member, the demand planner, who was responsible for coordinating the entire process. The design team then set about developing a statistical model of demand behavior, which would enable the company to make more accurate projections of future sales according to product, channel, and geographical area. During the design phase, workshops and presentations were provided to help users familiarize themselves with the new system. Once the model had been defined, the team developed a prototype and designed the reporting system in the SAP Business Information Warehouse. SAP and Cap Gemini Ernst & Youngs total commitment as implementation partners helped ensure the projects success.
THE IMPROVEMENT OF THE SUPPLY CHAIN
For the Codornu Group, improving its supply chain was key to achieving excellence of service. With total integration into the SAP R/3 System, mySAP SCM enabled us to manage our entire demand-planning cycle and reduce costs at the same time, says Jaume Marin, director of internal organization. Codornu used the SAP Business Information Warehouse to help track sales and generate reliable forecasts in a simple and flexible way. Planners also used the demand-planning capability of mySAP SCM as a central tool to define the annual budget. Today, Codornu uses mySAP SCM for the short-term planning of the bottling process. It also helps the group determine how best to use the different crop varieties and facilitates procurement (medium-term planning). In addition, the group uses mySAP SCM for more accurate long-term planning of its grape production.
A MULTITUDE OF TANGIBLE BENEFITS
AT A GLANCE
SAP solution components mySAP SCM
The implementation of mySAP SCM has brought Codornu many tangible benefits: The centralized demand-planning model, which is integrated with the ERP system, enables greater synchronicity between marketing departments and the production team. Forecasting can be carried out based on particular characteristics of the industry: the pronounced seasonal nature and the impact of cannibalization during the introduction of new products, for example. Because the master data for SAP APO and the SAP R/3 System is integrated, planning tasks are fast and the company can avoid data redundancies and errors.
NEW BUSINESS MODEL
Hardware platform Hewlett-Packard Operating system Database Number of users Implementation partners Unix Informix 20 SAP and Cap Gemini Ernst & Young
With the new system, Codornu can manage forecasts at different hierarchy levels and view the effects of the changes in planning, which can be grouped according to product families or disaggregated to the finest detail. The solution also ensures that each agent along the supply chain has access to information from a single source and is immediately alerted to any change in the forecast a critical factor in the wine business. As a result, the entire Codornu supply chain can react readily to short-term changes in demand.
A SOUND FUTURE
For the Codornu Group, the mySAP SCM demand-planning capabilities have provided the basis for building a sound future. With key mySAP SCM functionality and tools at its fingertips such as supply network planning (SNP) and global available to promise (ATP) the group can continue to integrate and optimize its supply chain and meet order delivery dates, while taking capacities and restrictions into account. The bottom line? mySAP SCM enables Codornu to fulfill its policy of continual improvement companywide and get a better return on its investments.
DEGUSSA AG
DEGUSSA ACCELERATES CONSOLIDATION AND STREAMLINES REPORTING WITH SAP SEM-BCS
Degussa AG is a multinational chemical company with a strong focus on decentralized management by its 5 divisions, comprising 21 business units. In keeping with this strategy, the company opted to introduce a new IT solution for business consolidation to deliver consistent external and internal financial information in a timely manner. SAP Strategic Enterprise Management Business Consolidation (SAP SEM-BCS) provides integrated legal and management consolidation with highly flexible reporting.
A GLOBAL PLAYER WITH AMBITIOUS PLANS
Mergers and acquisitions generate dramatic change, and they usually leave companies with multiple, often incompatible, systems that must somehow work together. Degussa AG, Germanys third-largest chemical company and the world leader in high-yield specialty chemicals, faced just such a challenge. As the product of a merger between Degussa-Hls AG and SKW Trostberg in February 2001, Degussa has dramatically grown and changed in structure in recent years. In 2002, Degussa had 435 subsidiaries and 47,623 employees, posting sales of 11.7 billion. With multiple international subsidiaries and a commitment to decentralized management, Degussa needed a solution that could consolidate financial information from multiple systems and provide accurate reports for decision making. That solution was SAP Strategic Enterprise Management Business Consolidation (SAP SEM-BCS). As Dr. Jrgen Hrtig, vice president of Degussa corporate projects, explains, We ran separate software systems for management and legal reporting. This often meant the same data had to be entered two or more times at different locations a costly, time-consuming, and inefficient process. In the wake of dramatic expansion, the group found itself with a variety of diverse IT systems and an urgent need to standardize reporting processes.
Given Degussas commitment to enterprise-wide, decentralized management, the company needed a single, efficient process for producing consolidated internal and external reports. The group was looking for a way to link accounting systems in each of its international subsidiaries without disrupting legacy software or compromising compliance with local standards and legal obligations. Because of this requirement, support for U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (U.S. GAAP) was a top priority.
DEGUSSA OPTS FOR ALL-IN-ONE FUNCTIONALITY
SAP Strategic Enterprise Management Business Consolidation (SAP SEM-BCS) produces consolidated information for companies with complex organizational structures and large numbers of subsidiaries like Degussa. This all-in-one functionality was very attractive to Degussa, says Hrtig. In addition to meeting legal requirements and complying with a wide variety of accounting standards, including U.S. GAAP and International Accounting Standards/International Financial Reporting Standards (IAS/IFRS), SAP SEM-BCS provides highly customizable management reporting for improved strategic decision making. Managers can view information at any time by using a standard Web browser.
DEGUSSA AND SAP: A PROVEN TRACK RECORD AND FUTURE-DRIVEN APPROACH
SAP SEM-BCS was a natural fit for Degussa. We already had many years excellent experience with SAP technology, and SAP has always proven itself to be a reliable and expert partner, says Hrtig. Easy integration with our legacy SAP systems was also important. As a pilot customer, we were fully aware of the risks involved, and we knew that it would need to be a team effort. Beginning with intensive consultation, the ambitious project dubbed Financial Redesign and System Transformation, or FIRST required intensive collaboration between Degussas in-house experts, SAP consultants and developers, and consultants from BearingPoint, Degussas implementation partner. The first step was to agree on standard methods and terminology in German and in English, explains Hrtig. Because it was a global project involving a minefield of accounting practices and concepts, laying down solid ground rules in the form of the Degussa Reporting Manual was a considerable task. After agreeing on methods and terminology, the team established standard processes for transferring data from worldwide subsidiaries into the central system. We worked hard with SAP Consulting and BearingPoint to prepare the terrain for the SAP solution. This was a major project in itself, says Hrtig. With these foundations successfully laid, Degussa was ready to implement SAP SEM-BCS. We set our sights high and were aware that a pioneering integration project of this scale never runs entirely smoothly. It is a great tribute to the collaboration of all three parties that SAP SEM-BCS is now fully operational. It really was an example of excellent teamwork, and we are grateful for the dedication of everyone involved, says Hrtig.
Integrating reporting and the corporate finance function, SAP SEM-BCS revolutionized Degussas reporting strategy, allowing managers to generate consolidated figures quickly and easily. To reap the full benefits of the new solution, Degussa restructured its external and internal reporting according to its organizational structure and processes. It also completely integrated all international subsidiaries into the reporting process. Using SAP SEM-BCS, subsidiaries validate their data and transfer it over the Web directly into the corporate consolidation system. The FIRST project has been a great success. SAP SEM-BCS handles incoming figures from a wide variety of heterogeneous accounting systems, dramatically reducing manual intervention and accelerating the entire process. The time taken to produce monthly reports for the total group has now been reduced to eight working days, says Hrtig. Degussa has also aligned its reporting processes with its global strategy. The lions share of the work is performed locally in keeping with Degussas [decentralized management] philosophy. This allows changes to legal entities and management structures to be handled more flexibly, and it minimizes the burden on central administrative staff, explains Hrtig. Standardized figures flow directly into the system, eliminating redundant data entry and manual validation and making the new solution far less prone to human error and inconsistency. The solution works from one common set of data. That means SAP SEM-BCS can automatically derive key performance indicators for legal and management units from financial statements during consolidation. The common platform is based on standardized data, processes, and content, which in turn allows the information to be universally understood and used in a variety of ways, says Hrtig. By providing quick and reliable information from a single database, SAP SEM-BCS not only meets all of Degussas business requirements, it also provides the necessary flexibility and scalability to meet Degussas future goals.
Extensive training of 400 users was the final milestone on the road to success. Training ensured that users companywide understood and accepted the new system and process changes. The groundbreaking project is a significant step forward for the Degussa group. As Hrtig points out, As the first organization to implement SAP SEM-BCS, we are also the first to reap the rewards of increased speed, efficiency, and quality of our reporting. This represents a very definite competitive advantage for Degussa in terms of administrative efficiency, stockholder transparency, and internal decision making.
THREEFOLD VALUATION AT DEGUSSA
Next on the horizon for Degussa is the implementation of IAS/IFRS accounting practices. Starting in 2005, the European Union (EU) will require EU companies listed on a regulated market to prepare their consolidated accounts according to IAS/IFRS. For Degussa, this means threefold valuation: German GAAP, U.S. GAAP, and IAS/IFRS. SAP SEM-BCS will position Degussa to handle this requirement. SAP has more than 10 years of experience in parallel valuation and is fully prepared to face the challenges of handling local GAAP, U.S. GAAP, and IAS/IFRS simultaneously.
A SOLID PLATFORM FOR THE FUTURE
Hrtig is delighted with the results of the SAP SEM-BCS implementation. It was not always easy, but the commitment and hard work of the teams involved have borne fruit, he says. We now have an enterprise-wide, fully integrated platform on which to build for the future. The ambitious project has delivered flexibility, scalability, and, above all, transparency to Degussas global operations. In a company with as many subsidiaries and business units as Degussa, this is an impressive achievement.
END-TO-END SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AT DOW CORNING

Dow Corning is a global leader in silicone-based technology and innovation. To enhance planning and execution of production and logistics, the corporation has installed SAP R/3 and the mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM) solution, with SAP Advanced Planner and Optimizer (SAP APO) at its core. This powerful combination has enabled Dow Corning to respond faster and more flexibly to the ever-changing pattern of market demand.
THE CHALLENGE THE NEED FOR MORE INFORMATION AND GREATER RESPONSIVENESS DOW CORNING A WORLD LEADER
Dow Corning Corp. provides performance-enhancing solutions to serve the diverse needs of more than 25,000 customers worldwide. It is a global leader in silicon-based technology and innovation, offering more than 7,000 products and services. Operating in Europe, Asia, and the United States, the enterprise has approximately 9,000 employees in 25 countries around the globe. Annual sales are U.S.$2.6 billion. In order to maintain and strengthen its market position, Dow Corning has embarked on introducing a state-of-the-art IT infrastructure that would give the company greater control over its supply chain and improve customer satisfaction.
Dow Cornings legacy IT systems, primarily mandatory based, were hitting hard against the limits of their capabilities, especially in an area vital to the competitiveness of a manufacturer: supply chain management. A major obstacle was lack of integration, coupled with system redundancy. In many instances, it was simply not possible to access and analyze much of the data needed for effective planning. This hampered decision making across the entire extended enterprise. It became clear that more powerful client/server hardware and cutting-edge software were needed if Dow Corning was going to improve data transparency and, ultimately, responsiveness.
RICH FUNCTIONALITY AND TIGHT INTEGRATION SAP APO AND SAP R/3
SAP software offered Dow Corning the functionality, flexibility, and tight integration it sought. The first step was to create a state-of-the-art enterprise resource planning backbone, based on SAP R/3. The second step was to introduce the mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM) solution, with SAP Advanced Planner and Optimizer (SAP APO) at its heart. This created an end-to-end environment, seamlessly linking all key processes from order generation, to production planning, to warehouse procedures, to transportation moves through to delivery and billing. The SAP APO solution enables the SCOR model: Plan, Source, Make, Deliver. SAP APO provides manufacturers such as Dow Corning with analysis, planning, and simulation tools that can draw on upto-the-minute data from diverse internal and external sources, increasing transparency while decreasing errors and costs. Whats more, the SAP environment allows those plans to be put into action. Implementation of the SAP APO pilot solution in a targeted supply chain took just nine months from design to delivery. In a collaborative effort by a team of SAP consultants and Dow Corning employees, business requirements were transformed into system requirements and design. Six of the nine months were spent on installing the enabling tools, prototyping, and stress testing. The supply chain environment went live without a hitch.
INCREASED EFFICIENCY AND CUSTOMER SATISFACTION
Since then, SAPs cutting-edge software has increased efficiency across the entire supply chain. Dow Corning has been able to establish a structure that enables supply and demand to be balanced around the world for this pilot. With access to global, real-time facts and figures, decision makers can now coordinate people, plants, and processes with far greater ease, matching production to market requirements on a global scale. The company expects to realize major savings, particularly in the area of materials management costs, when all supply chains are enabled. One of Dow Cornings major objectives was to raise the quality of customer service. Here as well, mySAP SCM has brought tangible improvements. Providing customers with reliable delivery commitments, evaluating new market share with confidence, and supplying on time all contribute to overall customer satisfaction. The supply planning capabilities of mySAP SCM enable the corporation to rebalance and optimize demand forecasts according to various criteria, including transportation costs, order destination, and so on. Dow Corning can now deliver more precisely what its customers need, when they need it.
ENTERPRISE-WIDE ROLLOUT TO FOLLOW SHORTLY
The remaining 25 supply chains across the enterprise have been impressed by the improvements in cost-effectiveness and ease of use, and are naturally anxious to gain the same benefits. The supply chains are pulling the need for this enabling toolset. In the longer term, the corporation intends to take advantage of the other enabling components of SAP APO, as well as other complementary solutions, such as SAP Customer Relationship Management (SAP CRM), to round out its end-to-end supply chain solution.
FORBO GROUP
ON FIRM GROUND UNDERNEATH BUSINESS PROCESSES WITH SAP
Forbo is living proof of the fact that a manufacturer of a basic product like floor covering can develop into a sizeable multinational. The company was founded in 1928 and has since grown into the market leader in vinyl and linoleum, with 5,700 employees worldwide. Forbo also has sales offices worldwide. Forbo chose SAP R/3 to facilitate global integration of production, sales, and logistics and to bring transparency to the whole organization. This was an important, but difficult, step towards streamlining operational management.
WORLDWIDE ROLLOUT
Forbos head office is in Zurich, Switzerland, and it has subsidiaries throughout Europe and the United States. Before choosing SAP for its flooring business, Forbo had its own solution, consisting of a mainframe environment, which had its drawbacks. Dietmar Bhm, Forbo CIO, recounts: The mainframe environment was expensive and made huge demands on support and maintenance. Furthermore, the system could not be expanded. For this reason, Forbo went in search of a new solution, to be rolled out worldwide. The solution had to be able to support and integrate order processing, logistics, sales, production, and distribution. SAP R/3 was chosen, because of the flexibility and integration the software offers. It is perfect for tracking information flows. Moreover, it is the embodiment of future-oriented technology. We initially chose SAP R/3, with the aim of enhancing it with SAP for Mill Products in a second phase.
PERFECT COLLABORATION BETWEEN SAP AND FORBO
Bhm outlines the scope of the project. The implementation is worldwide; most of the Forbo Group, like the subsidiaries in Frankfurt, Brussels, and the sites in the Netherlands, already use SAP R/3. It will also be rolled out in Scandinavia, England, Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, and the United States. All sales offices worldwide are already linked to the system. The implementation started in February 2001, and in May 2002 the first subsidiaries went live. The project went less smoothly than expected. At first we made some typical implementation errors, like not giving our users adequate training.
It is also important to strictly adhere to the project plan. In addition, consulting quality is decisive. I would nevertheless like to give the overall project a B, because SAP Consulting demonstrated a lot of competence, especially in the later phases, in bringing together all system elements. The go-live required a great deal of effort from all those involved, and the cooperation between SAP Consulting and Forbo employees could not have been better.
ONLINE INSIGHT INTO STOCKS
SAP R/3 offers flexibility and quality, states Bhm. It provides security in difficult economic times. It is essential to Forbo for maintaining its market position. All subsidiaries worldwide enter sales orders. Thanks to SAP R/3 and SAP for Mill Products, these orders trigger production and delivery. This is efficient
SAP R/3 provides flexibility and quality. It provides security in difficult economic times.
Dietmar Bhm, CIO, Forbo
and ensures better use of raw materials and semifinished products. It is a fully integrated system that offers transparency and insight. The figures it provides are more exact and clear. Before, for example, we had little real-time information on stocks in the Netherlands. Now every subsidiary worldwide can see online what is in stock. All information flows are perfectly visible. And our financial administrators are very satisfied, because they can track all cash flows with the available reporting options. Control has become simplified, because there are fewer interfaces and less diversity in the software.
The financial administrators are very satisfied. They can track all cash flows with the available reporting options of SAP R/3.
Dietmar Bhm, CIO, Forbo
The software also offers flexibility. Current, optimal financial data not only makes for decisive market approach; it also allows you to carry out internal reorganizations, such as opening or merging subsidiaries quickly and thus cost-effectively in SAP R/3. In my opinion, the market leadership of SAP is justified, especially because of the high level of software integration.
CONSIDERABLE DECREASE IN COSTS IN THE LONG TERM
AT A GLANCE
SAP solution SAP R/3 4.6b, SAP for Mill Products (FI-CO, MM, PP-PI, QM, PS, PM, IS-Mill 2.0, SD, LES)
Hardware platform IBM AS/400 Operating system Database Number of users Implementation time Implementation partner OS 400 IBM DB/2 450
The implementation project was a difficult one, and we had to overcome many obstacles, concludes Bhm. We are therefore proceeding carefully. I am down-to-earth and advise others to take the same approach. You should first make sure that the technology is up and running before improving your business processes with the software. For example, Forbo will not introduce corporate functionality until the worldwide implementation has been completed. We will first round off this project, then we will carry through improvements, and after that we will decide which step to take next. More tips? Set up small teams and take it one step at a time. Stick to your original project plan, and do not forget that there is no money to be made on the software itself. The benefits are indirect and only noticeable in the long term. If, for example, you take the reports our financial administrators are so happy with, if you see how many hours work they save, they make quite an impressive profit through efficiency. Hence, in the long term, this will decrease costs considerably.
15 months
SAP Consulting
GOODRICH CORPORATION
GOODRICH SELECTS mySAP BUSINESS SUITE TO QUICKLY ADAPT TO CHANGING BUSINESS MODEL
Goodrich is using lean manufacturing in its quest to achieve Enterprise Excellence perfection in how it serves all its stakeholders. The company turned to mySAP Business Suite a key part of the SAP for Aerospace & Defense portfolio of software and services to help it quickly adapt its business systems to support not only the initiative, but an increasing emphasis on e-business. Using the new software, Goodrich can also now react flexibly to the ever-changing requirements and pressures that characterize the aerospace industry.
Goodrich Corporations Aerostructures division designs and manufactures aircraft engine components such as nacelles, pylons, and thrust reversers and also provides maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) services for these components. The division is headquartered in Chula Vista, California, with additional manufacturing and MRO facilities worldwide.
ENTERPRISE EXCELLENCE
The company is using lean manufacturing in its quest to achieve Enterprise Excellence perfection in how it serves all its stakeholders. Goodrich turned to mySAP Business Suite a key part of the SAP for Aerospace & Defense portfolio of software and services for a comprehensive information solution to support its lean manufacturing initiative, along with the rest of its business. The rate of change in the aerospace business is increasing, especially in the e-business area, says M. Thornton, product data management/enterprise resource planning (PDM/ERP) project manager at Goodrich. We couldnt change or modify our 200-plus legacy systems fast enough to respond to our rapidly evolving business model. SAP and our PDM solution provide us with the ability to quickly make changes to our systems to support the changes taking place in our business. Additionally, mySAP Business Suite also provided a ready platform for e-business. When Goodrich says it can now make changes quickly, it means it.
We can literally make these changes in days or hours, says Gary Coleman, vice president for information technology. Each time we change one of our business processes, it requires a systems change. For example, as we co-locate people and operations around a product, this causes movement of machines and people and requires system changes to reflect where the new tasks and activities are taking place. If you dont have a responsive system that you can quickly, flexibly, and easily change, it becomes difficult to make those changes to the business. In the past, we would have to rely on programmers and wait months for the modification.
RAPID GLOBAL IMPLEMENTATION
The company rolled out mySAP Business Suite quickly, in only 14 months. Goodrich went live simultaneously at six manufacturing facilities on two continents. The implementation included a new time and attendance and shop-floor data collection system and impacted 4,500 users with changes to virtually every single transaction in their day-to-day activities. Goodrich credits the assistance of SAP Labs, SAP AG, SAP SI, and Xansa a business consulting, information technology, and outsourcing organization with extensive experience in aerospace and defense for its on-time, on-budget rollout. Xansa worked closely with Goodrich and the SAP partners to deploy virtually the entire mySAP Business Suite platform in a remotely hosted and managed configuration, including functionality for financials, project management, manufacturing, sales and service, procurement, warehousing, and business intelligence.
SAP: A CLEAR CHOICE
Goodrich undertook an extensive testing process before selecting SAP. SAP provided, first of all, a full suite and an integrated system, Coleman says. We also looked at a matrix of key players in the aerospace and defense industry. Many of them are using SAP; that validated our decision and facilitates synergy down the road. Moreover, we also wanted a healthy company with a track record that would be a valuable business partner for a long time. Goodrich is not only going to use mySAP Business Suite to run its business, its also going to use the system along with mySAP Business Intelligence (mySAP BI) to predict where it is going.
Most business information is results-related it tells you what you did yesterday, says Jim Harmon, director of the Goodrich SAP Customer Competency Center. We have a strong effort underway to identify and collect what we call driver information. This is information that is going to help us predict what the results are going to be. We want to get this information for example, the correlation between inventory and production build rates in the hands of our people quickly, to take corrective action before something becomes a result. Goodrich linked mySAP Business Suite to a product data management system for a complete life-cycle management solution. And, its internal competency center will help Goodrich continue to refine and enhance its ongoing business requirements with the SAP solution, so as the companys business changes, it can quickly make system changes to meet its business needs.
HENKEL GROUP
SAP STRATEGIC ENTERPRISE MANAGEMENT STREAMLINES INTERNATIONAL REPORTING
Henkel Groups reporting systems were outdated and inefficient, and the advent of International Accounting Standards (IAS) heightened the need for standardized global accounting practices. Henkel was quick to act, replacing five legacy systems with SAP Strategic Enterprise Management. The solution has already born fruit; the group completed its 2002 IAS-based annual report in just over one month, two weeks earlier than in previous years.
HIGH-QUALITY PRODUCTS FOR A GLOBAL MARKET
The Henkel Group, headquartered in Dsseldorf, Germany, is a multinational giant specializing in household, personal care, and cleaning articles, as well as adhesives, sealants, and surface-treatment products. Brands include such famous names as Persil, Fa, Loctite, Duck Tape, and Sellotape. The group has subsidiaries in 75 countries and employs approximately 46,000 people, some three quarters of whom are based outside Germany. In 2002, the group posted total consolidated sales of 9.6 billion.
INCREASED TRANSPARENCY AND COMPARABILITY WITH IAS
As a global player, Henkel was quick to recognize the benefits of adopting the International Accounting Standards (IAS). IAS was developed by the IASC, the International Accounting Standards Committee, set up in the 1970s by the accountancy bodies of a number of industrialized countries. Henkel was one of the first German companies to embrace these principles, which will become compulsory by 2005 for about 7,000 listed companies in the European Union (EU). According to Michael Rauch, director of management reporting at the Henkel Group, Working with internationally accepted standards increases transparency and improves comparability of financial information across national borders. Even without the latest EU requirements, this is vitally important to multinational organizations of our nature. For this reason, we adopted IAS well before most other German companies.
CREATING A SINGLE, COHERENT SYSTEM
However, as Stephan Rutter, IT corporate account manager at Henkel, points out, The obvious advantages of the international standards were not our only motivation for implementing a new solution.
We were looking for a single system to harmonize both internal and external reporting processes throughout the organization. The company looked to SAP for the answer. Prior to implementing SAP Strategic Enterprise Management (SAP SEM), Henkel was hampered by a variety of inefficient and outdated accounting and reporting solutions. In total, the
SAPs intuitive, browser-based user interface delivers the information they want, whenever they want it. This improves and accelerates decision making on all levels.
Michael Rauch, Director of Management Reporting, Henkel Group
Henkel Group used five different applications, each requiring data to be entered independently, and each with its own unique quirks. We were running several separate systems for management reporting and statutory accounting. And to make matters worse, our two file-transfer-based systems for internal reporting were both 25 years old a replacement was long overdue. Equally, statutory accounting processes were not automated and relied on e-mail leading to inevitable confusion, time lags, and losses in accuracy and efficiency. There was clearly room for improvement, explains Rutter. With SAP Strategic Enterprise Management, we were able to create a single, coherent reporting solution that seamlessly integrates with our enterprise-wide IT environment.
PARALLEL VALUATION WITH SAP
Although Henkel already had an SAP system in place, according to Rauch, We didnt choose IAS with SAP just because it was easier to integrate with our existing enterprise solutions; SAP has more than 10 years of experience in parallel valuation and offers tailored functionality. In addition, comprehensive support for IAS 14 segment reporting, which deals with segmentation by line of business and geographical area, is particularly important to a global organization like Henkel. Rutter adds, With the SAP R/3 implementation in 1998, we laid ground for parallel valuation at Henkel. We opted for the concept of parallel accounts, creating IAS accounts where needed and this was the right choice for us. The Top Accounting and Reporting System (TOPAS) project, driven by Rauch and Rutter jointly, began with a blueprinting phase in May 2001, initially concentrating on SAP SEM business consolidation capabilities. In the course of 2002, the project team tailored the solution to Henkels unique needs. This was a painstaking but unavoidable process that required the cooperation of experts from all areas of the organization, says Rauch. We invested 360 man days for 18 months to successfully complete the project. For a project of this scale, thats pretty good going. Henkel chose SAP Consulting to support the go-live. The group successfully accomplished international rollout in July 2003 to all 270 subsidiaries around the world within 6 months. User acceptance is essential to ensuring the success of a project of this kind. We devoted a lot of effort in face-to-face training, but when you see the cost and time savings, no one can argue that it was not worthwhile, explains Rauch.
GREATER SPEED AT LOWER COSTS
Henkel expects significant savings as a result of streamlining the closing process with SAP SEM. According to Rutter, The number of employees responsible for administration work relating to the reporting process is going to be reduced by a third. With one system replacing five legacy applications, data no longer has to be entered more than once and there is no need to compare and check information across systems. In addition, a variety of routine processes have been automated and streamlined.
Most important of all, reports can be created around 30% faster. For instance, the time taken to generate a monthly report has now been reduced to just five days. Similarly, the 2002 annual report according to IAS and local GAAP was ready in just over a month, compared to seven or eight weeks under the previous systems. But SAP Strategic Enterprise Management has led to much more than just streamlined financial-reporting processes. Because the input data is standardized, a large number of
The number of employees responsible for administration work relating to the reporting process is going to be reduced by a third. . . . In addition, a variety of routine processes have been automated and streamlined. Most important of all, reports can be created around 30% faster.
Stephan Rutter, IT Corporate Account Manager, Henkel Group
processes can be automated throughout the organization. In conjunction with SAP Business Information Warehouse a component of SAP Business Intelligence, a key offering within the SAP NetWeaver integration and application platform these important facts and figures are now available for a variety of reporting and analysis tasks. Decision makers and planners benefit from richer data delivered in a more practical, electronic form. SAPs intuitive, browser-based user interface delivers the information they want, whenever they want it. This improves and accelerates decision making on all levels, says Rauch. It also eliminates the need to distribute expensive printed reports.
LONG-TERM SUCCESS
SAP SEM opens up a world of possibilities for Henkel. SAP SEM is the ideal starting point for Henkel. It makes it easy to integrate new planning functionality to enhance reporting and analysis, explains Rutter. In global companies as large and complex as Henkel, this kind of integration is the key to longterm savings and long-term success.
SAP BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE AT INFINEON

SAP BUSINESS INFORMATION WAREHOUSE HELPS IMPROVE TRANSPARENCY OF PROCUREMENT PROCESSES WORLDWIDE AND REDUCE COSTS
The pressure to lower prices in a weak marketplace is forcing companies in the semiconductor industry to introduce long-ranging, cost-cutting measures. With the help of SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW) a key component within SAP Business Intelligence the German semiconductor manufacturer Infineon Technologies AG managed to improve the transparency of its procurement processes companywide. SAP BW also provided the foundation for a supplier relationship management system at Infineon.
Headquartered in Munich, Germany, Infineon Technologies was founded in 1999 to continue Siemenss business activities, inheriting a legacy of innovation begun by Siemens Semiconductors in 1952. Today, Infineons 30,000 employees develop, design, manufacture, and market a wide portfolio of semiconductor products and complete system solutions for wired communication, computer, security, and chip-card technology, as well as automotive and industrial electronics.
MASSIVE PROCUREMENT VOLUME
Infineon purchases goods and services that total between 3 and 4 billion every year. To increase purchasing transparency and achieve further cost savings, we implemented a procurement analysis project, based on SAP, says Peter Reischl, purchasing manager at Infineon. It used to take a lot of effort to retain a monthly overview of the entire companys purchasing volume. Although Infineon had been using SAP R/3 companywide, the different systems were not integrated. Each location would create evaluations using SAP R/3 tools and then send them as Microsoft Excel sheets to Infineons headquarters in Munich for compilation. We used to generate global reports by manually consolidating Excel tables containing data from nine local systems, says Thomas Uhlik, project manager for spend analysis at Infineon. Thats why the company decided to integrate purchasing data from the SAP R/3 Materials Management and Financial Accounting components used around the world into a single data warehouse.
FUTURE-PROOF SOLUTION
Infineon chose SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW) to do so. SAP BW is a component within SAP Business Intelligence, a key offering of the SAP NetWeaver integration and application platform. We decided on SAP BW because the SAP data warehouse is a future-proof solution that can be easily integrated using standard interfaces across different releases and forms, says Uhlik. Plus, SAP BW supports the data universal number system (DUNS) from Dun & Bradstreet (D&B). DUNS allows identification and qualification of more than 70 million businesses worldwide. This means, for example, that companies
SAP BW will have amortized within a year, which means a fast return on investment thats real business value.
Peter Reischl, Head of Purchasing, Infineon Technologies AG
can easily consolidate and update supplier data or third-party data on a regular basis and keep track of which businesses belong to which company. SAP BW also includes a user-friendly Web reporting feature. Being able to access reports and evaluations on the Internet was an important criterion for pragmatic reasons, because it meant that we didnt have to install special presentation software on our PCs that were being used all over the globe, says Uhlik. Web reporting allows users to access the information with a regular Web browser.
EFFICIENT CONSULTING
In collaboration with Infineon, SAP Consulting carried out a feasibility study to show SAP BWs cost-effectiveness. The study clearly showed process improvements and the potential for savings. Preparation for the project began in October 2002. Using the AcceleratedSAP (ASAP) implementation method, the system went live in just under four months in February 2003. Through close collaboration with SAP Consulting, we were
We decided on SAP BW because the SAP data warehouse is a futureproof solution that can be easily integrated using standard interfaces across different releases and forms.
Thomas Uhlik, Spend Analysis Project Manager, Infineon Technologies AG
able to stick to the schedule and come in well under our budgeted costs, says Reischl. The SAP consulting team, which provided support during every project phase, partly via remote support, helped us reduce our consulting costs by about 30%. The project team implemented spend analysis functionality using SAP Consultings proven methods and tools. This, coupled with the use of SAP BW business content, which Infineon was able to use almost in its entirety, meant the project could be completed swiftly and smoothly. The preconfigured report and analysis scenarios helped us immensely, says Uhlik. With extremely complex operations in a multitude of countries, and material master data that differs from location to location, Infineon needed to tailor business content companywide. Master data should be harmonized in one to two years.
COMPLETE SOLUTIONS ALL UNDER ONE ROOF
The implementation, however, involved some challenges. Accommodating nine SAP R/3 Systems, releases 4.0 to 4.6, in different languages, and with each needing to be customized, was not an easy task, says Uhlik. Infineon also standardized around 450 product categories during the project. Today, some 100 employees use SAP BW including 25 core product managers around the world, employees in purchasing and controlling, and purchasing managers. Infineon loads data on all product groups from the Materials Management application transaction data every week, master data every four weeks. And, once a month, data on some 30,000 creditors is synchronized with the D&B database.
COMPREHENSIVE REPORTS FOR TRANSPARENCY
Today, using six standard reports available in SAP BW, Infineon creates the necessary transparency to optimize procurement processes and save costs. One type of report, which determines purchasing volume, contains the volume/number of invoices paid and the amounts paid. The total purchasing volume at Infineon can be sorted by vendor, purchasing organization (by client), purchaser, product group, and month. A second type of standard report enables invoice-to-order comparison. This provides an overview of number/volume of orders and the number/volume of invoices received for these orders. It also makes payment for outstanding purchasing volumes more transparent and makes it easy to see when a large number of transactions with a low volume are made to a single vendor. One important issue at Infineon includes the monitoring and optimization of its business relationships with the top 20 vendors from around the world. To address this need, the company uses tools within SAP BW to create reports that enable high-value vendor analyses. With the SAP solution, the company will always have at its fingertips a clear overview of its vendors, displayable by location, product group, and invoices paid.
Finance reports (FI reports) provide the volume of all paid invoices and credits which means that invoices without Materials Management orders or without involvement of the purchasing department are also included. FI reports give Infineon the necessary information to maverick buy without involving the purchasing department. The DUNS family tree provides information on which corporations/groups individual vendors belong to. This information is important for contract negotiations because this is the only way
With SAP BW, we get detailed, clear information on the entire purchasing volume at the touch of a button instead of the difficult-to-consolidate Excel lists we previously had.
Martina Kamm, Purchasing Department, Infineon Technologies AG
that Infineon can determine the total volume it purchases from a single corporation. And, finally, duplicate vendor analyses use companies DUNS numbers to identify and merge (or delete) duplicate creditors stored in local SAP R/3 Systems. This allows Infineon to reduce the number of creditors.
REAL BUSINESS VALUE
With SAP BW, we get detailed, clear information on our entire procurement volume at the touch of a button instead of the difficult-to-consolidate Excel lists we previously had, says Martina Kamm, a power user in Infineons central purchasing department in Munich. Employees, who especially like the intuitive navigation and excellent usability of the Web reporting function, also say that SAP BWs overall performance is very good.
As a result of its SAP BW implementation, Infineon expects to begin showing quantifiable savings in the 2003/2004 financial year, which starts on October 1, 2003. We know in advance exactly what we are going to buy, how much, and from whom, and we certainly benefit from the new level of transparency, says Reischl. We can bundle purchase volumes with individual vendors more effectively than previously, which gets us better prices. Infineon expects savings of 3% to 5% through volume bundling and by reducing the total number of vendors. SAP BW will have amortized within a year, which means a fast return on investment thats real business value, says Reischl.
THE NEXT STEP
After the successful SAP BW implementation, Infineon wants to implement other SAP tools this year. For example, it plans to introduce an electronic, catalog-based procurement system for selected products based on SAP Enterprise Buyer. The company also wants to extend the use of SAP BW by the end of 2003 to create and distribute consignment reports. This will support Infineons consignment model for procurement, where vendors deliver goods to Infineon warehouses, and
Through close collaboration with SAP Consulting, we were able to stick to the schedule and come in well under our budgeted costs.
Peter Reischl, Head of Purchasing, Infineon Technologies AG
Infineon pays only for the goods that are used. This dynamic approach of combining innovative procurement processes with SAP BW will allow Infineon to save on capital goods. With the help of SAP BW, Infineon can continue to empower employees, streamline purchasing and above all, reduce costs.
JANSSEN-CILAG
SAP SEM ENABLES EFFICIENT, INTEGRATED PLANNING AND BUDGETING
In 1997, Janssen-Cilag and SAP worked together to implement an enterprise resource planning system SAP R/3 at the companys facilities in Greece. The collaboration continues with the recent installation of the SAP Strategic Enterprise Management solution (SAP SEM), which is helping Janssen-Cilag turn its business strategy into a reality. The first step of the SAP SEM implementation, an efficient solution for setting up and monitoring business planning, went live in mid-spring 2003.
Janssen-Cilag Hellas is a member of the Johnson & Johnson group of companies. It was established in Greece in 1973 as a scientific office with 20 employees. In 1979, Johnson & Johnson expanded its operations in Greece with the establishment of Janssen Pharmaceutica AEBE, which began producing medicines with third parties in 1980. In 1994, Janssen Pharmaceutica and Cilag merged to form Janssen-Cilag Pharmaceutical AEBE. Today, Janssen-Cilag is one of the five biggest pharmaceutical companies in Greece and produces the greatest percentage of medicines in the country. It has facilities in Athens and Thessalonica and a workforce of more than 200 employees. The companys financial track record over the past six years is impressive. From 1997 to 2002, its revenue quadrupled from 43 million to 163 million (a 280% increase). Moreover, its pretax income during the same period rose from 570,000 to 15.6 million. The companys workforce doubled (from 113 employees in 1997 to 217 in 2002) as new positions opened up for Greek scientists. Janssen-Cilag produces, imports, and trades Johnson & Johnson pharmaceutical products, which cover many medicinal fields including hematology, nephrology, oncology, psychiatry, neurology, mycology, gastroenterology, and chronic pain. The company has been using SAP R/3 as its primary technology platform since 1998, following a decision by Johnson & Johnson. The original project, which included almost all of the main modules of SAP R/3, focused on the enhancement of internal procedures and administrative information. As a result, Janssen-Cilag relies on SAP R/3 to support its purchasing and sales cycles and to monitor production to third parties. The administrative information provided by the solution enables managers to make decisions at a local level.
It also helps them manage reports to the parent company, Johnson & Johnson. Now the company has extended SAP support into the strategic enterprise management (SEM) arena with the installation of SAP SEM technology. The first SAP SEM module implemented covers planning and budgeting.
THE CHALLENGE: INTEGRATED PLANNING AND BUDGETING PROCEDURES
An efficient planning and budgeting strategy is critical to Janssen-Cilags continued success. Planning/budgeting covers every aspect of the business, from normal day-to-day activity to strategic decision making. As a process, it is divided into three closely related procedures: targeting, regular budgeting, and strategic planning. In order to fully support these procedures, all departments of the organization must participate in them. However, for a planning process of this scale to be successful, several factors must be ensured. The most important of these are: Business communication between parties Joint developments between budget holders Interactions between departments Independence for budget holders Flexibility Bottom-up and top-down information flow It was obvious to Janssen-Cilag decision makers that most of these factors had to be monitored within a collaborative, flexible, and transparent planning environment that would enable all the process-related parties to work from the same page. Janssen-Cilag wanted a budget system that would allow some flexibility in a complex local environment but most importantly would be structured in such a way that it expresses corporate strategy and procedures.
Only in this way could we ensure the accuracy and security of the budget process and results, says Kostantinos Kostandinides, information management director at Janssen-Cilag. The company decided to empower its planning-related organizational activities with SAP SEM technology, beginning with Business Planning & Simulation (SEM-BPS).
SAP SEM: A TURNKEY SOLUTION
Currently, SEM-BPS provides a unified, flexible, and unique planning environment for the whole Janssen-Cilag organization. Most of the firms corporate procedures are integrated into the system. All budget holders have their own space for planning and submit their budget to the next level of approval
We decided to reconstruct our existing planning process in order to give the company a system that not only covers all the information and functions needed for complete budgeting, but also reflects corporate procedures for recording and managing budgeted data.
Kostantinos Kostandinides, Information Management Director, Janssen-Cilag Hellas
through an established submission process. A status & tracking systems function ensures that the process is monitored continuously, while predefined, system-generated alerts fulfill corporate requirements for deadline management, possible extensions, and time limits. The solution brings with it complementary benefits in the area of corporate reporting, which is crucial to the companys business development and is now handled automatically by the system. Actual data (stored primarily in the SAP R/3 System) and plan data (stored primarily in SAP SEM) are now using the same reporting engine, SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW). Another complementary benefit of the new system is a decrease in system maintenance procedure and planning procedure costs.
This results partly from the new SAP technology, but mostly from the fact that every participant in the planning process has to complete only a small piece of work while the system itself ensures integration, information delivery, and data protection. The implementation of the SAP SEM project began in September 2002 and went live in spring 2003 at the companys Greek facilities. It is considered a pilot for Janssen-Cilag operations across Europe. The implementation team consisted of personnel from Janssen-Cilag and SAP Consulting. With the support of SAP Consulting, we successfully implemented a demanding project, covering all our requirements, within a short period of time, says Kostandinides.
COMMITMENT TO SUCCESS
PLANNING / BUDGETING PROJECT AT A GLANCE

SAP solution SAP SEM
Hardware platform Compaq Operating system Database Number of users Implementation time Implementation partner Windows 2000 Oracle 58
6 months
SAP Consulting
Janssen-Cilag has already invested several days for training and familiarizing employees with the new planning/budgeting model. The companys final strategic map, a product of hard work by many project teams, was presented to all employees at a seminar. We are now ready to proceed to the final phase of the SEM project, Kostandinides says. During this final phase, the company must ensure that: All company goals are properly represented and that the appropriate interface is in place Quantitative determination of the goals is clear, based on all the factors specified as necessary when the plan was drawn up Results are accurate and easy to analyze, and the analysis demonstrates that the business warehouse solution and its properties reinforce the supply of information not only from SAP systems, but also from others
NEXT STEPS: ONE PROJECT LEADS TO ANOTHER
Performance measurement has always been a challenge for Janssen-Cilag. Now that the SEM-BPS budgeting project has been completed and had a successful production run, the company is ready to consider the implementation of Corporate Performance Monitor (SEM-CPM) for its corporate balanced scorecard development. This will strengthen its internal processes and complete the corporate vision of effective enterprise management. In the contemporary IT world, says Kostandinides, corporate strategy support and development in the broader area of an organization is the new strategic challenge.
LOEWE
SERVICE AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL WITH mySAP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
The Loewe trademark is synonymous with outstanding consumer electronics of the highest quality. This image did not evolve by chance. It is the result of innovative product development and meticulous customer care. Since January 2002, the tradition-based company has relied on its modern customer-care center and the special capabilities of mySAP Customer Relationship Management to strengthen its brand position and provide comprehensive support to its authorized dealers.
THE ULTIMATE IN HOME ENTERTAINMENT
Loewe has earned its reputation by offering only first-class products and first-class service. The company has received high acclaim on numerous occasions for the innovative design of its premium consumer electronics. Today it offers the whole range of devices for home entertainment: televisions, DVD players, VCRs, audio systems, and multimedia Internet TVs. Loewe manages approximately 50 international branches from its head office in Kronach, Germany. In Germany alone, the company employs more than 1,200 people. In 2001, it generated sales of 392 million worldwide.
CUSTOMER CARE: THE CUSTOMER AS FOCAL POINT
Loewe offers its customers the highest quality not only in the technology and design of its products, but also in service. The most important component of its highly developed service concept is the newly implemented customer-care center (CCC). Loewe started the center with the aim of offering the best service in the industry in order to consolidate the companys brand position with customers and provide comprehensive support to its authorized dealers. The customer-care center should be the central contact point for customers who have problems or questions, says Jens Hrtel, who heads up the CCC. We absorb the time-consuming problems that the dealers would otherwise have to deal with, which frees up more time for consulting and allows us to gain valuable feedback from customers. It is a win-win relationship for everyone involved.
A HIGHLY INTEGRATED SOLUTION
The mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) interaction center forms the basis of the Loewe customer-care center. As one of the key capabilities of mySAP CRM, the interaction center links front- and back-office processes. Complete integration with the SAP enterprise software, already implemented at Loewe, enables seamless information flow and supports the CCC processes. With the mySAP CRM implementation, Loewe created the foundation for an enterprise-wide solution based on the mySAP Business Suite platform.
CENTRAL CONTACT POINT FOR ALL CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTS
Loewe customers contact the CCC for a number of different reasons, for example, questions about guarantees, complaints, company information, or user support. Thanks to a standardized and up-to-date overview of the information, most questions can be answered directly on the telephone. Call agents forward the more detailed inquiries to a demo room. Here, a customer service representative works through the problem step-by-step with the end user until the problem is solved. If this is not possible, technical customer service is also available. Today, 80% of customer inquiries can be processed directly by excellently trained CCC staff, says Klaus Riedel, IT area manager for Loewe. Only 20% of inquiries have to be forwarded.
DETERMINING MARKET REQUIREMENTS
The mySAP CRM interaction center also helps Loewe determine market requirements. The SAP solution supports all media, such as telephone, fax, or e-mail. Customer information and history is systematically collected, logged, and analyzed, and then saved centrally. Loewes product-development and improvement team can then take this customer feedback and make modifications to products or use the information to develop new product lines. In the long term, Loewe plans to use mySAP CRM to strengthen its ties to customers which will ultimately help the company increase profits.
SUCCESS THROUGH COMPETENCY AND TRUST
With the support of SAP Consulting, the Loewe customer-care center went live in January 2002 after only six months. In May 2002, the company made an upgrade to SAP CRM 3.0, which converted the flow of activities from Loewe to the customer. SAP consultants, who brought sound knowledge of customerservice processes and industry-specific know-how to the table, worked together with Loewe to successfully implement the project on time and within budget. Plus, the close connection with the SAP development team enabled SAP consultants to make enhancements to the SAP standard system for example, speeding up data transfer from the database to the CCC. Last but not least, expert training provided by SAP consultants helped make certain that Loewe employees could soon work independently with the new software. Riedel sums up the situation: A careful step-by-step procedure, along with effective teamwork between SAP and Loewe, ensured a successful implementation.
Today, mySAP CRM provides Loewe with an optimal solution that enables streamlined processes and superior customer care all of which helps ensure the success of the companys enterprise strategy and gives Loewe a lasting edge over its competitors.
SOLUTIONS WITH PERSPECTIVE
The next step for Loewe includes enhancing the system by implementing mySAP CRM marketing capabilities. Then, after the trial period in Germany, the company will consider implementing mySAP CRM in Belgium and the United States. For Loewe, the SAP solution has made a world of difference. Without mySAP CRM, we would not be able to realize our vision, says Hrtel. We are now in a far better position to target our resources more effectively and offer the customer a fast and qualified answer.
mySAP SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AT MARICO

ENHANCING BRAND EQUITY BY IMPROVING DISTRIBUTION PERFORMANCE
Marico Industries Ltd. is a leading India-based consumer goods company with sales of Rs 6.96 billion (approximately $142 million) for the fiscal year ending March 2002. With six factories and about 1,000 employees, it has maintained steady revenue and profitability growth over the past 10 years. Marico offers a range of products to the local and export markets (primarily South Asia and the Middle East), including refined edible oils, food products such as jams and sauces, niche fabric care products, and hair oils. Marico was incorporated in 1988 and began commercial operations in 1990 when it acquired the consumer products division of Bombay Oil Industries. A key strength of the company since its inception has been its ability to build brands. Marico has pursued a rigorous approach to creating and sustaining its brands, focusing on understanding and anticipating consumer needs, innovating in distinct ways, developing advertising campaigns to reinforce value delivered to consumers, and tracking metrics that support product positioning strategies. The companys approach has enabled it to pioneer polyethylene packaging for coconut oils, a cold-water clothes starching product, and other unique developments. Marico faces competition from large, well-capitalized international rivals such as ConAgra Foods and Unilever, and from domestic brands, and non-branded products. Nevertheless, Maricos approach has enabled the company to create unique value for consumers and thereby to build significant market share in many product categories. Of Maricos nine brands, three are market leaders.
A key attribute of Maricos brands is the widespread availability of the companys goods throughout India. Maricos distribution network is key to ensuring that its products reach about 100 million people throughout the Indian subcontinent each month. Marico produces 125 stock-keeping units (SKUs) at its own factories and through 15 subcontracting manufacturers. It stores products at 32 warehouses and sells to 3,500 distributors. These distributors in turn provide products to 1.6 million domestic retail outlets. Maricos peer companies in other countries recognize its strength in distribution; consequently, Marico has secured a distribution alliance with Indo Nissin Foods and a distribution agreement with Procter & Gamble. Though Marico experienced robust expansion throughout the 1990s, the company realized that it would face challenges to continued profitable growth. Greater rivalry in its core markets meant it had to increase marketing expenditures. The company also was unable to sustain the performance of its supply chain as its scale of operations grew. Marico was increasingly experiencing inaccurate forecasts, excess inventory, stock-outs, and delays in response to market requirements. These supply chain performance issues were reducing Maricos cash flow and did not support the product brand images the company had taken care to develop.
In order to achieve sustained profitable growth, given market factors and the need to maintain its distribution effectiveness, Marico determined that it must improve its supply chain capabilities. Specifically, the company focused on customerfacing business processes as well as on its internal operations. After a careful analysis of alternatives, Marico selected mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM) to enable the reengineering of its associated planning and execution processes. Maricos goals included improving forecast accuracy and delivery performance in order to sustain the widespread availability of its products in the market and the associated positive perceptions of its brands. By concentrating on internal operations, Marico has been able to lower inventory and supply chain operating costs, particularly those expenses that could be reduced through better planning in areas such as intracompany stock transfers. The company has achieved improved cash flow to fund future growth, sustained the viability of its independent distributor network, and maintained those elements of its brands images that are tightly coupled with high availability of its products to its customers.
CHALLENGES AND OBJECTIVES
Although Marico had achieved a compound annual growth rate of about 18% during the 1990s, the company recognized in the latter part of the decade that it must renew its focus on profitability in order to participate in long-term growth opportunities.
The company had become highly dependent on its three leading brands for generating revenue and earnings, and was facing increasing competition in the associated edible oil markets as well as in other product categories. This meant that Marico would have to increase its advertising expenditures to defend the market positions of its various products and continue to invest in product development to ensure continued growth. Moreover, even though distribution was a core strength for Marico, the performance of its supply chain network was not keeping pace with the growing scale of its operations. For example, the company had a planning cycle of 30 days, and, during this period, was unable to respond to changes in demand. The bucketed time horizons for manufacturing and distribution were not synchronized and distribution levels were uneven, with a weighting of 15%, 32%, and 53% for the first, second, and final third of each month. This suboptimal skewing of distribution activity over time, coupled with low levels of forecast accuracy, led to a mismatch of supply and demand, inventory build-ups at Marico and at its distributors, expired products, and stock-outs all of which adversely affected endconsumer perceptions. Total delivered costs were increasing due to storage capacity constraints, which often required interwarehouse stock transfers, temporary renting of additional storage space, and truck demurrage. Also, spreadsheet-based planning methods and multiple, nonintegrated transaction systems inhibited widespread visibility into essential data, further compounding planning-process problems. Thus, key goals for Marico included improved forecast accuracy and more uniform distribution levels throughout each month. The company also needed to reengineer its planning processes to more effectively match supply and demand. As a result, costs would be more in line with best-in-class operations in the consumer industry. Inventory carrying costs and total supply chain costs would be reduced, freeing cash flow to reinvest in growth-generating activities. Marico targeted improvements in stock-out reductions and on-time delivery that would be a consequence of better planning processes. These actions would support the companys branding initiatives as well as help ensure the profitable operation and continued viability of its distributor network.
IMPLEMENTATION
In 1999, Marico initiated a detailed evaluation of its supply chain operations to determine how best to reduce costs, satisfy customer needs, support its brands images, and position the company for long-term growth. The company concluded that sourcing and manufacturing were straightforward, while its distribution operations were the key source of opportunity. Marico procured only a few commodity raw materials (for example, vegetable oils and safflower seeds), had no major manufacturing capacity constraints, had no sales seasonality associated with its products, and minimized artificially induced demand surges by avoiding the use of promotions. However, the distribution network was complex, with SKU/distribution point combinations numbering in the millions. Marico focused on business processes that addressed internal collaborative forecasting between its manufacturing sites and warehouses. The company defined clear responsibilities to ensure that distribution from its warehouses to distributors would meet service-level and inventory objectives. Also, the company implemented policies to distinguish the relative priority of SKUs and of distributors. After a careful evaluation, Marico selected mySAP SCM to enable the associated planning and execution processes. These processes included calculation of monthly shipment requirements from its plants to its warehouses to support make-to-stock operations, electronic transfer of stock-level data from the distributors to Marico, and push distribution of products from Marico to distributors based on forecasted retail-level demand and distributor inventory levels. Implementation of SAP R/3 capabilities in finance, cost accounting, materials management, production planning, quality management, and sales and distribution was started in June 2000 and went live quickly in a big bang implementation in April 2001. Implementation of the demand-planning and supply-network-planning capabilities of SAP Planning & Optimization, a key component of mySAP SCM along with the SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW) began in August 2000 and went live in a big bang implementation in May 2001.
Twenty-six staff members and 20 consultants from SAP Consulting and its partner Siemens Information Systems Ltd. (SISL) assisted in the project, using AcceleratedSAP (ASAP) methodologies to ensure a rapid implementation. The scope included all company factories, warehouses, and business offices; distributors; and contract manufacturers; and the implementation achieved systems integration that efficiently supported the new planning and execution processes. The implementation produced quick results. By early 2002, forecast accuracy was improved by 14%, and the levels of shipment activity through each third of a month had become more even (25%, 32%, and 43%). The planning-cycle time was reduced from 30 days to 1520 days, and enhanced reporting facilitated management decision making. These results led to reduced internal and distributor inventory, fewer stock-outs, lower levels of lost sales, and reduced supply chain exception-handling costs. In the future, Marico plans to implement vendor-managed inventory (VMI) processes by making use of Internet-based integration of distributors stock levels into the companys SAP R/3 system. This VMI implementation will enable Marico to further reduce the planning cycle to 10 days and ensure greater visibility into distributor operations, reduced inventory, lower supply chain management costs, and higher levels of delivery performance. These results will continue to reinforce the companys branding initiatives and position Marico for long-term, profitable growth.
AT A GLANCE
Strategic goals
Enhance long-term value of company brands by achieving excellence in distribution performance Maintain market share growth in a competitive environment with much larger, offshore rivals Scale supply chain operations to sustain customer service as the business grows Reduce total delivered costs
Approach Marico shortened its planning cycle from 30 days to about 15 days; revised its demand-planning process to forecast sales out (shipment from distributors to retailers); and implemented an improved process to replenish its distributors. The company focused on achieving relatively even shipment levels throughout each month and developed internal collaborative processes to support planning. This approach was enabled by mySAP Supply Chain Management software, which includes demand planning and supply network planning capabilities coupled with SAP R/3 and SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW). Results achieved during 3Q01 to 1Q02
Decreased stock-outs associated with distributor sales to retailers by 33% Reduced lost sales due to stock-outs by 28%, thereby improving total revenue by 1.5% Lowered excess distributor inventory by 33% Reduced late deliveries to distributors by 37.5% Reduced costs associated with supply chain
exceptions by 25% (for example, intracompany stock transfers, and truck detention costs) Positioned the company for a vendor-managed inventory implementation and further performance improvements
MULTIBRS
MULTIBRS MAXIMIZES CUSTOMER SATISFACTION WITH INTERNET SALES FROM mySAP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
Multibrs is the Brazilian market leader in home appliances. To ensure its continued success, the company wanted to provide its retailers, both large and small, with improved efficiency and higher quality service. Thats why Multibrs implemented Internet Sales with mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM). Now, the company offers a new online sales channel to customers, where they can get product information, place orders, and monitor order status anytime and anywhere.
PRODUCTS IN DEMAND
Founded in 1994 with the merger of three domestic appliance companies Brastemp, Consul, and Semer Multibrs is the leading manufacturer of household appliances in Brazil, with sales in 2001 exceeding U.S.$708 million. As the leader in this market, Multibrs serves thousands of customers. Its products are in high demand by most households and are sold throughout the country in retail outlets of all sizes. As the sole manufacturer of a complete family of white line products, Multibrs sells retail merchandise including refrigerators, chest and upright freezers, stoves, washing machines, dryers, dishwashers, microwave ovens, air conditioners, and air purifiers. With its Brastemp brand of goods, the company also offers small kitchen appliances such as mixers, coffee machines, blenders, and food processors.
SUPERIOR SERVICE IS A TOP PRIORITY
Serving customers with increased efficiency and higher quality service in presales, sales, and postsales activities was a high priority for Multibrs. By improving the ability to respond to customers, the companys management knew the result would be added customer loyalty and retention. To accomplish that objective, it decided to implement Internet Sales with mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM). Internet Sales covers the entire process chain associated with online selling through the Internet from creating appealing online product catalogs to price promotions, order processing, secure payment transactions, and order status checking.
Manufacturing Industries 92 Consumer Industries
Multibrs first introduced its online-shopping capabilities to a pilot group of retailers through its Web portal. This phase of the project was met with great success. [With mySAP CRM], retailers can count on accessing a large variety of self-service information through Multibrs corporate portal, without time limitations or the restrictions of working hours, says Renato Faure, Multibrs director of information technology. This enhances our relationship with our trade partners. As an added benefit, the company has seen more efficient use of its support staff in the customer service center. Now, these employees can be more proactive, rather than reactive, to problem-solving on behalf of customers.
A SOLUTION THAT MEETS INTEGRATION REQUIREMENTS
From the viewpoint of Multibrs executives, choosing mySAP CRM was a natural next step. We have been using SAP R/3 since 1998, with 1,400 of 3,500 stations in our network running SAP, says Faure. We opted for this [CRM] solution with integration in mind. This solution is an ideal match for our requirements. Implementation took only three months, with software localization done on the fly. We relied on the support of SAP Consulting and SAP Global Custom Development Services teams based in Germany and India to adapt the solution to the Brazilian tax system, Faure explains. At Multibrs, four people were directly involved with the implementation two from the IT group and two business specialists. Four SAP Consulting professionals from SAPs Brazilian subsidiary were also committed to this project.
Multibrs wanted to make sure that the online implementation would meet customer expectations. To ensure this, it initiated a program to get user comments. For the initial stages, we chose companies that would give us honest feedback and make suggestions, providing us with a true picture of this online capability from their point of view.
NEXT STEPS
Looking ahead, Multibrs sees the benefits of mySAP CRM. During the coming months, we will analyze the potential of expanding the project and at the same time plan to widen it to a larger group of customers, says Faure. Multibrs is developing a service project using mySAP CRM to support authorized dealers with technical assistance through its portal. Plans are being made to publish an electronic catalog of parts, manuals, and technical newsletters on the Web. At that point, we will start to accept orders for spare parts through the portal, and give customers access to information about the status of each of their orders.
NATO HELICOPTER INDUSTRIES

BUILDING HELICOPTERS WITH mySAP PRODUCT LIFECYCLE MANAGEMENT
NATO Helicopter Industries (NHI), a joint venture between four industrial enterprises in the aerospace and defense sectors, chose mySAP Product Lifecycle Management (mySAP PLM) to manage the development process, from concept to serial production, of its NH90 helicopter. Only a tool as structured and functionally rich as mySAP PLM could have enabled us to carry out the tasks set by France, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands, says Jean-Michel Poulier, operations manager at NHI. Only SAP was able to guarantee us assistance in implementing and hosting the solution.
NATO Helicopter Industries (NHI) was formed at the beginning of the 1990s when four NATO member countries France, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands decided to join forces to design and build a new military helicopter, the NH90. In February 1992, the four member nations set up the NATO Helicopter Management Agency (NAHEMA). The purpose of NAHEMA was to manage the product development project and engage four industrial enterprises to carry it out: Eurocopter France, Eurocopter Deutschland (Germany), Fokker (the Netherlands), and Italys Agusta. As part of its first mission in 1992, NHI designed five prototypes that, with more than 1,000 hours of flying time to their credit, are now used as development and testing tools. In June 2000, NHI, which by then had more than 60 partners, signed its second contract with NAHEMA for the serial production of the helicopter. We already have an order book of 300 firm orders and an organized industrial outfit. The NH90 will be assembled at three production facilities Milan, Marignane, and Munich and each of the four industrial partners will be responsible for buying or manufacturing the various components of the helicopters, says Jean-Michel Poulier, operations manager at NHI. We also decided to centralize two strategic functions within NHI: helicopter configuration and production plan management. That was why we decided we needed a flexible management system.
EXTREMELY DEMANDING REQUIREMENTS
NHI organized a tender among software developers and presented them with extremely demanding terms: the system had to be integrated and structure-defining in order to optimize the internal decision-making process. In addition due to NHIs limited IT resources customization of the system had to be easy and fast. We also wanted it to be one of the standard systems used in the aerospace industry, so that we could benefit from upgrades resulting from advances in the sector, says Poulier. Finally, we werent just seeking a software developer. What we needed was a partner who would be prepared to help us set up the system and look after hosting and operating it. SAP was the only company that met our long list of criteria. The mySAP Product Lifecycle Management (mySAP PLM) solution is the perfect solution to meet our functional requirements.
OPTIMAL CONFIGURATION MANAGEMENT
NHI and SAP signed a deal in December 2000. By May 2001, the configuration management function was up and running, followed by the configuration change tracking capabilities, and the integration to production planning. The deadlines and budgets were totally respected, thanks to four factors: a rigorous investigation of our processes and objectives before the project which enabled us to get started with a clear set of ideas; the hands-on experience of the SAP consultants, their excellent knowledge of the aerospace industry, and their efficiency; the fact that we placed the implementation of the solution in the hands of professionals with a track record; and finally, our decision to stick to the mySAP PLM standards, says Poulier.
NHI began serial production of two models of the NH90 in the summer of 2001: one for troop transportation and one for coastal surveillance work. The configurations requested by the projects clients (the four original member nations, recently joined by the Scandinavian countries) are managed in SAP, which automatically generates component requirements and production plans to be submitted to the four industrial partners. The SAP solution is an excellent tool for enhancing productivity, said Poulier. It enables us to manage our two complex activities, multisite configuration and planning, on very limited resources: only three people for configuration and two for production planning. NHI calculated that the savings realized with respect to these two functions alone, which are normally highly resource intensive, meant that the solution would pay for itself in less than two years, with operating costs kept under control, thanks to hosting. Moreover, the flexibility of mySAP PLM meant that NHI could modify configurations right up to the last minute. This enables NHI to offer a tailored approach to its clients evolving needs and constraints, while keeping track of the product structures for the 16 years already covered by its order book.
A STRONG ADVANTAGE
NHI opened up its system to its clients at the beginning of 2002, so they can now review their orders and monitor how their configuration data is changing in real time. Our clients are very impressed at the structure and stability that mySAP PLM injects into our production programs, says Poulier. The SAP solution is a real sales advantage for us, as it gives our clients confidence in our ability via our industrial partners to deliver the configurations they require on time. mySAP PLM is only the first stage, however. NHI has already begun implementing other mySAP Business Suite solutions, for example to improve pricing procedures as it prepares to expand its client base. NHI also has long-term plans to implement collaboration tools based on the integration of NHIs system with those of its industrial partners. Eurocopter France and Eurocopter Deutschland run SAP R/3, and Agusta runs SAP R/2. Fokker is the only one to run a non-SAP system. As Poulier says, Our objective is to arrive gradually at a situation where we are making full use of the potential offered by mySAP Business Suite.
PHILIPS LIGHTING
CENTRALIZED LOGISTICS SYSTEM INTEGRATES MANAGEMENT INFORMATION, CRM, AND PURCHASING
Anticipating the further integration of the European market, Lamps Europe, the European business unit of Philips Lighting, began to restructure its organization in 1996 by forming three market groups. In the future, marketing and pricing policy would be decided centrally in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, while product distribution would be handled by three main distribution centers. An important objective of the restructure was to optimize internal processes to achieve integrated European logistics planning. To accomplish its new organization structure, Philips Lighting chose to replace its local European computer systems with the integrated software of SAP.
BASIS FOR EUROPEAN INTEGRATION
Lights are the product that has made Philips one of the worlds biggest electronics companies. And today, Philips Lighting is a stable and profitable business division of Philips. The division serves three markets: retail (the consumer as end buyer), professional wholesale (electrical contracting firms), and OEMs (original equipment manufacturers). Each of those markets has its own needs. An ordinary bulb is very different from, say, a cooking lamp or a stadium lighting system, explains Louis Luijten, chief information officer and SAP manager at the business unit Lamps Europe. We operate in different markets, with a very broad product range. All these products are manufactured with a wide array of techniques that require many different base materials. In other words, at Philips Lighting youll find all conceivable logistics concepts in the industry. People dont always appreciate what it takes to manufacture and sell a simple light bulb. To retain the small margins that keep our business alive we have to constantly optimize our internal processes. In the mid-nineties, when Philips Lighting saw that more and more businesses were reorganizing themselves on both a European and a global level and gaining strength by bundling their buying power it realized that it was time to regroup. However, it recognized that its existing automation environment would be a hindrance. All branches were using their own systems, interconnected by Electronic Data Interchange (EDI). Therefore, in 1996, Philips decided to replace all local systems with a single integrated system.
And Philips chose SAP. It was a strategic choice, explains Luijten. SAP is a stable partner who can take our enterprise into the future. Their software has the scope and robustness a multinational such as Philips needs. The next question was: Do we opt for integration or best of breed? The transparency and simplicity of the integration concept eventually swayed our decision. We chose SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW) to extract the required management information, and, in a later stage, mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM). We never even considered other suppliers. As long as SAP can fulfill more than 80% of our wishes, thats good enough for us.
STEADFAST PARTNER AND SUPPLIER
In 1997, Lamps Europe embarked on a five-year plan that would lead to the full implementation of SAP R/3 at all European branches. SAP partner Cyber Solution Partners was brought on board to support the implementation process. Was Luijten ever afraid that the megaproject might be too ambitious? Every big IT project is a high-risk affair. Nevertheless, weve been able to keep the promise that we made in 1997, by connecting all branches with a total of 5,500 employees to SAP R/3, on time and within budget. How did we manage? First and foremost, thanks to the high level of commitment within the organization.
A project like this needs vision from management, an understanding of the reasons, and a willingness to promote that understanding in the organization. Also, its crucial to make the necessary human and material resources time, money, and attention available. And, since youre dealing with a fiveyear project, patience and a constant focus on the future are indispensable.
SAP is a stable partner who can take our enterprise into the future.
Louis Luijten, Chief Information Officer and SAP Program Manager, Philips
The quality of project management and continuity of the project team are a second prerequisite. Because the European market organization was new and we had zero experience with SAP R/3, our partner and supplier played an important role. It also explains why we were eager to set up a European competence center so quickly. And, when dealing with the local organizations, its important you stick to your guns. This calls for determination on the part of ones partner and supplier. Sometimes our consultants went into the field, knife clenched between the teeth, adamant to defend the objectives of the project: a single European organization with a single IT system.
CRUCIAL FIGURES ROUTINELY AVAILABLE
Lamps Europe has experienced many concrete advantages of its SAP R/3 implementation. Centralized distribution, which could not have happened without an integrated IT system, has already yielded considerable cost savings. The integrated planning system within SAP R/3 has optimized the entire supply chain. Weve been able to structurally reduce stocks by 35%. On the organizational level were already enjoying the benefits of SAP, notes Luijten. Its all very well to convert your company to a European market group organization that can establish a price policy and a marketing vision centrally, but you can do that only when you have the right information at hand. Thats why we not only replaced all local systems but also the central consolidation systems. In their place, we implemented a central management information system based on SAP BW. In the old days, each country had anywhere from five to seven local information systems.
It was impossible to extract simple, uniform information on sales, performance, financial performance, and very important profitability per customer. With mySAP Business Intelligence (mySAP BI), those figures are routinely available now.
EASIER DOING BUSINESS
AT A GLANCE
SAP solution
SAP R/3 SAP BW mySAP CRM SAP Enterprise Buyer

Professional (mySAP SRM) SAP APO
In early 2001, Lamps Europe decided to extend its SAP portfolio with mySAP Customer Relationship Management and mySAP Supplier Relationship Management (mySAP SRM). Philips once again chose to work with Cyber Solution Partners,
Our stocks have been structurally reduced by 35%.
Louis Luijten, Chief Information Officer and SAP Program Manager, Philips
Hardware platform IBM RS/6000 R80 and S80 Operating system Database Number of users Implementation time IBM AIX Oracle 8 7,500
5 years
Implementation partners
along with SAP Nederland and SAP AG. The CRM solution served the double purpose of enabling mobile access to sales information for field staff and providing an extranet application for customers. In addition, a pilot for e-procurement of parts and machinery was set up for the manufacturing plants. As Luijten explains, The efficiency of the order desk has been increased and customers now find it easier to do business with us. The CRM solution of SAP has replaced some 20 local applications. The extranet, which is especially for smaller retailers and wholesalers that are not ready to invest in EDI, is now up and running in four countries. The product is not received enthusiastically everywhere some customers are very reluctant to use this technology, while others, like those in Scandinavia, readily embrace it but were aiming principally at long-term customer retention. It made sense to get the system going as soon as possible because technology strides ahead fast, and these days you dont get much time to respond. Philips Lighting has plans to extend its adoption of the mySAP Business Suite family of business solutions. Looking to the future, it wants to deploy mySAP Supply Chain Management worldwide to maximize supply chain efficiency at a global level.
Cyber Solution Partners SAP Nederland SAP AG SAP Consulting

Services
(SAP R/3 and SAP BW, 50 plants) 1 year (mySAP CRM)
ratiopharm
MAXIMIZING REVENUE WITH TAILORED CUSTOMER MANAGEMENT AT GERMANYS LARGEST PHARMACEUTICAL MANUFACTURER
In order to ensure a future in the dynamic pharmaceutical market, comprehensive and up-to-date knowledge of customer requirements is becoming increasingly important, along with product excellence. With the help of mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM), ratiopharm has access to this knowledge, which enables it to tailor its sales activities more specifically to the most important customer segments, improve customer retention, and intensify its efforts to gain new customers.
Over the last 25 years, ratiopharm has transformed the German pharmaceutical market. The company, based in Ulm, Germany, develops, produces, and markets generic products: preparations with active agents whose patents have run out. Its slogan, your health our commitment, is backed by ratiopharms commitment to offer low-cost, high-quality medication across numerous branches of medicine a cheaper alternative to the original products. The company is enjoying visible success: ratiopharm ranks as the largest pharmaceutical manufacturer, with the most-prescribed brand of medication in Germany today. However, forward-looking strategies are needed to maintain this success in the hotly competitive pharmaceutical market, with cost-cutting measures and deregulation already pushing down the margins. The profit margins in our industry sector wont always stay at the present level, says Peter Prock, chief financial officer at ratiopharm. To actively meet the challenge, ratiopharm has devised an aggressive strategy: the company intends to extend its current role as a market-leading manufacturer of generic products to become a significant medical supplier in Europe. ratiopharm plans to achieve this by shifting the emphasis from products to customers.
CRM: FUNDAMENTAL COMPONENT OF STRATEGIC CHANGE
The use of progressive information technology is of fundamental importance for ratiopharms strategy. The company needs flexibility just as much as the ability to adapt to the dynamic conditions of the pharmaceutical market. As the inherent requirements change, the role of the participants is also redefined. Pharmacies, for instance, have become increasingly significant as a result of deregulation of prescription-only medication.
It often lies at the pharmacys discretion whether a patient is given a biological equivalent or the therapeutic preparation prescribed by the doctor. But, thats all changing: consumers can now demand what preparation they receive. The interactions have become much more complex, explains Stefan Langthaler, head of business systems at ratiopharm. Against this background, systematic customer relationship management is becoming more of a focal point, which means comprehensive data must be available in order to support relations with doctors, pharmacies, hospitals, and consumers.
Collaboration with SAP will definitely enable us to develop and refine our customer strategies, which will not only secure our competitive advantage in todays pharmaceutical market, but also pave the way for future growth.
Peter Prock, Chief Financial Officer at ratiopharm
For example, analytical evaluation to direct sales activities at customer segments can help companies improve their chances of generating greater profits which is why ratiopharm decided to use mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) and its mobile sales capability to support the companys external sales force.
CONSULTING BY SAP: COMPETENT AND RAPID INTERNATIONAL IMPLEMENTATION
In keeping with the ratiopharm policy of rapid reaction, this decision was soon followed by action the company equipped its German primary care sales team with mySAP CRM and its mobile sales capability within five months. The rollout for the full sales team in Spain followed two months later, and, after another four months, the entire German sales organization began working with the new solution. Throughout this tight schedule, ratiopharm relied on the extensive knowledge of the
mySAP CRM enables us to provide more tailored support for customers, significantly increase the efficiency of the external sales force, and react more quickly to the dynamic pharmaceutical market.
Stefan Langthaler, Head of Business Systems at ratiopharm
industry and detailed product experience of SAP Consulting. From the start, the consultants impressed the company with their competent and goal-oriented project management. Their direct cooperation with SAP product development contributed to the successful and effective realization of customer requirements. The success at ratiopharm reflects favorably on the all-encompassing SAP services portfolio, which includes innovative SAP software and proven consulting services. The days of struggling with difficult process and data integration and incomplete customer information are over at ratiopharm; mySAP CRM ensures that ratiopharms external sales force has the full and latest picture about its customers and their potential and requirements anytime, anywhere.
CUSTOMER INFORMATION AT YOUR FINGERTIPS
Today, mySAP CRM provides ratiopharms external sales force members with everything they need to address target groups effectively comprehensive knowledge about pharmacies, doctors, and clinics. Information about products, prices, and competitors is also available at the touch of a button, and a link between mySAP CRM and an external address pool produces up-to-date information on customers and contacts.
The solution also increases productivity by helping sales force employees prepare for customer visits. Various functions help simplify the whole sales process, including arranging appointments and completing correspondence, selecting experts, and planning trips, as well as generating follow-up reports and analyses. mySAP CRM then goes even further by forwarding orders that the sales force entered while in the field into the internal processing system. And finally, order management capabilities provide comprehensive coverage of every stage in the sales process. With mySAP CRM, we can provide more tailored support for customers, significantly increase the efficiency of the external sales force, and react more quickly to the dynamic pharmaceutical market, says Langthaler. The technology supports our strategy of moving away from a solely product-oriented vision, in order to focus considerably more on our customers.
RAPID ROI
AT A GLANCE
Software mySAP CRM mobile sales capabilities SAP R/3 Fujitsu Siemens (server) Compaq (clients) Windows NT Windows 2000 Oracle 510
Hardware
Operating system
Database Number of users
According to a CRM return-on-investment (ROI) review published by Peppers and Rogers, a firm that specializes in customer-oriented strategies, ratiopharm can expect 63% effective interest on its capital expenditure over a three-year period with an amortization period of only 16 months as a result of implementing mySAP CRM. According to the analysis, ratiopharm can also expect a considerable increase in sales figures in the next three years a 46% increase in sales to the most valuable customers (category A customers) and 32% to category B customers. The review also states that ratiopharm will raise its total number of customer contacts by 17% and customer churn will be minimized by analyzing and fulfilling customer expectations. We have calculated that even a 1% reduction in customer churn will pay for our entire investment, explains Prock. Collaboration with SAP will definitely enable us to develop and refine our customer strategies, which will not only secure our competitive advantage in todays pharmaceutical market, but also pave the way for future growth.
ROYAL DUTCH/SHELL GROUP

mySAP SRM FUELS SHELLS CORPORATE VISION
One of the largest corporations in the world, the Royal Dutch/Shell Group was founded in 1907 when N.V. Koninklijke Nederlandsche Petroleum Maatschappij merged with Shell Transport and Trading Company plc. A diverse group of energy companies with operations in over 140 countries, its businesses include oil and gas exploration and production; power generation; manufacturing, marketing, and shipping of oil products and chemicals; and renewable energy projects including wind and solar power.
PURCHASING POWER
Shopping is fun especially if theres an occasional bargain to snap up. But if youre really serious about getting high-quality goods at reasonable prices, then you need to be able to see exactly what all manufacturers and suppliers are offering. With SAPs support, the Royal Dutch/Shell Group of Companies will soon be able to systematically manage their suppliers across the world. Shells daily purchasing bill runs into millions. This huge corporation produces approximately 3% of the worlds oil supply and holds interests in 55 refineries in 33 countries. Keeping its facilities operational means ensuring a constant supply of spare parts and equipment. From ballpoint pens to high-tech drilling platforms, Shell has to keep supplies flowing to operating companies in over 140 countries and this is precisely the challenge that the companys procurement experts are currently tackling. Shells long history of success (the company will celebrate its 100th anniversary in 2007) has left the company with a somewhat problematic legacy. Numerous mergers and acquisitions have created a diverse system landscape consisting of more than 100 back-end systems running different versions of ERP applications JD Edwards and, principally, SAP. Inevitably, the companys purchasing processes have not remained immune to this situation; each local operating unit is responsible for procuring its own goods and services. Whats more, information gaps and differing requirements in the various business units have so far stymied any attempts to introduce systematic supplier relationship management at the global level.
But this situation is set to change. In a project that it calls Transactional E-Procurement, Shell is aiming to enter a new era in supplier relationship management. By deploying SAP solutions on its existing ERP systems, the company plans among other things to streamline its procurement processes and cut its costs accordingly. But it needs to do some basic preparation first: This will consist of achieving data synchronization across the system landscape and providing analysis tools to generate vital management information. After all, if both the procurement people and the business management teams dont have all the facts, they cant be expected to evaluate supplier relationships objectively, let alone embark on effective strategic planning.
TRUSTING SAP TECHNOLOGY
To me, implementing the Transactional E-Procurement project is like building a new gas processing plant, says Steve Iveson, Shells e-procurement project manager and a member of the team responsible for leading the project out of corporate headquarters in London. You have to invest in both the technology and the associated change before you reap the benefits. Currently, Shells main investments are in two core elements of mySAP Supplier Relationship Management (mySAP SRM): the SAP Enterprise Buyer procurement application and the exchange infrastructure. In addition to functioning as a private exchange to provide an integration hub for Shells procurement operations, this exchange platform will run key applications for evaluating and optimizing supplier relationships and for integrating content.
The project plan envisions installing separate SAP Enterprise Buyer installations for the JD Edwards and SAP back-end systems and using XML messaging to link them to the private exchange. From here, orders will be transmitted to TradeRanger, a global e-procurement hub for buyers and suppliers
E-procurement enables us to make radical changes to the way we buy, the speed at which we buy, the way we and our suppliers work together, and the way we can use information to manage our business in the connected economy.
Chris Miller, Shell Group Adviser, Strategic Sourcing
in the oil and petrochemical industries. Trade-Ranger is set to play a key role in Shells procurement architecture. In fact, Shell wants its purchasing volume through Trade-Ranger to approach several hundred million U.S. dollars by the end of 2002, and to process 50% of its procurement business via this channel in just a few years thereafter. Already Shell and other major corporations from the energy and petrochemical sectors have positioned Trade-Rangers hub as the central axis for their electronic purchasing.
With the establishment of a new global procurement infrastructure, Shell is building on its existing strategic partnership with SAP. Shell was impressed by two strategic capabilities of mySAP SRM: options for integrating it with Shells installed ERP systems and its uniquely open and scalable technology. Moreover, SAP and Shell are working together to implement a number of new enhancements. Iveson states, When it comes down to it, were both pursuing the same vision. He then adds, Most importantly, the infrastructure were putting in place will give us the ideal platform for realizing our goal of fully integrated systems that support real collaboration both internally and externally.
JOINT STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENTS
The focus of this close collaboration is a group of strategic development projects (SDPs) that fulfill Shells business requirements and will also influence future SAP components. The projects include constructing a cross-system of master data management (content integration solution from SAP), implementing the analytical functionality of mySAP SRM to Shells specifications in the companys private exchange, and integrating JD Edwardss back-end systems into the SAP-based procurement environment. After all, if global spend reporting is to be effective, Shells managers need an accurate breakdown of purchasing expenditures across categories such as business units, suppliers, supplier families, and material groups. Iveson is particularly impressed by the analytics for breaking purchasing data down to the level of individual articles so that managers, for example, can identify the best supplier for a specific article. In Shells case, aggregating purchasing data at the ERP level is difficult because of the different data structures in their disparate back-end systems. Among its other advantages, the private exchange infrastructure offers enhanced master data management, which enables synchronization of master data for both internal and external suppliers. The content integration solution from SAP, for example, provides invaluable support when it comes to standardizing distributed content. Among other things, it helps identify identical or similar products and goods, no matter where the relevant information is stored.
Shell Information Technology International is responsible for installing the private exchange at one of Shells own IT centers near Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. Frans Liefhebber, Shells global e-procurement IT manager and a colleague of Steve Iveson, explains: Weve already got several hundred people there looking after Shells IT infrastructure. Whats more, they also handle key parts of Shells worldwide desktop support. So it made perfect sense to set up the private exchange at this location. The companys e-procurement hub went live with its initial functions in mid 2002. The key challenge for us is working out how we can provide optimal support for this high-availability infrastructure, says Liefhebber. Deciding what tools we need and which teams will be responsible is all part of the learning process.
SUCCESSFUL PILOT PROJECTS
SAP Enterprise Buyer, on the other hand, has already earned its place at Shell. Following a pilot last year at SEPCo (Shell Exploration & Production Company), the U.S. upstream subsidiary of the Royal Dutch/Shell Group, SAP Enterprise Buyer has been implemented at the Dutch upstream company NAM. This was a real showcase project, says Iveson. And there is now nothing to stop the planned rollout from proceeding rapidly, business unit by business unit. In many instances, the rollout will be accompanied by key ERP standardization initiatives currently underway in various business areas. Shell plans to have SAP Enterprise Buyer up and running in all the main operating units by 2004. Were looking at approximately 20,000 users in the exploration and production business alone, Iveson estimates.
Theyll benefit from being able to access online catalogs to quickly and easily order goods direct from selected suppliers rather than having to take the tortuous and time-consuming route through the more traditional procurement processes. This means that the purchasing people will be able to devote more time to vital tasks such as strategic sourcing. Iveson and Liefhebber are enthusiastic about the deployment of electronic procurement for services, which accounts for 70% of all Shell purchases and thus offers enormous potential for optimization. Information about costly routine maintenance, which counts as service purchases, is stored in SAP Plant Maintenance components in Shells SAP back-end systems, where it can be accessed via SAP Enterprise Buyer. When it comes to procuring more complex services, though, the two Shell managers agree that the existing applications need further work, which they know that SAP is addressing. So far, both Iveson and Liefhebber are satisfied with the progress of Shells Transactional E-Procurement project and with SAP as a partner. The ongoing challenge, as Liefhebber explains, remains how to respond effectively to the constant stream of changes that take place both inside and outside the project environment. For his part, Iveson remains confident that SAP will work with Shell to overcome these challenges.
SCHWARZ PHARMA
GUARANTEEING CUSTOMER SATISFACTION WITH mySAP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
SCHWARZ PHARMA Deutschland selected mySAP CRM from the portfolio of solutions offered by SAP for Pharmaceuticals to create a standardized view of all customer-related data. The project is part of the companys business excellence initiative, which it uses to enable a more strategic focus on customers. Besides creating a stable data platform, mySAP CRM helps the company to better identify profitable customers, increase the quality of service, and tailor marketing campaigns more appropriately.
SCHWARZ PHARMA Deutschland values its customer relationships. Their goal is to become the pharmaceutical company with the most satisfied customers in Germany. They intend to achieve this by diligently following the principles of business excellence, and striving for constant improvement in all business areas and services. Excellence is no stranger to the company. It develops and markets innovative drugs for unmet medical needs with a focus on the therapeutic areas of neurology and urology, as well as cardiovascular and gastrointestinal diseases. In 2002 the company, which is headquartered in Monheim, Germany with a workforce of approximately 600 employees, had global sales of 964 million. Implementing mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM), from the portfolio of solutions offered with SAP for Pharmaceuticals, represented an important milestone on the path towards continuous optimization for SCHWARZ PHARMA. One of the deciding factors in selecting mySAP CRM, along with its functionality, was seamless integration into SCHWARZ PHARMAs existing SAP environment. SAP scored additional points for being a single-source provider, with software and consulting from SAP Consulting as an integrated package.
STANDARDIZED AND INTEGRATED VIEW OF ALL CUSTOMER DATA
mySAP CRM succeeded in unifying customer data that had previously been managed in a decentralized way. As a result, we have a complete picture of our customers across all products and communication channels, explains project manager Horst Beeck. This had not been the case previously, particularly for office-based personnel.
Consumer Industries 114 Manufacturing Industries
With its new CRM solution, the customer care center (CCC), the medical science department, and marketing have a clear and unified focus. SAP has also helped the company leverage its existing resources. The non-SAP system still used by field sales staff communicates seamlessly, via an interface, with the SAP solution in the office. This enables smooth data exchange for customer addresses, customer calls and samples, and directly integrates field sales employees into business processes. Approximately 120 employees are already using mySAP CRM at SCHWARZ PHARMA. The CCC registers all inquiries and orders received by post, fax, or telephone in the mySAP CRM
The commitment of SAP consultants, and intensive and close collaboration within the project team, enabled us to successfully implement our ambitious goals.
Horst Beeck, Project Manager, SCHWARZ PHARMA
interaction center. A user-specific entry screen facilitates direct access to customer and product information, and facilitates rapid processing of tasks, including outbound telemarketing. Embedded multimedia call center technology by Cycos is able to identify incoming telephone calls using the phone number, and automatically forwards them to the appropriate staff. This feature is particularly useful for the medical science department, whose members deal with highly specialized subject areas.
mySAP CRM also supports the marketing department in planning and implementing approximately 600 events and 200 direct marketing campaigns every year, each of which targets 30,000 to 80,000 doctors. mySAP CRM, together with SAP R/3, facilitates these activities, from the process of selecting target groups, through preparing addresses, to processing responses. Measuring the success of these activities is accomplished with analytical CRM functions that interact with mySAP Business Intelligence to evaluate campaigns, contacts, orders, and customer relationships.
PARTNERSHIP FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOLUTION
Thanks to extensive product expertise and proximity to SAP development, SAP Consulting offered solutions characterized by efficiency and flexibility. The commitment of SAP consultants, and intensive and close collaboration within the project team, enabled us to successfully implement our ambitious goals, says Beeck.
Integrated customer support from SAP, which covered extensive consulting services and appropriate training, helped promote easy acceptance of the new CRM solution by the companys employees. For Jrgen Willas, director of finance, mySAP CRM proved to be the driving force behind the implementation of the business excellence initiative at SCHWARZ PHARMA. We see ourselves as the pioneer in CRM in the pharmaceuticals market, leading the way with vision and courage, says Willas. Optimizations are already in the pipeline; the next priority is to incorporate fax and e-mail as communication channels in the CRM system.
CONVINCING BENEFITS
AT A GLANCE
Company name SCHWARZ PHARMA Deutschland Pharmaceuticals Improve companywide view of customers, orders, and contacts to enhance customer relationships and marketing activities.
Industry Challenge
Implementation partner Solutions
SAP Consulting - mySAP Customer Relationship Management - mySAP Business Intelligence - Over 120 employees using mySAP CRM - Created centralized customer database - Supports 600 events and 200 direct mail campaigns, which target up to 80,000 doctors - Complete view of customers and products across all channels - High marketing response rates - Improved communications and operational efficiency - Increased responsiveness to customers
SCHWARZ PHARMA has seen measurable improvements with mySAP CRM in its goal of enhancing customer service and customer satisfaction. It now has a complete view of all customers,
We see ourselves as the pioneer in CRM in the pharmaceuticals market, leading the way with vision and courage.
Jrgen Willas, Director of Finance, SCHWARZ PHARMA
Implementation highlights
Benefits
products, and communication channels. There is also greater transparency across customers, orders, and contacts through analytical CRM. Higher response rates in marketing have increased profitability, while quicker and slimmer processing, thanks to SAP R/3 integration, has reduced costs. With a solid foundation upon which to build, SCHWARZ PHARMA is one step closer to becoming the pharmaceutical company with the most satisfied customers in Germany.
SWAROVSKI TAKES NEW STEPS IN ELECTRONIC ORDERING AND GAINS A COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE
THE WORLD MARKET LEADER IN CUT CRYSTAL
With the implementation of the e-procurement tool within mySAP Supplier Relationship Management at this family-owned, Austria-based company, Swarovski significantly improved the efficiency of its procurement processes. Even after just a few months of productive operation, this leading manufacturer of cut crystal experienced a dramatic reduction in errors and in related costs. And now with e-procurement, Swarovski can stay ahead of the competition.
Swarovski is the worlds leading manufacturer of cut crystal. The family-owned company, established in 1895 in Wattens, Tyrolia, is managed by the fifth-generation descendents of the founder, Daniel Swarovski. Some 13,400 employees contributed to consolidated company sales of CHF 2.55 billion ( 1.64 billion) in 2001. Swarovski cut crystal is used in the fashion, jewelry, and lighting industries. Since the seventies, its crystal can be found in an array of articles such as gifts, collectibles, decorative objects, and jewelry. It maintains a strong presence in the luxury market with its crystal art objects, exclusive jewelry, and accessories. Swarovskis product palette also includes precision optical instruments, abrasive materials, and other industrial goods. In 1995, to celebrate its centenary, this notable company released the biggest crystal gem stone in the world: the Swarovski Centenar. With a diameter of 40 centimeters, a weight of 62 kilograms/310,000 carats, and 100 facets, this gem secured a place in the Guinness Book of Records. In contrast, the company also produced the smallest cut crystal in the world; the gem has a diameter of only 0.8 millimeters. Both can be viewed in the Swarovski Kristallwelten, the multimedia crystal-themed attraction created by Andr Heller in Wattens, Tyrolia.
STREAMLINING PURCHASING WITH E-PROCUREMENT
In spite of the companys impressive track record, Swarovski knew it had to modernize its procurement strategy. It once again looked to SAP and mySAP E-Procurement (which has now been incorporated into mySAP Supplier Relationship Management). As a decade-long customer of SAP, we not only had trust in its products, but the result of a cost/benefits analysis showed that implementing the e-procurement solution would be extremely positive for us in purchasing, says Gnther Streit, project head.
E-procurement with SAP puts us ahead of the competition, even if we have only reached 50% of our target so far.
Gnther Streit, Project Head, Swarovski
The company also chose SAP software based on its comprehensive range of functions, its openness, and easy integration with the companys SAP R/3 back-end system. E-procurement features for very specialized purchasing department applications that are not available in any other standard software can be easily integrated, adds Streit. SAP Consulting from Austria came on board to help with the implementation. The main challenge was to meet the complex requirements of the purchasing departments, says Franz Hinterberger, project lead from SAP Consulting. Through perfect teamwork with our colleagues from Swarovski, we were able to reach our objective quickly.
ACCESSIBLE PRICING INFORMATION
One important advantage of the solution is the option to create mixed shopping carts, says Streit. In other words, the ordering party can use an intranet connection to include an item selected via the material number, as well as a free-text order at the same time. There is no more time-consuming searching through paper pamphlets. Users can now access comprehensive online catalogs that list product descriptions and prices. Being able to find information regarding estimated/fixed price has been very useful for price negotiation, whereas in the past, the purchasing department often did not have pricing information. After entry of the material group and account assignment, automated G/L account determination considerably accelerates the procurement process and prevents errors. Previously, G/L accounts had to be added manually to the order.
MORE POTENTIAL SAVINGS IN THE FUTURE
AT A GLANCE
Software mySAP E-Procurement (capabilities now integrated into mySAP SRM) SNI Primergy 870 4 x PIII XEON 450 (1 MB SLC, 3 GB RAM) NT 4.0 SP5 Enterprise Oracle 8.1.7/2.1 500 to 600 at the Wattens location
According to Streit, E-procurement with SAP puts us ahead of the competition, even if we have only reached 50% of our target so far. Currently, we have achieved the first cost savings in the procurement process. Once we have fully automated our processes for order confirmation, shipping notification, and invoice creation (credit memo procedure) for vendors, we will increase efficiency and reduce process costs even further. In the meantime, the implementation of the new solution has more than doubled the number of electronic purchase orders in just a few months which means reduced administrative load for individual orders, and a high level of acceptance among users. In June 2002, some 500 employees began the final training phase to familiarize themselves with the new e-procurement software using an online learning tool.
Hardware
Operating system Database Number of users
122 Service Industries
SERVICE INDUSTRIES
Service Industries 123
AMERICAN EAGLE OUTFITTERS AND THE CHILDRENS PLACE

AMERICAN EAGLE OUTFITTERS AND THE CHILDRENS PLACE USE SAP StaffWorks TO IMPROVE SCHEDULING EFFECTIVENESS AND INCREASE SALES
American Eagle Outfitters and The Childrens Place picked software from the SAP for Retail portfolio of solutions and services to ensure that, as they grow, they do so efficiently and profitably while continuing to enhance customer service. Both companies use SAP StaffWorks a key application within the portfolio to schedule associates based on store traffic and business needs and to download productivity standards information to stores.
American Eagle Outfitters and The Childrens Place are successful North American retailers that are growing rapidly and launching new stores to keep pace with customer demand for their retail merchandise. American Eagle Outfitters, a $1.4 billion company that designs, markets, and sells the American Eagle brand of relaxed, clean, and versatile clothing for 16- to 34-year-olds, provides high-quality merchandise at affordable prices. The Childrens Place is a $575 million leading specialty retailer of high-quality, value-priced fashion apparel and accessories for children from birth to age 12. Both companies picked SAP StaffWorks a key application within the SAP for Retail portfolio of software and services. Using the solutions workforce management capabilities, these companies could ensure that, as they grew, they did so efficiently and profitably while continuing to enhance customer service. We wanted what many retailers desire in this area: to be more effective and more efficient through scheduling workforce talent to the business needs, says Joe Kerin, executive vice president of store operations at American Eagle Outfitters. Our business is fairly labor-intensive. Employee count and hours worked are significant relative to sales volume. We wanted to give managers at the store level who may or may not be skilled in scheduling a retail calendar, with its many twists and turns in traffic patterns a tool to save them time and develop the most effective schedule. Adds David Collignon, director of strategic store operations at The Childrens Place, As we grow, we want to focus on standardization and efficiency to be as productive as possible and maintain profitable stores.
We are unit-driven as an organization and, as a result, tend to be task-driven in our stores. Its important to be efficient so we can put more time into interacting with customers and do a better job of converting every customer that walks through our door into a buying customer. American Eagle operates 700 American Eagle Outfitters stores in 48 states and the District of Columbia, 52 American Eagle Outfitters stores in Canada, 110 Bluenotes/Thriftys stores in Canada, and its American Eagle Outfitters online store, ae.com. The Childrens Place operates 520 stores in 46 states and sells its merchandise through its virtual store at childrensplace.com. Both companies use the SAP StaffWorks scheduling capabilities to schedule their associates based on store traffic and business needs. The Childrens Place uses the time and attendance capabilities of SAP StaffWorks to automatically collect payroll data; American Eagle Outfitters uses an SAP gateway to its existing time and attendance solution. Both companies also use the parameter manager feature in SAP StaffWorks to download standards information to their stores. Both are getting measurable returns. From a cost-savings standpoint, we expect to see a return on investment within the first year, says Collignon of The Childrens Place. Weve had a 50% increase in schedule effectiveness using SAP StaffWorks. We are scheduling the right people at the right times and in the right quantities, adds Kerin of American Eagle Outfitters. Our productivity this year is up nicely over the preceding year, and SAP StaffWorks is an important enabler of that improvement.
Not only is productivity up at American Eagle Outfitters so are sales and customer service. By improving our schedule effectiveness we have reduced our labor costs while maintaining, or in some cases improving, customer service, adds Tracy Benaman, director of store support at American Eagle Outfitters. To be successful in todays retail environment, we need to equip our field personnel with the best tools; SAP StaffWorks is a good example.
REPLACING TEDIOUS MANUAL PROCESSES
American Eagle Outfitters and The Childrens Place had been scheduling their staffs manually. Managers worked with pen and paper, making a list of names, day by day, hour by hour, plotting it manually on a grid for stores of upwards of 70 people, Kerin says. Schedules were
SAP StaffWorks prompts you for information and doesnt require you to navigate countless screens and windows. We received very good feedback from our store teams that the system was easy to use and that they liked it.
David Collignon, Director of Strategic Store Operations, The Childrens Place
filled with flaws and based on emotion and guesswork. Managers didnt have sufficient facts at their fingertips to make or qualify their judgment calls. Collignon of The Childrens Place agrees. It was very timeconsuming, with a lot of inaccuracies and redundant work. Both companies evaluated a number of solutions before selecting SAP. We knew that our competitors were using this solution and achieving improvements in scheduling effectiveness, Kerin says. We felt we could get a payback over a reasonable period of time.
Says Ken Watts, vice president of information services at American Eagle Outfitters, We looked at the major players that had a solution that would help us in the stores and give us a quick payback. SAP quickly came to the top of our list for functionality, ease of use, and ease of implementation. Ease of use, in particular, was crucial to store acceptance. The Childrens Place involved its end users heavily in the selection process. It asked each vendor being evaluated to input specific store data and generate schedules, which the users then tried out. We put the system through its paces and validated that the information was accurate and that the schedules were effective, Collignon says. With 520 stores, we needed to be certain that every one of our end users would be comfortable with the product, would not be intimidated by it, and would give us complete buy-in.
SAP has expertise in its product and is developing the solution in the right way for our stores. SAP has also been very responsive the company has been there when weve asked it to be.
David Collignon, Director of Strategic Store Operations, The Childrens Place
If you have a product that people dont feel good about, they wont use it. SAP StaffWorks prompts you for information and doesnt require you to navigate countless screens and windows. We received very good feedback from our store teams that the system was easy to use and that they liked it.
SCHEDULING WORKFORCE TO MEET SPECIFIC BUSINESS NEEDS
Managers at both companies use the system to generate weekly schedules for their stores. SAP StaffWorks automatically evaluates scheduling variables like customer traffic, floor coverage, employee skills and availability, point-of-sale data, workloads, budgetary constraints, and payroll objectives. The system then creates the optimal schedule for each location.
SAP StaffWorks maintains information about your history as well as your employees and their availability, Collignon says. It prompts you to really look at your business for the following week and consider the scheduling needs based on historical data and current trends. This enables us to focus on whats going to drive our business, rather than just scheduling to each persons availability. We anticipate a significant improvement in our scheduling effectiveness SAP StaffWorks produces forecasts based on business history, not on emotion. Schedules are synchronized with the time and attendance capabilities in SAP StaffWorks to gather employee clock-in and clock-out information for in-store control of employee time accounting and payroll procedures. Both companies run the system on IBM Netfinity servers, linked to store registers, for employee time and attendance functions as well as store manager use. The parameter manager is used in the home office of both corporations. American Eagle Outfitters might use it, for example, during Thanksgiving week, to alert the SAP StaffWorks application to look at that particular day or week in history and use the information from that previous time interval to schedule, rather than looking at the last six weeks. The Childrens Place similarly uses the parameter manager feature to download standards changes to the stores. We can change a group of stores seamlessly, overnight, at any time, Collignon says. This enables us to make changes to stores configurations without the store managers having to make the changes at the stores themselves.
FREEING MANAGERS TO IMPROVE STORE PERFORMANCE
The reduction in store manager work has been a big benefit for both companies. It really reduces workload and frustration, Kerin says. This enables managers to focus on merchandising, recruiting personnel, and providing best-practice training on customer service, receiving, and replenishing. Managers also have more time and information visibility to attend to customers and track whats happening in their stores. They can compare payroll and sales performance, manage by exception, and make changes to improve performance.
Managers are now taking the time they previously devoted to developing schedules and processing payroll and spending it on the sales floor, focusing on their customers and their business, Collignon says. Theyre looking at reports on a daily basis that, until now, they havent had access to. When they come in each
We looked at the major players that had a solution that would help us in the stores and give us a quick payback. SAP quickly came to the top of our list for functionality, ease of use, and ease of implementation.
Ken Watts, Vice President of Information Services, American Eagle Outfitters
morning, theyre reviewing yesterdays sales and payroll spending, looking at projections for the rest of the week, and making adjustments accordingly. They can now do this each day rather than midweek or at the end of the week so they dont have to suddenly scramble to adjust payroll.
BEST-PRACTICE TEMPLATES
As American Eagle Outfitters and The Childrens Place gather all this information, they can identify successful templates of best practices at their leading stores. We are gaining the ability to see which stores are performing effectively and understand why, Collignon says. We will be able to hone in and look at their schedules, see how theyre using the system, and understand why theyre more effective than others. This will enable us to develop best practices for the rest of our rollout; were planning to open another 120 stores next year. SAP will continue to play a role in enabling that growth. SAP has expertise in its product and is developing the solution in the right way for our stores, Collignon says. SAP has also been very responsive the company has been there when weve asked it to be. SAP has been very available to us throughout our implementation.
BELGACOM
TELECOMMUNICATIONS GIANT BELGACOM OPTS FOR SAP TO OPTIMIZE ALL PURCHASING PROCESSES
In spite of its success and an annual turnover of some 5.22 billion, Belgacom NV needed to streamline its purchasing processes. For certain items, the administrative and logistics costs were often higher than the purchase cost. This leading Belgian telecommunications company chose SAP Enterprise Buyer a key application within mySAP Supplier Relationship Management to help it meet these challenges. Now, purchasing is much simpler, which helps the company save time, money, and resources.
According to Philippe Deconinck, business-to-supplier (B2S) program manager at Brussels-based Belgacom NV, the companys traditional purchasing processes were exceedingly complex. Even for buying a simple item such as a screwdriver or a pencil, the purchasers had to go through multiple steps; a time-consuming and expensive activity, he says. For certain items, the administrative and logistics costs were often higher than the purchase cost. In order to rein in this expenditure, we needed to enhance our electronic purchasing processes. To do this, the company chose SAP Enterprise Buyer (SAP EPB), the procurement component within mySAP Supplier Relationship Management. Belgacom NV is the Belgian market leader in the field of global telecommunication solutions. The Belgacom group supplies local, interzonal, and international communication and data services via fixed and mobile networks and satellite carriers. It also offers a variety of Internet services. At the end of 2002, the Belgacom group employed some 19,000 people, with an annual turnover of 5.22 billion.
FOCUS ON INTEGRATION
After just a few years, Belgacom realized its original e-procurement solution could not keep up with the companys requirements. Everything went well at first; we could produce digital catalogs quickly and made progress, explains Yves Brne, IT project manager at Belgacom. However, when we wanted to automate the more complex purchasing procedures, such as for ordering the less popular products, we experienced problems.
Consumer Industries 130 Service Industries
Deconinck continues: The main sticking point was the integration of the e-procurement solution with our back-end SAP R/3 System. We needed a powerful interface to integrate the package, which meant a heavy investment. In the meantime, we also noticed that the functionality of the existing system was too limited. In 2001, Belgacom made the decision: it would purchase a new e-procurement solution. A detailed selection process followed, which involved analyses of different options. Ultimately the SAP e-procurement solution appeared to be the best choice. A big
The number of employees involved in transacting a purchase has been reduced from five to one. Now that our purchasers are not buried beneath a mountain of paperwork, they have time to do other tasks.
Yves Brne, IT Project Manager, Belgacom
advantage of the SAP package included its easy integration with the SAP R/3 backbone, says Brne. In addition, SAP also offered all the functionality that a large company such as Belgacom needs.
EIGHT MONTHS TO GO LIVE
The implementation team kicked off the project on February 19, 2002. The first step for the SAP project involved transferring the digital catalogs to SAP, which we accomplished quickly, says Brne. On September 30, eight months later, the system went live. We began using the SAP EBP solution for about 50% of our orders. SAP Consulting provided support during the implementation. Two to three committed SAP consultants worked full-time on the project, says Paul Rits, project manager at Belgacom. If there were questions or if things werent clear, the consultants called the head office in Walldorf. In addition, four IT staff members from Belgacom and five from our business department came on board for the implementation. When asked if employees were skeptical about the changeover, Rits says that it was quite the opposite. He goes on to say that everybody who previously worked with the e-procurement solution clearly saw its limitations, and understood the need for a new solution.
Additionally, the SAP component is very user-friendly and logical, and has a comfortable search engine, says Rits. Even the most critical users quickly accepted the system. To help the users become more confident with the new solution, we provided a number of demos and organized an e-learning project. The companys suppliers easily adapted to the system, as well. They had received thorough training for the previous e-procurement solution and many had produced the catalogs themselves, says Deconinck. The suppliers ability to work with e-procurement, for that matter, also influenced our decision.
SHORTER CYCLE TIME AND A NEW ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE
By implementing the SAP e-procurement solution, Belgacom saw many benefits. Thanks to SAP, purchasing has become much simpler, so we can order more quickly and ultimately deliver more quickly, too, says Deconinck. SAP EBP will help us drastically shorten our cycle time. In addition, our people in the field, such as the technical staff, receive their material much more quickly. This results in better service. They used to order material on reserve, so the black stock disappears. Brne continues: The number of employees involved in transacting a purchase has been reduced from five to one. Now that our purchasers are not buried beneath a mountain of paperwork, they have time to do other tasks. The nature of their jobs has changed dramatically; instead of spending time on administrative/organizational duties, they can now focus on more strategic tasks such as negotiations with suppliers.
ONWARD TO 100% E-PROCUREMENT
By the end of the year, purchasing processes should be 100% automated. This presents somewhat of a challenge, says Deconinck, because the remaining 50% are more difficult to transfer; this mainly involves special orders where no catalogs are available. In fact, according to Brne, transferring over to 100% e-procurement is considered quite innovative for a company in Belgium. However, concludes Deconinck, the SAP package contains sufficient functionality and is so perfectly integrated with the backbone that we have complete faith in it.
BELL CANADA
BELL CANADA IMPLEMENTS mySAP MOBILE BUSINESS IN FOUR MONTHS TO SIMPLIFY MATERIAL ORDERING FOR FIELD SERVICES TECHNICIANS
Bell Canada outfitted the 4,000 field technicians that handle the installation, maintenance, and repair of its more than 55,000 SKUs with mySAP Mobile Business. The solution provides its technicians with access to parts to simplify and accelerate material ordering. Bell Canada got the solution which allows technicians to search at their laptops by SKU, description, or key word and view graphical information up and running in only four months.
Bell Canada is Canadas national leader for communications. The company provides connectivity to residential and business customers through wired and wireless voice and data communications, high speed and wireless Internet access, IP broadband services, e-business solutions, and local and long distance phone and directory services. That means a lot of equipment more than 55,000 stock-keeping units (SKUs) for modems, telephone sets, PBX equipment, wiring, jacks, and so forth. In an ongoing effort to improve customer service and automate its supply chain, Bell Canada provided 4,000 field services technicians with mySAP Mobile Business, a solution for mobile procurement. The solution enables them to order materials accurately and quickly from a customized service catalog. We are continuously adding SKUs for the new types of equipment coming into the telecommunication world, says Denis Courchesne, project director on the supply chain reengineering team. Its too costly and time-consuming to print new catalog pages. We used mySAP Mobile Business to provide our technicians with connected and disconnected access to these rapidly changing parts to simplify and accelerate material ordering. Bell Canada got the mySAP Mobile Business solution up and running in four months and realized a return on its investment in just under six months. Technicians search by SKU, description, or key word, view item pictures and cost information, load a shopping cart, and specify delivery location. Orders over a certain value or quantity threshold, or within a restricted material group, trigger a workflow request for manager approval.
Service Industries 134 Consumer Industries
Minutes later, the technician gets feedback quantity available, delivery date, ship-from location. Out-of-stock situations launch a purchase order and provide lead time information for delivery. Its quick and its easy, Courchesne says. Our technicians need to be in the field and working we dont want to tie them down to their desks or the telephone searching for materials.
Our technicians need to be in the field and working we dont want to tie them down . . . searching for materials. Technicians estimate they can spend 30 minutes to 2 hours a day on these issues. mySAP Mobile Business helps us reduce this search time.
Denis Courchesne, Project Director, Bell Canada
Technicians themselves estimate they can spend 30 minutes to 2 hours a day on these issues. mySAP Mobile Business helps us reduce this search time. The technicians are really satisfied with it. Technicians now know when they are going to get the materials, ensuring that they are ready for each customer appointment, Courchesne says. If there is a problem getting the material, they know about it right away and can search for an alternate source of supply.
Managers also have better information. Previously, they didnt know what the technicians were ordering until they received reports at the end of each month. Now management has that information as soon as a technician order triggers the workflow, along with a consumption report that tracks ordered parts and inventory levels. A key selection criterion for the system was the ability to work in a disconnected mode. When the technician reconnects online, he simply clicks on a button and mySAP Mobile Business transmits the shopping cart contents automatically and updates the catalog.
We wanted the technicians to be able to work in off-site environments where they didnt have online access, Courchesne says. We also chose mySAP Mobile Business because we needed a system that would interface easily with our SAP R/3 backend system and material masters. Bell Canada next plans to deploy mySAP Mobile Business to other technicians in the company. It also plans to take
We used mySAP Mobile Business . . . to simplify and accelerate material ordering.
Denis Courchesne, Project Director, Bell Canada
advantage of additional capabilities with mySAP Mobile Business, such as confirmation of goods receipts in the field. SAP in partnership with CGI, our IT group, did a good job and worked hard with us throughout the process, Courchesne says. It was a good team good spirit and efficient, qualified people, all working together. SAP really understood the importance of this project and did its best to deliver according to plan.
BKW FMB ENERGIE AG

SAP CONSULTINGS SYSTEM LANDSCAPE OPTIMIZATION (SLO) HELPS CONSOLIDATE AND OPTIMIZE SAP INFRASTRUCTURE
BKW FMB Energie AG, a major Swiss utility company, successfully aligned its SAP R/3 System data structures with its industryspecific software for utilities from SAP. This virtual integration enabled BKW to optimally model key business processes across several systems. The System Landscape Optimization (SLO) group, a part of SAP Consulting, helped implement this ambitious project.
BKW FMB Energie AG (BKW) supplies electricity to a million people in 400 communities from the Alps to the French border efficiently, safely, and ecologically. Revenues of more than CHF 2 billion ( 1.29 billion) and a workforce of approximately 2,000 reflect the national standing of this longestablished, major Swiss utilities company. With the rapid development of the European energy markets and the prospect of deregulation in Switzerland (which rejected proposals for energy-market legislation in a referendum in September 2002), BKW decided back in 2001 that it was time to prepare for the future. Changing customer requirements meant that it needed to refocus its business strategy more specifically, BKW needed to break down company codes into greater detail and adapt its existing SAP system.
SECURING COMPETITIVENESS WITH INTEGRATED INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Until the end of 2000, BKW had operated SAP R/3 and industryspecific SAP software for utilities on the same system. However, early in 2001, it implemented core SAP R/3 components on a new system with a different company code structure. Due to other projects that were going on in parallel, the company did not have the time or resources to immediately migrate the industry-specific data. This made it impossible to model all business transactions throughout the new system infrastructure. The company then analyzed various proposals for combining the two systems. To maintain flexibility and minimize migration effort, BKW decided to retain the two systems and optimize the interfaces. This involved integrating SAP R/3 with the SAP industry-specific software for utilities.
It was also important that the two systems share the same organizational structures in order to accommodate Application Link Enabling (ALE) standard interfaces. The company wanted to complete the project between April 2002 and September 2002, in order to avoid interfering with upgrades and the other projects already in progress.
OPTIMIZING SYSTEM LANDSCAPE WITH THE HELP OF SAP CONSULTING
After thorough market research, BKW tapped the System Landscape Optimization (SLO) consulting team from SAP Consulting to help implement the complex consolidation project, since the SLO approach offered substantial advantages
We selected SAP Consulting because SAP was the only provider with excellent references. Our choice of consulting partner turned out to be the right one: despite the time constraints, the implementation was on time, within budget, and of high quality.
Klaus-Dieter Lffler, Project Leader and Manager, SAP Customer Competence Center, BKW
over a classical data-transfer solution. Furthermore, the SAP consulting team provided conversion services that have been tried and tested in a wide range of projects. For example, SLO helped adapt internal orders and object numbers according to the companys requirements in the SAP R/3 Controlling application.
The tight time frame demanded high levels of flexibility, commitment, and expertise from the project team. Following a detailed planning phase, the definition of requirements and translation rules, and extensive tests, a big-bang implementation took place in August 2002. The sheer volume of data involved illustrates the complexity of the project: the team carried out changes to general-ledger accounts, cost centers, orders, and profit centers at the database level in less than seven hours net runtime. Nearly 400 tables and around 104 million data records had to be processed. The second phase comprised migration of technical master data, reclassification of regional structures, and the creation of business partners in the industry-specific SAP software for utilities. This process involved running 68 batch and online jobs. By reorganizing the work processes, the total runtime was reduced from 312 hours to 72 hours. The team also implemented roleauthorization capabilities.
LEVERAGING FULL POTENTIAL OF SYSTEM CAPABILITIES
Reto Willi, director of treasury/cash management, expressed a high degree of satisfaction with the results of the consolidation project: SAP Consulting demonstrated a high level of technical and problem-solving expertise. The logistical integration of two physically different systems enabled us to implement a cross-system and cross-application solution that is missioncritical for modeling our business processes.
CANADA POST
AN INNOVATIVE LEADER IN THE GLOBAL POSTAL COMMUNITY ACHIEVES BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION WITH mySAP BUSINESS SUITE
Canada Post, winner of the 2002 Gartner CRM Award of Excellence, faced many challenges associated with a rapidly changing marketplace brought about by new Internet technologies. In its most ambitious initiative ever, one of Canadas largest providers of physical and electronic delivery solutions turned to mySAP Business Suite to help it revamp its business processes and expand its offerings, with the goal of delivering superior customer service. Today, SAP helps Canada Post remain competitive and create value for all its stakeholders.
Canada Post Corporation, Canadas seventh largest employer, provides physical and electronic delivery solutions to more than 30 million Canadian residential customers and one million Canadian businesses and public institutions. Each year, the corporation delivers more than 10 billion messages and parcels to over 13 million addresses in Canada via 15,000 mail carrier routes, 6,000 contractors, and 25 major plants. The 150-year-old organization is one of the most visible in Canada, and is the only one that does business with virtually every household, business, and government in the country. In addition, Canada Post is recognized for innovation in the global postal community, having signed over 133 contracts to provide consulting services in 54 countries.
BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION INITIATIVE
In the late 1990s, the corporation faced numerous challenges associated with a rapidly changing marketplace. Fierce competition from new Internet technologies became both a threat and an opportunity to the traditional business and revenue base. Evolution and growing acceptance of these new technologies drove the rapid expansion of e-commerce and shaped customer demands for greater speed, flexibility, and information. Furthermore, a global trend among private couriers and other postal organizations to expand product offerings (both physical and electronic) and geographic reach compounded these challenges. These marketplace dynamics prompted Canada Post to embark on its largest-ever initiative. Known as the Business Transformation Initiative, this bold initiative aims to change the way Canada Post conducts business and to expand Canada Posts electronic service delivery offerings, with the goal of delivering superior value to customers.
Since its inception in September 2000, the Business Transformation Program has been Canada Posts top priority, as it represents the future of the corporation. This comprehensive enterprise-wide initiative was designed to transform Canada Post from a function-based organization into a process-based organization, and from an information-rich environment to a knowledge-rich environment. To help it make this transition, Canada Post needed to find a comprehensive e-business solution that would enable it to reduce costs while significantly improving quality and accessibility of information for all stakeholders, customers, employees, partners, and vendors. It also needed a highly integrated solution that would enable it to streamline supply chains, gain a holistic view of the product life cycle, and enable online buying and selling, while at the same time empower its employees and improve customer relationships. This was a tall order to fill.
A COMPREHENSIVE PLATFORM AND COMMITMENT TO SUCCESS
During the selection process, SAP distinguished itself by offering the most comprehensive and flexible enterprise and e-business solution platform available as well as a commitment to work closely with Canada Post and partners to ensure a successful implementation. The SAP business case development team provided us with expertise and accelerators to determine the benefits that mySAP Business Suite could bring to Canada Post. The team did this in a number of ways throughout our phased decision-making process, ranging from providing ROI toolkits and methodologies, to assisting with executive workshops. In addition, the team supported us with a repository of ROI metrics that can be mapped specifically to SAP industry solutions, says Cal Hart, Canada Post vice president of business transformation.
Without a doubt, the mySAP Business Suite platform could provide the engine to tightly link all of the organizations technologies and systems, its people and processes, and its intranet and the Internet to form one collaborative business environment. The other vendors had what we needed, but no one vendor had an integrated solution suite including the range of functionality that SAP could provide, says Hart. And, according to Phil Lemay, Canada Post executive vice president of business development, mySAP Business Suite offered the most cost-effective approach to supporting Canada Posts five strategic priorities: (1) defend our current business, (2) grow our competitive business, (3) achieve operational excellence, (4) make employees a competitive advantage, and (5) enhance corporate equity.
BUSINESS IMPROVEMENT AND VALUE CREATION
Since the inception of its strategic program, Canada Post has taken advantage of mySAP Business Suite and its breadth of capabilities, world-class best business practices, and endless opportunities for business improvement and value creation by implementing a wide range of SAP solutions: mySAP Enterprise Portal; mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM); mySAP E-Procurement; mySAP Financials; mySAP Human Resources (mySAP HR); mySAP Business Intelligence (mySAP BI); and industry-related applications from the SAP for Retail and SAP for Technology portfolio of software and services.
With the help of SAP, Canada Post was able to implement these integrated offerings quickly and efficiently and has purchased mySAP Business Suite licenses for all 61,000 of its employees. Users adapted quickly to the platform and the results so far have been impressive. For example, to date, 12,600 travel and expense claim employees use the system to help eliminate hand-offs and paperwork. As a result, internal processing costs have decreased and the time between submission and payment has been reduced from over two weeks to one day.
OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE USING mySAP E-PROCUREMENT
mySAP E-Procurement (which has been superceded by mySAP Supplier Relationship Management, a solution that builds on the capabilities of mySAP E-Procurement) is used by some 7,100 employees, and has enabled Canada Post to streamline the purchasing process and minimize maverick buying. Furthermore, 21,000 suppliers have converted and more than 10,000 contracts have been entered into the system, with 50,000 items from 185 suppliers in the e-catalog. And, more than 30,000 auto POs (orders sent electronically without sourcing intervention) were generated in the first four months of use. Such business process improvement helps Canada Post achieve its strategic priority of operational excellence, making the corporation easier to do business with and providing a better workplace for employees.
WIDE RANGE OF BENEFITS WITH mySAP CRM
Client and customer satisfaction, as well as effective management of stakeholder relationships, are at the core of Canada Posts business success. While the Business Transformation Program is an enterprise-wide initiative involving a full spectrum of processes, customer relationship management remains the cornerstone of the program. According to Aaron Nichols, general manager of business transformation, We felt mySAP Customer Relationship Management would enable us to provide a rich, uniform customer experience across all channels and help us differentiate service levels based on customer value. Additionally, we saw mySAP CRM as a way to leverage the knowledge gained through our customer interactions, and to integrate CRM tightly with the overall core SAP enterprise system. The benefits of mySAP CRM are wide-ranging. With mySAP CRM, commercial customers can place orders and create shipping documents electronically, which helps reduce paper-work,
The SAP business case development team provided us with expertise and accelerators to determine the benefits that mySAP Business Suite could bring to Canada Post.
Cal Hart, Vice President of Business Transformation, Canada Post
save time, and improve transaction accuracy. The companys online store at www.canadapost.ca gives customers more convenient access to products and services, and provides Internet self-service (package tracking, rate calculations, outlet location, online account access, and so on). Canada Post customer service agents and delivery supervisors can easily access details of customer transactions (inquiries, complaints, claims, orders, and so on) from a Web browser.
With eight contact centers handling approximately seven million calls each year, Canada Post uses mySAP CRM to provide 700 customer service agents with details of customer transactions from a single screen. Prior to mySAP Business Suite and mySAP CRM, which comprise one central source of corporate data, Canada Post had six sources of customer data. SAP workflow functions route cases to delivery depots or employees, and SAP phone technology supports queuing customer inquiries, automatic screen pop-ups for customer service agents, and fax, e-mail, and voice-back options for customers.
IMPROVED DATA COLLECTION/CONSISTENT SERVICE
mySAP Business Suite has helped Canada Post transform its business by improving data collection processes and eliminating more than 80 legacy systems, functional silos, and fragmented data pools. Access to a single, comprehensive, unified source of data helps the corporation dramatically streamline client interactions. mySAP CRM permits Canada Post to align access channels with customer needs, and in so doing, optimizes the sales and service functions. As a result, the sales force has been relieved of time- and cost-intensive customer interactions. We have been able to take a large number of our middle-tier commercial customers and move them to the phone or Internet instead of servicing them face-to-face. Overall, this migration is driving costs down while servicing customers more effectively, says Nichols. And, with mySAP CRM, service for the individual consumer is more reliable, too. As with other large organizations, the customer experience with Canada Post in the past was not always consistent. A customer could call several times on the same issue and receive different responses from call agents, says Hart. The sales force automation systems were standalone, and there was no integration of customer and call information. Now, when the customer calls, the message is the same. There is a history of the cases related to this customer, and frequently asked questions are referenced from the mySAP CRM solutions database.
REDUCTION OF ADMINISTRATIVE ACTIVITIES FOR SALES FORCE
Prior to mySAP CRM, the commercial sales force spent a considerable amount of time on administrative activities. The fully integrated SAP enterprise system and e-business platform substantially reduced time spent on administrative tasks and follow-ups, enabling the sales force to devote more time to revenue-generating activities. Plus, mySAP CRMs contract management feature allowed Canada Post to monitor compliance levels with volume levels as stated by each customer contract. When a customer fails to achieve the contracted volume level, pricing is adjusted to reflect actual volume levels.
With a comprehensive, integrated solution, powered by mySAP Business Suite, we are firmly in the drivers seat on all aspects of change exactly what we need to make business transformation a success and realize our goals.
Cal Hart, Vice President of Business Transformation, Canada Post
The company can now eliminate revenue leakage through tighter controls and verification of customer documentation at the time of receipt. With the new integrated CRM processes, information can be captured and verified at the source and adjustments to declared values billed and collected. When adjustments are required, mySAP CRM generates a supplementary invoice to bill or credit a customer.
As a result of its successful mySAP Business Suite implementation, Canada Post has been rewarded with global industry recognition: in March of 2002, Canada Post received Gartners CRM Award of Excellence, given to the organization demonstrating best practices in their use of CRM to solve real-world business challenges.
EXPANDING THE SAP FOOTPRINT
Based on its high degree of satisfaction with SAP, Canada Post continues to expand its SAP footprint. mySAP CRM is only one part of our business transformation powered by mySAP Business Suite, but as the conduit to our customers, it is vital to our business success, says Nichols. Because of it, we are now in a position to move forward with a full suite of e-business services for future business growth. Canada Post is now evaluating new upgrades and is in the process of adding new functionality to its strategic mySAP Business Suite e-business platform: employee self-service, supply chain management, and new processes for e-procurement and customer relationship management. In addition, SAP is poised as a leading candidate to provide Canada Post with an e-learning environment, which will leverage the organizations investment on the back end (human resources, billing, reporting, and so on). Hart credits SAP for much of Canada Posts recent accomplishments. SAPs complete solution started us off in the right direction, he says. With a comprehensive, integrated solution, powered by mySAP Business Suite, we are firmly in the drivers seat on all aspects of change exactly what we need to make business transformation a success and realize our goals.
CENTRADE
CENTRADE SELECTS mySAP MARKETPLACE AND mySAP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT AS KEY PLATFORM FOR CZECH REPUBLICS FIRST ONLINE TRADING COMMUNITIES
CenTrade is the Czech Republics largest independent business-to-business (B2B) electronic marketplace. The company implemented mySAP Marketplace, which helps it provide a robust B2B environment, enabling companies to conduct online trading as buyers and sellers. Due to its exceptional growth, CenTrade also realized that providing highquality customer service was a top priority. To ensure that it could meet this requirement, CenTrade also selected mySAP Customer Relationship Management. Now, not only is its customer service more responsive, but more business opportunities are being secured with improved contact management.
SUPPORTING BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES WITH mySAP MARKETPLACE
CenTrade seized upon an exciting business opportunity. It realized that companies within the Czech Republic wanted to expand their businesses by linking buyers and suppliers in open, real-time trading communities. By having an electronic marketplace available to them, large and small companies could greatly benefit by accessing new channels of commerce. CenTrade needed a way to support these new trading exchanges. Thats when it selected SAP to provide an efficient business-to-business (B2B) solution. The CenTrade project was initiated by CESK TELECOM, the largest telecommunications company in the Czech Republic. CenTrade chose mySAP Marketplace to provide the infrastructure and applications it needed for creating virtual trading exchanges, and Citibank as a partner for providing financial services. Delivered through MarketSet, a joint solution from SAP Markets Inc., and Commerce One Inc., the mySAP Marketplace solution was able to connect multiple CenTrade business partners using an online trading community platform. With MarketSet, CenTrade provides services that combine collaborative design, planning, procurement, fulfillment, and selling capabilities with collaborative services from third parties such as for content management, financials, and logistics to provide a comprehensive solution for the entire procurement value chain.
Having completed this task successfully and with the extensive professional support of SAP Consulting, we are focused on bringing many new customers to CenTrade, says Petar P. Stancev, CenTrade general manager. Based on our experience, the benefit of any electronic marketplace increases with the growing community of suppliers and customers trading online and CenTrade will be very attractive to Czech companies. CenTrade allows suppliers to upload product catalogs onto the virtual marketplace and buyers to browse these catalogs, create purchase orders, and process purchase orders with suppliers. The company announced its first electronic business transaction in February 2001 and the first electronic auctions in April 2001. After three months of pilot operations, CenTrade began commercial trading on the live platform.
QUALITY CUSTOMER RELATIONS A KEY TO SUCCESS
From the outset, CenTrade intended to implement a customer relationship management system. It wanted to use this system not only as a key tool to support customers, but also as a central application that would provide a range of customer interaction and engagement capabilities for all CenTrade employees. After a thorough evaluation, the company selected mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) as the best solution for managing customer relationships. First of all, the solution could support the complete cycle of customer care, ranging from contact management and exploring potential business opportunities, to selling its trading services, through offering relevant products from third parties and CenTrade partners. Moreover, mySAP CRM allowed the company to perform a detailed analysis and segmentation of its customers and partners according to various criteria.
Consolidated data about customers and new projects are critical for the success of a business organization, says Robert Opletal, CenTrade direct sales manager. mySAP CRM is a solution from a steady company that provides consistent functionality.
A SMOOTH IMPLEMENTATION
The mySAP CRM implementation was problem free, says Dawood Hla Shwe, CenTrade project consultant and manager. First, we didnt need to involve a lot of staff with this project and second, the checkout phase was very short. The main
Based on our experience, the benefit of any electronic marketplace increases with the growing community of suppliers and customers trading online and CenTrade will be very attractive to Czech companies.
Petar P. Stancev, CenTrade General Manager
reason for the implementations accuracy was that the standard functionality of mySAP CRM accommodated our requirements, and major adjustments were not needed. We also highly value our teamwork with SAP Consulting, which was our only implementation partner in the project. Preparations for implementing mySAP CRM were made in the beginning of May 2001 by developing a requirements plan. The plan defined the priorities for customer relationship processes as well as requirements for system functionality. The implementation was designed and scheduled as a two-stage process.
The first stage included implementing mySAP CRM, mapping partners, creating a central business-partner registry, supporting interaction center processes, and managing business activities. This stage lasted a little less than two months. As a result, mySAP CRM went live in July 2001. The second stage was completed in October and included implementing mySAP CRM opportunity management capabilities. Opportunity management provides sales tracking and sales forecasting, identifies key decision makers, and estimates potential-to-buy and potential closing dates. This set of features gives CenTrades key account managers a solid tool for supporting a proactive approach with customers. mySAP CRM also gives CenTrade staff comprehensive, up-to-date information about business partners. We greatly appreciate our collaboration with SAP, says Stancev. mySAP CRM is just more proof of the sophistication of this exceptional company. We are quite happy that this particular technology can help us find a better way to support our customers every day, as well as focus our activities on meeting their needs.
A RICH ASSORTMENT OF mySAP CRM CAPABILITIES
CenTrade uses mySAP CRM to administer a complete database of companies and contact persons and associated activities and opportunities. In cooperation with the interaction center operating Green Line the companys toll-free telephone number where customers get information about products or services CenTrade also monitors all communications in its customer care department. This includes incoming and outgoing calls as well as electronic mail. Incoming calls currently make up about 80% of the calls CenTrade handles.
However, outgoing activities that leverage new opportunities using proactive customer engagement are growing as CenTrade takes advantage of mySAP CRM capabilities that support campaign management, telemarketing, and e-marketing. The quality of customer support has also been greatly improved. With mySAP CRM, operators can choose from a variety of scripted scenarios to resolve a wide range of situations. Responding procedures for complaints, inquiries, technical issues, and other situations can be predetermined, including the obligatory time limit for answering a call, as guaranteed by CenTrade to its customers. CenTrade has gained a better overview of its incoming communications and the reasons why customers call Green Line. Additionally, it now has an overview of customers problems with the name of the CenTrade person who handled the call and the method they used to address the situation. CRM solutions are becoming more and more crucial for the success of companies in todays competitive world, says Jir Dont, CenTrade director of strategy. Our experience proves that mySAP CRM is the leader in this industry. In the near future, CenTrade plans to create a knowledge base built on existing customer responses and experiences. The base would serve as a resource for generating more scenarios to help operators give customers faster and better-quality responses.
VISIBLE BENEFITS IN OPPORTUNITY MANAGEMENT
Before implementing mySAP CRM, opportunities were difficult to monitor and track. Staff members contacted dozens of people and had great difficulty remembering the status of each business case. Now, with mySAP CRM, capitalizing on business opportunities is more efficient and profitable. CenTrade can now assign a staff member to each opportunity, along with the
CRM solutions are becoming more and more crucial for the success of companies in todays competitive world.
Jir Dont, CenTrade Director of Strategy
subsequent activities for which they are responsible in a given period. Time frames are designated for a client or partner response. Every opportunity is accurately documented, which makes it easy to quickly monitor its status. Moreover, mySAP CRM ensures that opportunities are not missed. With the opportunity management capabilities of mySAP CRM, CenTrade has noticed a great rise in efficiency compared to previous periods, and sees a substantial improvement in the quality of its business-cycle management.
DANONE INTERNATIONAL BRANDS OPTIMIZES DISTRIBUTION WITH mySAP CRM

With 100,000 employees, nearly 15 billion in sales, and a global distribution network, the Danone Group is the world leader in fresh dairy products and bottled water, and ranks second for cookies and crackers. To reinforce its accomplishments, the groups export company, Danone International Brands (DIB), realized it needed to strengthen relations with its network of importers/distributors. DIB chose mySAP CRM with its Internet sales capabilities to help meet this challenge. Today, at www.dib.com the export companys new Web site customers can place orders or obtain product information anytime, from any place in the world.
The Danone Group is the food industrys world leader in fresh dairy products, bottled water, and is number two in cookies and crackers. In 2001, it generated sales of nearly 15 billion. With more than 100,000 employees, the group markets its food products in some 120 countries worldwide. However, in spite of the groups success, Danone International Brands (DIB) the export company of the Danone Group faced an interesting business challenge. Since 2000, it had been looking for a way to better manage some 400 distributors and importers spread around the globe in several different time zones, while strengthening customer relations. Setting up a B2B site, where customers can consult product catalogs, place orders, and follow them up and take advantage of sales offers online, seemed like the right solution to us, says Claire Thomas, DIB customer service manager.
EMPOWERING CUSTOMERS WITH NEW ONLINE TECHNOLOGIES
In response, the companys IT department began to study stateof-the-art B2B technologies currently available on the market. After considering a variety of vendors, DIB narrowed it down to two solutions: mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) and its Internet sales capabilities and a custom solution from a start-up company. We opted for the mySAP CRM solution, reassured by SAPs stability and its strong R&D potential, said Agns Simard, information systems manager for DIB. Close integration of this front-office tool with the companys future back-office system also influenced DIBs decision, according to Simard.
In June 2000, DIB specified functional parameters with the assistance of Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC), which had been selected for its in-depth knowledge of DIB acquired while working on a previous project that same year. CSC was also able to show us concrete, completed B2B projects and demonstrate its responsiveness by putting together a team that could meet our aggressive deadlines while fulfilling a competitive commercial proposal, says Simard. Three experts from SAP, four CSC consultants, and five internal employees made up the project team. In late July, an initial test was performed in Japan, and in early September, the www.dib.com site went into production with five pilot DIB customers. According to Simard, four major factors contributed to meeting these ambitious deadlines: The thorough involvement of SAP; the quality of relations between SAP and CSC; the availability and genuine e-business expertise of the integration team; and the assistance with the changeover inside the company, supported by the human resources department, helped ease any fears and bolstered real enthusiasm for the project.
INCREASED SALES AS A RESULT OF NEW WEB SITE
Since January 2001, the site has been open to all DIBs export customers. Already, 50% of the sales are generated through this new sales channel, and we are aiming for 80%, says Simard. This success is explained by customer satisfaction. For them, this site is much more than an electronic purchase order system. With a unique, secured access code, each one of them has their own custom home page, with contact details and photos of their contacts and targeted messages sent to them in their own language by the sales staff. This human factor is highly appreciated. At the new site, the customer can access catalogs that are adapted to their own business needs and receive targeted promotions through a push system, especially information regarding new products. Customers can place orders using shopping carts that are pre-configured according to the customers profiles, and if requested, according to previous orders. Not only do they save a lot of time, but customers can also optimize the container fill rate. The site offers precise order progress tracking, so customers can anticipate when shipments arrive and plan for product distribution. For the importers whose business involves local promotion to their own distribution networks, technical information, photos, and product endorsements are available online.
SERVICES THAT BUILD LOYALTY AND STIMULATE PURCHASING
DIB has realized several benefits from mySAP CRM and its Internet sales capabilities. First of all, the solution helps the company meet customer expectations for flexibility and availability: customers can place orders or obtain product information at any time, regardless of where they are connected. In addition, with more information available about the status of their orders, customers can take more responsibility for making sure that their orders are accurate and moving ahead. And, thanks to the push system and user-friendly tools, customers are placing more orders. All this boils down to increased customer loyalty. Other benefits include optimized business processes. The sales, marketing, sales administration, and IT staff all work together to update and manage the site, which has resulted in greater efficiency and cooperation between departments. The company has also realized major gains in productivity. We have seen a significant reduction in administrative tasks, linked to the decrease in the number of order confirmations and pro forma invoices that have to be entered and approved, says Thomas. Sales assistants now have more time for added-value activities. That means that agents can focus on customer relations, which is another excellent way for us to increase customer loyalty.
FRAPORT AG
SEAMLESS PROCUREMENT AND REDUCED COSTS WITH mySAP SUPPLIER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
Saving money on procurement, while providing exceptional service was key for the company that owns and manages Germanys Frankfurt Airport Fraport AG. Thats why it chose mySAP Supplier Relationship Management with SAP Enterprise Buyer as the central e-procurement component of the SAP solution. Now, almost 360 users order thousands of items like books, office equipment, and furniture simply and without unnecessary paperwork. Better yet, the solution saves the company an estimated $130 per order.
A BUSY INTERNATIONAL HUB
A leading business driver and challenge for the international airport business is keeping expenses down while providing quality. That was just what Fraport AG, owner and operator of Frankfurt Airport, wanted to do. Fraport AG handles the entire logistics chain supporting all airport and airline operations for Frankfurt airport, which is one of the worlds largest airports and a major international hub for the movement of goods and passengers. In 2001, Fraport with close to 16,000 employees handled almost 50 million passengers and some 1.5 million tons of freight, generating revenues of $1.9 billion. Fraports operations are extensive, and groups like traffic and terminal management, ground crew services, freight logistics, real estate management, and information and communications services all require supplies of every type. To better manage costs and ordering processes for close to 40,000 items, its legacy purchasing system needed to be replaced. Thats when Fraport selected mySAP Supplier Relationship Management (mySAP SRM) with SAP Enterprise Buyer, for its e-procurement solution.
REPLACING A CUSTOM SOLUTION
Fraport AG recognized the benefits of an electronic ordering system back in 1997. These benefits included lower processing costs, decentralized procurement activities, a reduced workload for the procurement department, and faster replenishment. Unfortunately, there were no mature standard products on the market. This led the company to develop and implement a custom in-house solution, with an active interface to its SAP back-end system.
While the custom procurement solution fulfilled many of the companys functional goals (mostly due to the process modifications it mandated), Fraport AG did not have a truly seamless, end-to-end electronic procurement chain until it switched to
Thanks to online purchasing and leaner processes, we have cut ordering costs by up to 87%.
Matthias Schulmeyer, Manager of Strategy Development and E-Procurement, Fraport AG
the e-procurement solution provided by mySAP SRM with SAP Enterprise Buyer, which integrates fully with SAP back-end systems.
INTEGRATION IS THE KEY
Fraports focus on continuous improvements has always been part of its strategic objectives. Whats more, streamlining and integrating front- and back-end business processes are critical parts of this effort. With this in mind, Fraport AG introduced the latest version of SAP Enterprise Buyer as part of the 2002 companywide project, ProSAP, to take advantage of new capabilities. The project began with the analysis and optimization of the administrative software. Then came the migration from SAP R/2 to SAP R/3. Thanks to intensive support from SAP consultants and the SAP skills available within the company, Fraport AG completed the migration in record time.
E-commerce solutions only bring real benefits if they are fully integrated into a companys system platform, says Dieter Burmeister, spokesman for central purchasing and construction bids. Integration is the key. Today, the procurement solution is fully integrated into Fraport AGs 17 back-end systems.
EXPANDING ITS PURCHASING RANGE
Thanks to the integration of SAP Enterprise Buyer into Fraports back-end business processes, the company can now collaborate with its internal suppliers completely electronically. This means, for example, that the in-house printing service (that prints visitors passes) and Airport Cater Service (which supplies Fraport employees with refreshments) can bill their customers electronically. Meanwhile, Fraport AG has begun using SAP Enterprise Buyer to purchase much more than office supplies. The company plans to procure all items that can be cataloged electronically through a clearly laid-out catalog, created by an SAP partner company, Wallmedien AG, and maintained by Fraport itself. The catalog gives users a choice of 100,000 items and includes office supplies, electrical goods, office equipment, furniture, and more. Additionally, employees interested in purchasing books, magazine subscriptions, or specific documents (for example, legal documents) have access to an external catalog from VUB Printmedia GmbH, a company that provides specialized publications. This catalog is directly linked to SAP Enterprise Buyer.
ELECTRONIC PROCUREMENT STREAMLINES PROCESSES
Making procurement easier and streamlining the buying process has had an additional benefit. Costs are reduced, since administrative overhead and paperwork have been eliminated for non-strategic goods. Under the new system, a superiors sign off and controllers approval are no longer needed for purchases. This has resulted in a significantly leaner and shorter procurement chain. Fraport AG also introduced self-billing, making invoices a thing of the past. Under the self-billing system, a credit memo is generated in the back-end system after the customer has confirmed delivery. The memo is then sent to the supplier electronically.
It didnt take [the finance department] long to recognize the benefits of the new system.
Matthias Schulmeyer, Manager of Strategy Development and E-Procurement, Fraport AG
The finance department was initially skeptical, but this quickly changed. It didnt take them long to recognize the benefits of the new system, says Matthias Schulmeyer, manager of strategy development and e-procurement. Self-billing does away with a large number of small bills and this helps to reduce costs. Moreover, the solution includes a budget control mechanism that prevents departments from overspending. Additional savings have also been realized with detailed analysis of purchasing behavior gained through mySAP SRM. Now that the central procurement department has accurate figures, Fraport is in a better position to negotiate discounts with suppliers.
INCREASED VOLUME REDUCES COSTS
Users of the system provide the biggest cost benefits by embracing the SAP system and moving away from traditional and expensive purchasing methods. The electronic procurement system now handles a purchase volume of around $1.8 million a year. But its the transaction volume that really expresses the scale of the new system. It currently handles about 9,000 orders per calendar year, comprising almost 40,000 different purchase order items. This volume is increasing: User acceptance has risen significantly since the changeover of the procurement system to the mySAP SRM solution with SAP Enterprise Buyer. Compared with usage under the previous system, Fraport AG reports a fivefold increase in the number of orders placed. Fraport AG attributes this to the standardized SAP user interface, an improved search function, and faster system response time. Thanks to online purchasing and leaner processes, we have cut ordering costs by up to 87%, says Schulmeyer. This averages about $130 per order. We have freed our procurement department employees from routine tasks so they can concentrate on more added-value activities. Moreover, we have made collaborative procurement for Fraport AG possible throughout Europe.
FULL SPEED AHEAD
The introduction of SAP Enterprise Buyer at Fraport AG has proven a complete success, and the company is now looking at further savings. Fraport plans to integrate external suppliers into its electronic procurement processes so that orders, payments, and requests for services from outside vendors can be conducted electronically. The supplier portal SAP Supplier Self-Services, which is a component of mySAP SRM will serve as the link between Fraport AG and these business partners. To safeguard seamless communication between its multiple systems, Fraport AG also plans to implement SAP Exchange Infrastructure a part of the integration and application platform SAP NetWeaver to support collaboration both within and beyond the enterprise.
GASAG
mySAP CRM PROVIDES PERFECT SUPPORT FOR CAMPAIGNS AT THE LARGEST MUNICIPAL SUPPLIER OF GAS IN WESTERN EUROPE
Faced with the ever-growing fierce competition of the liberalized energy market, utility companies are coming up with all kinds of ideas to attract new customers and retain their existing ones with high-quality services. GASAG, located in Berlin, Germany, has taken the first step to win new market share by replacing its inhouse customer information system with the highly integrated mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM).
For more that 150 years, Berliner Gaswerke Aktiengesellschaft (GASAG) has been part of Berlins history. On January 1, 1847, gaslights erected by the company lit up the inner city. In 1992, GASAG converted to a stock company and, one year later, merged with the East Berlin gas company Berliner Erdgas AG to create the largest municipal gas supplier in Western Europe. GASAG was fully privatized in 1998. Today, the company has more than 700,000 customers. It supplies 600,000 Berlin apartments with environmentally friendly natural gas, giving GASAG a market share of more than 40% in the Berlin heating market. In 2001, GASAG employed 1,184 people and generated revenues of 654 million.
WINNING NEW MARKET SHARE WITH mySAP CRM
In spite of its impressive history, however, not too long ago GASAG realized that although its previous customer information system, IKIS (developed in-house), was perfectly suited to internal requirements, it could no longer meet the companys increased demand for reports and evaluations. It was not linked to the central SAP R/3 System and the SAP IS-U system, including the companys billing solution. This resulted in redundant data, poor quality of data, and high processing times for inquiries because the customer service staff members were constantly switching between different systems.
But these werent the only reasons it wanted to replace its system; GASAG also wanted to further bolster its presence in the marketplace. A market share of around 42% is great, but we think we have even more potential and are aiming for a market share of over 50%, says Michael Adamczyk, CRM project leader. In order to support its ambitious goals, GASAG turned to SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW) and mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM)
Our colleagues in marketing now have complete autonomy, thanks to mySAP CRM. And, our reduced rate of returns is a sure sign that we have been able to increase the quality of our data. In GASAGs marketing department, mySAP CRM is already firmly associated with making work easier.
Michael Adamczyk, CRM Project Leader, GASAG
to help it improve its quality of data, increase efficiency, manage marketing campaigns and ultimately to acquire new customers.
Berlin Dat and SAP Consulting came on board as GASAGs implementation partners. IBM provided qualified support in the realization of SAP BW. And thanks to expert support, the mySAP CRM implementation was rapid, taking only six months.
ONE VIEW OF ALL DATA
What is now better than before? Everything, says Adamczyk. Previously, we had the data on the customers but it was contained in two different systems and no one could access it without encountering problems. Every time we wanted to do something, it required the efforts of a developer to write an evaluation program. Our plan to integrate mySAP CRM with the SAP utilities industry solution billing function means we will have one, uniform view of all our customer data. Our colleagues in marketing now have complete autonomy, thanks to this application. And, our reduced rate of returns is a sure sign that we have been able to increase the quality of our data. In GASAGs marketing department, mySAP CRM is already firmly associated with making work easier.
REALIZING VISIONS WITH SAP
GASAG is still a long way from fully realizing the potential of mySAP CRM. As part of the companys internal transformation to an active service provider, GASAG is focusing on new customer services, which are to be supported by the highly integrated SAP solutions. GASAG has two main projects in the pipeline: role-specific enterprise portals for employees, call center agents, and customers, as well as fully comprehensive complaints management. Today, GASAG feels confident it can gain new market share in the private sector by utilizing mySAP CRM marketing campaign functions. All knowledge generated as a result of the campaigns can be entered in mySAP CRM and made immediately available to all the required employees for further processing. For example, the company is currently using mySAP CRM to identify target groups based on sophisticated selection criteria which means it takes only a few mouse clicks for employees to link a tailored e-mail campaign with the addresses of a target group. Plus, return correspondence containing feedback from potential prospects can be entered in the system and then automatically archived.
IS:ENERGY
FIRST-CLASS SERVICE AND EFFICIENT SALES AND DISTRIBUTION PROCESSES WITH mySAP CRM
To support and optimize its sales and marketing processes as well as its customer-centric energy-supply processes Germanys leading full IT service provider for the energy industry, is:energy, decided to implement mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM). Just months after the go-live, the company began realizing benefits including reduced manual labor and a consistent, transparent view of customer information.
INFORMATION SERVICES FOR THE ENERGY INDUSTRY
Experience and innovation, competence and partnership: these are the qualities that is:energy brings to the table. The Hannover-based joint venture company of E.ON Energie and Cap Gemini Ernst & Young resulted from the amalgamation of Gedos GmbH and Synergis GmbH. is:energy, which employs some 1,000 people, looks after more than 90 energy service providers in 220 locations. These are predominately companies of the E.ON Energie group, although public service and regional supply companies also form part of its customer base.
MAIN FOCUS: EFFICIENT CUSTOMER SERVICE
is:energy chose the mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) solution to help it gain a competitive advantage through targeted customer service. However, the IT service provider is not just seeking to optimize in-house customer relationship management with mySAP CRM: As a certified SAP Customer Competence Center, the company also sees itself as an implementation and consulting partner for its demanding customer base. Our experience of the mySAP CRM pilot installation should also serve as a multiplier. We can also recommend to customers what we are running successfully ourselves, says Frank Schepke, project lead at is:energy.
SAP CHOSEN FROM LONG LIST OF CONTENDERS
Before is:energy made the decision to go with mySAP CRM, it conducted an extensive selection during which 17 bidders were tested; of those 17 tested, 3 were short-listed. We didnt just decide on SAP because of our successful, long-standing partnership, says Alexander Urtel, project lead. The first-class functionality of mySAP CRM convinced us, and, on top of that, the seamless integration it offers with software from the SAP for Utilities portfolio.
And there were other plus points: This integration primarily allows continuous support of all the customer-centric energy supply processes. Because of that, we expect a strong demand from our internal and external customers.
ALL REQUIREMENTS FULLY MET
The project started mid-2001 and was realized as a stand-alone solution, with SAP Consulting providing their expertise. At the time, as one of the first companies in the world to use the newest version of mySAP CRM, is:energy truly placed itself at
The provision of comprehensive customer information in marketing, sales and distribution, and consulting increases the service quality and guarantees universal sales and distribution processes.
Alexander Urtel, Project Lead, is:energy GmbH
the cutting edge. The go-live in January 2002 was a special day for the 100 employees in 13 sites in Germany and Austria, when all functions were rolled out simultaneously. And, the rollout went smoothly and according to plan. The positive feedback shows that our employees have adapted to the new solution very quickly, says Schepke. By the final stage, all is:energy employees will use mySAP CRM.
CONSISTENT VIEW OF CUSTOMER INFORMATION
For is:energy, customer service in the past involved a lot of manual effort. Now, SAPs comprehensive CRM solution provides employees with all the functions and tools necessary for efficient customer relationship management. And, cooperation between customer-oriented departments has improved enormously. mySAP CRM supports the entry and transfer of sales inquiries to account management and helps employees plan all customer-related activities. We support the entire quotation process with mySAP CRM, including opportunities and project description, says Schepke. With the click of a mouse, users can access all the current information on business partners, opportunities, contracts, competitors, and campaigns; marketing, sales and distribution, and back-office staff obtain exactly the customer information that they need for their daily work. The companys consultants also benefit from access to extensive, transparent information. The result: fewer consultation calls with shorter processing times guarantee optimal customer service in the acquisition phase and beyond.
Following the successful introduction of mySAP CRM, is:energy is already considering further implementations, with SAP Enterprise Portal high on the list of priorities. The SAP portal solution will provide is:energy employees with a single point of access to vital information, applications, and solutions such as mySAP CRM via a role-based portal workplace all of which can help the company continue to deliver superior customer service and streamline its marketing and sales and distribution processes.
LINZ AG
ONE-STOP CUSTOMER SERVICE WITH mySAP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
Since October 2002, customer service at LINZ AG has been operating out of a new call center. This new customer center, responsible for handling inquiries from the Austrian utility companys approximately 425,000 customers, has been outfitted with mySAP Customer Relationship Management. Using this system, the 55 employees working in the customer center, plus an additional 60 specialists, have instant access to a central database containing various customer data.
LINZ AG was founded against the backdrop of energy-market deregulation in Austria. The company consists of four subsidiaries (Linz Strom GmbH, Linz Gas/Wrme GmbH, Linz Service GmbH, and Linz Linien GmbH) plus the management company that services them, Managementservice Linz GmbH. These subsidiaries were brought together in an effort to reduce costs and secure profits through synergies. This merger established the forward-looking, market-oriented company that has since developed into a multi-utility provider. LINZ AG recorded total assets of 1.36 billion for fiscal year 2001/2002 (ending in September 2002) up 15.4% from the previous year. Business activity generated an estimated 29.87 million in profits. The utility company employs approximately 2,600 people.
THE CHALLENGE
One-stop service: This is the mission of the utility company founded on October 1, 2001. And one-stop service means one central database; hence the project Call Center Realization, part of the reorientation process that followed the merger of the SBL and ESG companies. These companies specialized in natural gas, water, wastewater, waste, and local heating; and electricity, long-distance heating, and public transportation in Linz, respectively. The project aimed not only to improve customer service response times, but also to attract new customers and win back former ones.
In parallel, the company carried out another project with the goal of merging the SBL and ESG SAP R/3 Systems and implementing a new industry-specific system based on SAP at LINZ AG. This meant the company needed a powerful CRM software solution that would easily integrate with these systems. The company referred to the project as Alpha. LINZ AG also required a solution that was flexible enough for its call center and one that was suitable both for the initial phase of transition (during which old billing systems would still be operating) and for the final stage of transition to the uniform industry-specific applications from the SAP for Utilities portfolio of software and services. But that was not all: LINZ AG wanted a solution that would require minimal costs during the transition.
THE WINNING SOLUTION
mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) met these criteria. At the end of a rigorous selection process, the company chose SAP not only to supply the software, but also to implement it, making SAP an important player in the companys ambitious project. Merging the companys old systems presented a major challenge for SAPs utility team. Alfred Allram, account manager at SAP, and Raimund Hfinger, SAP solution architect, were thrilled with the projects success: This is quite a milestone for SAP Consulting, says Allram. Thanks to mySAP CRMs high level of integration with LINZs existing billing system and work processes, complex customer requests can now be handled by one call center in a simple, straightforward manner. Workflows have also been dramatically streamlined.
ONE-STOP SHOP
Now that the systems have been merged, call center employees have access to the same data that is available to the cost allocation center, for example. The call center receives both telephone and e-mail inquiries. Telephone-computer integration means that customer inquiries are handled with maximum
With mySAP CRM, we can answer customer inquiries quickly and are better able to meet our customers needs. In addition, the system enables us to document customer requests as they are being processed, providing us with important information for product development.
Stefan Gintenreiter-Kgl, LINZ AG
efficiency: Today, 32 call center employees process up to 1,000 calls and approximately 100 e-mail inquiries daily (regarding, for example, electricity bills; natural gas and water use/rates; and annual tickets for public transportation). Both LINZ AG and its customers now enjoy the benefits of instant access to a variety of customer data. Gone are the days of switching systems and transferring customer calls to specialists. mySAP CRM makes it possible to process and document all customer requests in one single step.
With mySAP CRM, we can answer customer inquiries quickly and are better able to meet our customers needs. In addition, the system enables us to document customer requests as they are being processed, providing us with important information for product development, says Stefan Gintenreiter-Kgl, LINZ AG.
HIGHLIGHT: 300 NEW CUSTOMERS
AT A GLANCE
Software Database Users Implementation time mySAP CRM Oracle 330
6 months
LINZ AGs targeted program to win back customers has already proven to be a success. Three hundred customers have switched back since the mySAP CRM solution was implemented on
The CRM project had to be carried out under a great deal of time pressure. Success would not have been possible without the expertise of SAP consultants.
Georg Gratzl, LINZ AG
October 1, 2002. Plus, the success of the CRM project confirmed the know-how and high-quality standards of the SAP team. Georg Gratzl, LINZ AG, confirms, The project had to be carried out under a great deal of time pressure. Success would not have been possible without the expertise of SAP consultants.
METRO CASH & CARRY INTERNATIONAL GMBH

mySAP HUMAN RESOURCES IMPLEMENTATION HELPS METRO MANAGE RETAIL ACTIVITIES WORLDWIDE
With its Metro Cash & Carry stores, which are managed under the brand names Metro and Makro, the Metro Group remains the international market leader in self-service wholesaling. A benchmark analysis performed by SAP Business Consulting showed that, by implementing mySAP Human Resources throughout its network of stores, the group would experience significant savings and benefits.
With revenues of around 50 billion, the Metro Group is the fifth largest retail company worldwide. It divides its business into four areas one of which involves operating some 400 retail outlets called Metro Cash & Carry (MCC). These stores, which are disbursed throughout the globe, generate more than 45% of the groups total sales. To help manage a staff of more than 72,000 people (as of business year 2002) who work for Metro Cash & Carry, the group
Once consolidated and processed, the quantitative and qualitative key figures provided a transparent picture of the operative and strategic potential per application area and for the company overall.
Ute Riemann, Head of Benchmark Project for MCC
chose mySAP Human Resources (mySAP HR). Upon successful implementation of organization management, administration, and payroll applications in countries such as Poland, Austria, Russia, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic, the Metro Group brought SAP Business Consulting on board to help evaluate the potential costs savings and benefits of a more extensive mySAP HR rollout.
BENCHMARK ANALYSIS BASED ON SAP BEST PRACTICES
Ute Riemann, head of the benchmark project for MCC, describes how the team created its analysis: We first selected industry-neutral and industry-specific figures by using the key performance indicators (KPIs), and used them as the basis for quantitative evaluations, such as by cost, for example. However, qualitative aspects were also included in the analysis. We used SAP Best Practices to evaluate the performance of current processes and to determine the optimization potential of mySAP HR, says Riemann. Once consolidated and processed, the quantitative and qualitative key figures provided a transparent picture of the operative and strategic potential per application area and for the company overall. For example, the analysis showed that mySAP HR would significantly reduce the workload of routine tasks in the HR department, allowing employees to perform more strategically important ones. It also concluded that mySAP HR could significantly reduce the administration workload for MCC human resources personnel. One of the key findings for us was the fact that the implementation of further modules will enhance the benefit of the system considerably, commented Udo Stauber, head of HR controlling and SAP HR project manager, on the results of the analysis.
NEW APPLICATIONS
In addition, the analysis showed MCC management that implementing new applications such as e-recruiting and e-learning could dramatically increase savings, while reducing costs. And how long did it take the team from SAP Business Consulting to perform the benchmark analysis for MCC? A study of this kind can be completed within 12 days, says Riemann.
GREEN LIGHT FOR FURTHER GLOBAL ROLLOUT
AT A GLANCE
Company Metro Cash & Carry International GmbH (MCC) Benchmark analysis for global implementation of mySAP HR at MCC Support decision making through quantitative and qualitative determination of potential costs and benefits based on internal and external benchmarks SAP Business Consulting Decision to implement mySAP HR worldwide
Based on the positive results, the group gave a green light for further rollout of mySAP HR at its Metro Cash & Carry stores.
Project
Goals
Implementation The result
SFR
AN EFFECTIVE SUPPLY CHAIN POWERED BY mySAP SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT
SFR decided to reorganize its supply chain processes in order to meet the challenges of a rapidly expanding mobile telecommunications market. With sales of 5.3 billion in 2001, the company opted for mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM) to anchor its new processes and synchronize its supply chain. After a rapid, trouble-free implementation, SFR began seeing results: a 98% service performance rate, an average three-month drop in inventory, and improved collaboration with its distributors.
In the late 1990s, the mobile telecommunications sector, until then limited to the professional-users market, began to target the general public. Suddenly we were confronted with a market in full expansion driven by the forces of fashion and heavily influenced by promotions, says Claire Carpentier, director of production and logistics at SFR. As we were accustomed to a client base consisting almost exclusively of professional users, we were forced to rethink our whole mobile business, which meant developing and marketing mobile-phone packages cellular phone, plus SIM card, plus services, all in one package for the public. To succeed, SFR needed to strategically deploy its products, develop imaginative marketing strategies, and manage increased volumes throughout its entire supply chain all the way from package-assembly subcontracting to distribution to end users in order to respond to the changing demand of the retail outlets. In order not to lose any potential clients, SFR knew it had to be sure of having the right product in the right quantity at the right place at all times, with very little margin for error. As the cellular phone itself was subsidized by the operator, and the cost of each cell phone is relatively high, the financial impact of having either too much or too little stock at the retail outlets would have been severe; only by expanding its subscriber base could SFR recuperate its huge initial investment. We decided to reorganize our supply chain processes all the way from cellular-phone and SIM-card procurement to delivery to our distribution clients, says Carpentier. At the same time, we were careful to keep up with the pace at which the network was developing by ensuring the availability of the two virtual components of the pack: the telephone number and the voice mail account.
The core objectives of the reorganization project involved implementing sales-planning processes within SFR in order to create a demand-driven supply chain; enhance and accelerate demand forecasting for both end products and raw materials;
The savings provided by mySAP SCM in terms of enhanced efficiency and reduced costs mean that the return on our investment in the solution is less than one year.
Claire Carpentier, Director of Production and Logistics, SFR
ensure faster reaction to market changes and variations; speed up stock rotation; and, finally, improve collaboration with distributors and optimize their stocks via better-tailored allocation plans.
EASE OF INTEGRATION A DECIDING FACTOR
SFR began evaluating three major supply chain management (SCM) solution vendors. It was not an easy choice to make, says Carpentier. We finally selected SAP primarily because of the ease with which the solution could be integrated with our existing SAP environment. Other factors included its ergonomic user interface, and, especially, the fact that it made sense for us to integrate this planning solution with our existing SAP R/3 management system, which we use for purchasing, sales, production, and finance.
After six months developing the pilot configuration, SFR began implementing SAP Advanced Planning & Optimization (SAP APO) a key component of mySAP SCM. The project team consisted of about 50 people, including several SAP consultants. The project was divided into 13 subprojects: 4 involved the new processes being implemented (planning, distribution demand management, production planning, stock allocation); another 4 were devoted to reengineering existing transactional processes (purchasing/supply, manufacturing order management, order acceptance and available-to-promise checking, and technical data management); 3 were project-wide subprojects (change management, performance indicators, IT architecture); and 2 were focused on new activities (notably, mail-order sales for renewal of clients cellular phones).
A SOLUTION THAT SYNCHRONIZES TASKS AND MEETS ALL NEEDS
After 3 months of general design work and 5 months of detailed design and prototyping, SFR was in possession of a functioning pilot system. The project was put on hold at that stage to make way for another more urgent project: that of combining the SAP systems used throughout the group into a single system. The company deployed SAP APO within 5 months, which completed the supply chain project. The entire project took 12 months, exactly the duration allocated in the project schedule. Carpentier believes that the rigorous project-management methodology had a lot to do with the successful and timely project rollout. It also had to do with the way in which the project was strategically positioned as an enterprise-wide project, sponsored by general management, and the fact that from the very outset it called upon all supply chain players to help build a set of new processes based on true synergy and synchronization of tasks. The 40 users of the new solution adopted it quickly, as it corresponded perfectly to their needs. One year later, it had already formed an integral part of their daily lives. Motivated by the realization that this solution was going to help them improve their performance, all of the users have now achieved a high degree of expertise, says Carpentier. SAP APO is fully functioning as a steering, planning, and decision-making tool, and it has become vital to our business. It enables us to create economic indicators for our flows.
The company experienced numerous and measurable benefits throughout the supply chain as a result of implementing mySAP SCM. Upstream, it manages 6,000 different raw-material items, and downstream, it manages some 2,500 finished products of all types (various packages, SIM cards, recharges, and
We started off with nothing in regards to processes and tools, and now, at the end of a thrilling project, we have an open-ended solution that will enable us to move from the old market of conquering new ground to the new market of renewal.
so on) and 15,000 retail outlets. The two are linked by an optimized flow, due in part to the new processes, but also as a result of the full-scale integration of mySAP SCMs supply chain planning functions and SAP R/3. SAP APO focuses on strategic issues and operational planning, while SAP R/3 handles after-process execution. At the tactical level, the demand-planning functions enable sales planning at the most detailed level: for each product-retail outlet pairing. The new solution also enables SFR to work collaboratively with its distributors. The supply-network planning capabilities within SAP APO calculate end-product and key component requirements for the extended logistics network, taking account of SFRs stocks and those of its distributors, without the distributors needing to intervene.
A SUPPLY CHAIN DRIVEN BY THE NEEDS OF THE MARKET
Before, we had no way of obtaining such useful and accurate visibility of our needs, or of taking our projections into account at all levels, says Carpentier. Thanks to these new capabilities, we now have a supply chain that is genuinely driven by the needs of end clients, a supply chain that is therefore much better correlated with market reality. The fact that we can update our forecasts as frequently as we like with SAP APO with corresponding updates of demand planning means that we can respond more rapidly to market uncertainties and sudden changes in demand.
At an operational level, the forecasts are used by SAP R/3 to calculate requirements for finished products, production, and distribution, taking into account SFRs stocks and those of its distributors. Supply-network planning is used to establish an initial stock allocation plan, which also considers orders from retail outlets entered in the SAP R/3 System. The sales-department employees adjust the stock allocation plan to account for any events or promotions taking place that were not originally scheduled.
MORE ACCURATE AND BALANCED STOCK ALLOCATION
The solution provides our stock handlers with a reliable tool for tracking distributor stocks on an individual outlet basis, says Carpentier. They know exactly how much each distributor needs, where they need it (which retail outlet), and when. The transparency of stock availability allows them to keep our distributors informed of delivery schedules. All of this means that our stock handlers can communicate much better and more effectively collaborate with our clients. The supply-network planning capabilities provide production plans for two production sites and one distribution center. They provide data for the production-planning capability in SAP R/3, which in turn generates SIM card and package manufacturing orders for SFRs subcontractors. This process is tailored to the needs of our planners, says Carpentier. In the future, SFR will use the available-to-promise (ATP) functions in SAP APO to compare stock-allocation plans with deliveries to retail outlets, thus further refining allocation planning and optimizing distributor stocks. This means much more coherent stock allocations to our distributors than before, says Carpentier. They have a much clearer view of our deliveries, and, accordingly, of their own stocks. This enables them to plan their sales better, and reinforces the collaboration between us. Improvements achieved in the logistics process and stock allocation as a result of the implementation have enabled the company to improve its service performance rate, which is now at 98% or more, with more than 80% of retail outlets having the target stock levels on hand in order to execute sales plans.
FASTER STOCK ROTATION FOR COMPETITIVE PROMOTIONS
AT A GLANCE
Software mySAP SCM (SAP APO) HP Superdom UNIX Oracle 40
SFR has not only accomplished its original objective of having the right product available at the right time for each potential client; its new solution has also enabled a significant reduction in finished-product stock levels throughout the logistics
SAP APO is fully functioning as a steering, planning, and decision-making tool, and it has become vital to our business.
Hardware Operating system Database Number of users
network. Better planning accuracy and optimized stock allocations and processes have brought down stock levels at SFR from two months to one month, and from six months to two or three months for SFRs distributors, depending on the product. This has had a direct impact on inventory costs and hence the cost of our finished products and on product rotation, which is now better coordinated with our monthly promotions, says Carpentier. The fact that a particular product might have been sitting on our distributors shelves for six months or more made it difficult for us to play this competitive card in the past. Reduced stock levels at SFR also mean better stock management: mySAP SCM provides good visibility of undersupply and oversupply risks and enables the company to take swift action. This applies also to upstream operations, on the supply end, where inventory needs can be revised at any time and production planning revised accordingly. If problems arise with suppliers, such as nondelivery of cell phones, SFR can deploy a substitute product faster. SAP APO is now an integral part of our daily life at SFR. The processes it supports and its tools have facilitated much more fluid information flows, both internally and externally, and improved our global performance thanks to the synergy it creates at all levels: sales, logistics, stock allocation, distribution, says Carpentier. Our ultimate goal would be to have all of our distribution clients connected into our system in order to ensure even closer integration of their procurement processes.
TELE ATLAS
TELE ATLAS GETS CLOSER TO THE CUSTOMER WITH mySAP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT (mySAP CRM)
Since its establishment in 1984, Tele Atlas has grown into a world leader in digital navigation data. The company currently operates establishments in more than 21 different countries, employing 1,900 people. As a dynamic multinational concern, Tele Atlas continuously endeavors to flexibly respond to the needs of the rapidly changing market. The company, which has been using SAP software since 1999 to optimize its internal business processes, decided to harness the power of mySAP Customer Relationship Management to enhance customer loyalty.
Tele Atlas generates a major part of its turnover through the commercialization of navigation CDs for in-car navigation systems. The company sells the CDs through a global network of garage owners and car accessory shops. Until recently, our dealers were forced to place their orders at the Navigation Service Center (NSC), an external call center located in Edinburgh, explains Geert Bert, sales service manager for Europe and head of the business planning department. This type of outsourcing was very expensive. Moreover, the people at the NSC had little or no affinity with our company. Too often, their product knowledge was too limited to properly respond to customer questions. This inefficiency slowly but steadily translated into declining turnover figures. In addition, the lack of communication between the NSC and Tele Atlas was considered a serious problem. As a result, management often had to make wild guesses about our customers identities and needs, says Bert. To bridge the gap with its dealers, and at the same time reduce costs, Tele Atlas made the decision to handle the dealer database and the orders internally: the Business Service Center (BSC) was born.
mySAP CRM, A LOGICAL CHOICE
Once the BSC had been established, the need arose for an IT system that would help employees manage customer relations. A careful comparison of several packages proved mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) to be the solution that best met the criteria of Tele Atlas. We had been using SAP for some time to manage all of our other business processes, with excellent results. Therefore we felt especially confident about the mySAP CRM solution. Moreover, this software provides all of the functionality that our company needs, today and in the future. Also from a purely technical point of view, mySAP CRM seemed like the best solution, as it allowed us to easily expand our existing software package with a solution from the same supplier.
The actual implementation went smoothly. In September 2001, we began the implementation of mySAP CRM, says Bert. The system was already operational in March 2002. To successfully complete such an elaborate project in such an astonishingly short time span, very strict planning was required. Our
mySAP CRM provides us with a clear overview of our dealers orders, of the quantities bought, and of the different peak periods. This information enables us to orchestrate our promotional campaigns in a far more target-oriented and customer-specific manner.
Geert Bert, Sales Service Manager for Europe and Head of the Business Planning Department, Tele Atlas
accomplishment is, first of all, a tribute to the efforts of our high-quality and greatly motivated project team. In addition, the team from SAP Consulting demonstrated dedication to the project and commitment to excellence.
INCREASED TURNOVER AND COST SAVINGS
mySAP CRM provides us with a clear overview of our dealers orders, of the quantities bought, and of the different peak periods. This information enables us to orchestrate our promotional campaigns in a far more target-oriented and customerspecific manner, Bert explains. The SAP solution also offers numerous advantages with respect to complaint handling. In the past, dealers who had complaints could only appeal to the NSC.
Their grievances were only rarely or never passed on to Tele Atlas, says Bert. Thanks to mySAP CRM, we now have a direct channel to our customers and we can personally follow up their complaints. As a result, we also get a lot more feedback
Thanks to mySAP CRM and our new way of working through the Business Service Center the cost price per CD was reduced by not less than 40%.
Geert Bert, Sales Service Manager for Europe and Head of the Business Planning Department, Tele Atlas
on our products, allowing us to better address our customers needs when developing new CDs. As a consequence of our impressive service improvement, weve already experienced a remarkable increase in the number of calls. In addition, our turnover has also grown slightly during the last few months. Taking into account the current economic malaise, this is, to put it mildly, a welcome bonus. The SAP solution also helped Tele Atlas reduce costs. mySAP CRM allows us to distribute our resources more efficiently among our individual customers. Moreover, a great deal of administrative costs have been eliminated. Thanks to mySAP CRM and our new way of working through the Business Service Center the cost price per CD was reduced by not less than 40% in seven months time, Bert proudly indicates.
READY FOR THE FUTURE
AT A GLANCE
Software mySAP Customer Relationship Management Compaq Windows 2000 Informics 20
At present, the SAP software contains all the information about our European B2B customers, says Bert. However, we also aim to include information about our end users in the long term. In the near future, we even want to use mySAP CRM to manage our many different partnerships with telecommunications companies, service providers, and application designers, Bert points out. Thanks to the flexibility and the functionality of the package, we are sufficiently armed to take up these challenges. We might even consider the idea of starting up a Web shop. Bert provides the following advice for businesses that plan to switch to SAP: Prior to taking the first step toward a new software platform, it is crucial to thoroughly consider exactly what you want to achieve. As an SAP implementation project is quite a heavy investment, you also have to gain insight into the return on investment from the very beginning. SAP is a package that provides almost unlimited possibilities. Therefore, you have to ask yourself what exactly you want from the system and what aspects you want to emphasize. This requires a thorough analysis of the different business processes. However, if you follow this advice, you will be rapidly convinced that SAP is an incredibly multifunctional and very advantageous partner.
Hardware Operating system Database Number of users Implementation time Implementation partner
6 months
SAP Consulting
UTA TELEKOM AG
SAP HELPS UTA MANAGE KEY ACCOUNTING PROCESSES
UTAs existing solution for managing accounts receivables lacked effective interfaces to the companys core SAP R/3 environment. In addition, UTAs legacy system offered only limited functionality for managing open items and dunning and reporting processes. Thanks to SAP Revenue Management Contract Accounting (SAP RM-CA), the Austrian telco now has a fully integrated, industry-specific solution that streamlines business processes, and delivers a range of powerful new functions.
Headquartered in Vienna, Austria, UTA Telekom AG is the countrys leading new provider of telecommunications and e-business services for enterprises and private customers. Leveraging state-of-the-art technologies and its own cuttingedge fiber-optic network, the company delivers a wide range of high-quality services for landline voice telephony, cell phones, the Internet, and corporate networks. UTA employs a workforce of 620. In 2002, it posted revenues of 248.2 million.
INTEGRATED SYSTEMS AND CUTTING-EDGE FUNCTIONALITY
With 460,000 telephony and 330,000 Internet customers, UTA is a major player in the Austrian telecommunications market. But keeping tabs on accounts-receivables (A/R) data for this volume of business presents a major challenge for any company. And, not too long ago, as its customer base continued to expand, UTA became fully aware of the shortcomings of its existing system. There had always been a problem with systems integration, recalls Elmar Hassler, head of the SAP competence center at UTA, and jointly in charge of the implementation project. But when our auditors criticized our processes, we knew it was time to take action. In response, UTA went looking for a solution that would not only help it manage large amounts of A/R data; it also needed a solution that would seamlessly integrate with its core SAP R/3 System and support other key accounting processes. Our legacy system lacked effective, integrated functions for managing open items, which made it very difficult to keep track of receivables, says Hassler.
In an attempt to overcome some of these problems, UTA had interfaced its billing system to SAP R/3, allowing billing data to be entered in the general ledger. However, this was purely a stopgap measure, and did not fully resolve the issue of systems integration. The lack of communication between the legacy system and SAP R/3 particularly affected UTAs sales professionals, who could not easily access consistent data on customers and the status of their accounts.
PARTNERING FOR SUCCESS
Since 1998, SAP R/3 has been at the very heart of UTAs business processes, handling a wide range of tasks, including generalledger accounting, payroll, and logistics. So, when it came time
Thanks to SAP, we have the integration we so badly needed plus a range of powerful, industry-specific functionality that streamlines our day-to-day processes.
Elmar Hassler, Head of SAP Competence Center and Project Lead at UTA
to select new software, the company made the obvious choice: SAP. Partnering with SAP not only ensured optimized integration with our core system, says Hassler. It also gave us the expert support we needed to streamline our dunning, reporting, and payment processes.
RAPID, EFFECTIVE IMPLEMENTATION
Preparations for implementing SAP Revenue Management Contract Accounting (SAP RM-CA) an application in the SAP for Telecommunications portfolio of software and services began in August 2001 when UTA and SAP Consulting in Austria jointly conducted a preliminary study into the strengths and weaknesses of the telcos IT infrastructure and business processes. At this stage, we realized that SAP not only offered excellent support for our existing processes; its industry-specific solution also provided a range of completely new capabilities, states Hassler. These included user-friendly installment planning, automatic handling of untraceable incoming payments, and calculation of interest on open items none of which had been possible with UTAs legacy system. To ensure the implementation went as smoothly as possible, UTA set up three subprojects, focusing on accounts-receivables management, integration of general ledger and controlling, and infrastructure and interfaces. The SAP implementation at UTA centered on migrating the telcos accounts receivables from its legacy system to the new SAP solution. This meant transferring core processes and master data for customer accounts. In addition, the project aimed at creating a unified view of customer data across various systems, user-friendly open-items management, more efficient dunning, and more effective reporting. It also included implementation of a call-center solution to give agents rapid access to UTAs optical archives via SAP BAPI interfaces. Other goals included enhanced integration of general and subledgers, and provision of reliable data for downstream reporting, cash management, and controlling (profitability analysis). An analysis phase began in January 2002, and in February the core team received training. From March to April, the implementation team set up a prototype to demonstrate how the new functionality could be integrated into UTAs day-to-day operations. Our people were very enthusiastic about what the SAP solution had to offer, and were keen to put the new functionality to use in their departments, says Hassler.
Following testing and user training, SAP RM-CA went live at UTA on August 12, 2002 a little over eight months after kickoff, and right on schedule. Close collaboration between UTAs in-house project team and SAP Consulting played a decisive role in ensuring quick and effective implementation.
MADE-TO-MEASURE FUNCTIONALITY FOR TODAYS TELCOS
SAP Revenue Management Contract Accounting is a subledger accounting system geared to the specific requirements of players in the telecommunications industry. The solution is specially designed to automatically handle large numbers of customers and high volumes of documents, where manual processing would be unfeasible. SAP RM-CA capabilities for receivables and collections management support all payment methods used by telcos for example, bank debits, bank transfers, checks, credit cards, and cash. Integrated dunning functionality monitors customers payment histories, and initiates action where appropriate. SAP RM-CA allows telcos to define various dunning levels and how to determine them. In addition, the solution can calculate dunning charges in accordance with the dunning level of the open items and the customers credit history. And if dunning fails to bring the desired results, the SAP industry solution supports transfer of data to external collection agencies. Where customers are unable to pay, an installment agreement or a deferred payment agreement can be set up for one or more receivable items. Furthermore, a receivables- and collection-management posting causes an immediate posting in the SAP treasury system, ensuring that the liquidity forecast and data in the cash-management system is always up-to-date. SAP RM-CA also includes a range of online query, reporting, and analysis tools. An account display function provides users with an overview of debit and credit items for a particular customer account. The data displayed can be selected according to various criteria, allowing users to home in on precisely the information they require.
In addition to the functions for individual accounts, SAP RM-CA includes powerful capabilities for aggregated reporting. These include statistics for drawing up financial statements, such as open items on balance sheets. The solution also enables the volume of open items at the end of the working day to be analyzed according to various criteria such as overdue receivables. SAP Revenue Management Contract Accounting also interfaces seamlessly with the SAP controlling system, allowing in-depth profitability analysis, for example. An additional intermediate document (IDoc) interface enables users to view the
At this stage, we realized that SAP not only offered excellent support for our existing processes its industryspecific solution also provided a range of completely new capabilities.
Elmar Hassler, Head of SAP Competence Center and Project Lead at UTA
receivables and collections postings associated with certain bills. This link to the optical archive is an invaluable source of information when call-center employees have to deal with bill inquiries from customers. To ensure the highest standards of customer service, SAP RM-CA exchanges data with SAP and non-SAP customercare and CRM systems, providing essential information for customer-centric tasks.
A HOST OF TANGIBLE BENEFITS
AT A GLANCE
Software
The SAP solution has brought UTA a host of tangible benefits. The new solution provides us with quick and easy access to a wide range of up-to-the-minute information, explains Hassler. With SAP software, UTA can now deal with customer inquiries more quickly and efficiently. Sales staff can view the latest details on customer accounts with point-and-click simplicity, exploring the data according to a variety of criteria. All in all, the system has greatly improved the quality and quantity of information available to our employees, says Hassler. In addition, the new functionality provided by SAP RM-CA has enabled UTA to streamline its business processes. And the integration of accounts receivable into the telcos core system has simplified the IT infrastructure, making for easier maintenance and lower costs.
A RESOUNDING SUCCESS
SAP RM-CA SAP R/3
Operating system
(for financials, controlling, project system, materials management, sales and distribution, human resources) SAP Business Information Warehouse
Windows 2000 Advanced Server 40 to 45
Number of users Duration of implementation
Approximately 8 months
At present, a total of 40 to 45 users work with the new solution. While it is still too early to quantify the effects of the implementation, Hassler is more than satisfied with the results: We are all very happy with the new solution. Thanks to SAP, we have the integration we so badly needed plus a range of powerful, industry-specific functionality that streamlines our day-to-day processes. In the wake of the successful implementation, UTA is now in the process of integrating the SAP sales and distribution (SD) functions into its IT environment. A test system is already in place, and the telco plans to incorporate aspects of billing into SD in the near future all of which will go toward further enhancing the quality of the companys customer service.
198 Financial & Public Services
FINANCIAL & PUBLIC SERVICES
Financial & Public Services 199
BANCO URQUIJO
USES mySAP CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT TO SATISFY DEMANDING CUSTOMERS
For Banco Urquijo, effective customer relationship management is more than just one of many ways to enhance the bottom line its a fundamental success factor. To meet ever-increasing demands for service, the bank needs effective tools for managing customer information and increasing productivity.
mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) provides a number of benefits from better marketing information to enhanced productivity at all levels giving Banco Urquijo the tools it needs for success in a competitive industry. Madrid-based Banco Urquijos primary business is in private and personal banking, commercial banking, and capital markets. A subsidiary of the KBL Group, Banco Urquijo maintains a banking network of 57 offices in Spain and 1 in Argentina. It has agents in Frankfurt and holdings in KBL Switzerland, CDC Urquijo (a Madrid-based bank specializing in handling securities), and various Internet portals. It also operates a virtual banking service that allows customers to make many types of bank transactions and queries online or by phone. The KBL Group, headquartered in Luxembourg, is composed of a number of subsidiaries that specialize in managing investment funds, pensions, assets, stocks, and insurance.
CUSTOMER RELATIONS: A CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTOR
Todays banking industry is highly competitive, with a huge number of financial institutions competing for customers who demand superior service. Effective customer relationship management is a fundamental success factor for Banco Urquijo and a guarantee of the banks growth. To help itself meet growing demands, Banco Urquijo implemented mySAP CRM.
WHY mySAP CRM?
mySAP CRM not only enhances the banks ability to manage important customer information, but also helps it to manage its commercial banking division more efficiently and effectively. The decision to adopt the SAP solution for customer relationship management, mySAP CRM, is in line with the evolution the banking industry is experiencing, says Pedro Martnez, organization and virtual banking manager for Banco Urquijo. The Spanish financial system is now highly competitive. Whats more, because the market has attained a certain maturity, its becoming necessary to adopt more effective management methods and tools that increase resource productivity.
IMPLEMENTATION
The entire implementation was completed in just five months. The project was mapped out in February 2001, initial implementation lasted from March to June, and the system went live in July. The implementation lived up to Banco Urquijos expectations and delivered a quick return on investment. SAP Consulting from Spain implemented mySAP CRM, with consultants from CSC Ploenzke assisting with technical matters. The mySAP CRM technological platform included a set of IBM AIX servers and a DB2 database.
FUNCTIONAL COVERAGE IN ALL AREAS
mySAP CRM provides a variety of tools to meet the banks requirements: Agenda management Agenda management tools help both account managers and supervisors plan their commercial activity. Customer management Customer management tools provide general information on customers. This includes, among other functions: Queries on customers overall financial accounts Display of customer activities Display and management of various customer opportunities, along with other functions Potential-customer management The potential-customer management tool provides a database of potential customers that includes both general information and relevant commercial activity and associated results. It helps managers perform such tasks as assigning potential customers to a particular manager or creating and modifying potential-customer records. It also provides statistics on potential-customer action taken and action pending. Product management Product management tools give the bank the ability to design and update product catalogs. Reporting, sales arguments, and access to both internal and external information are done through the mySAP Enterprise Portal solution.
Activity and commercial action management

Activity and commercial action management tools help agents and other employees manually activate internal activities and support them in activities designed to increase the banks business, such as scheduling customer visits. The status, phase, and information regarding the person in charge of specific activities and actions can be accessed at any time and are available in a report form. Alarm management Special tools within mySAP CRM were integrated with the financial institutions alarm system, which automatically alerts the appropriate employee of customer situations that require immediate attention. The alarms created using the mySAP CRM special tools alert employees to idle accounts, negative balances, declines in commissions, and risky operations.
BENEFITS OF USING mySAP CRM
The mySAP CRM solution provides Banco Urquijo with numerous benefits that help to make the bank more competitive in a tough marketplace: Accurate real-time information that is available throughout the entire company Enhanced productivity and analytical capacity at every level Improved knowledge and tracking of opportunities Increased sales action Enhanced motivation and discipline throughout the sales force More reliable customer and marketing information Increased profits from sales and reduced associated costs Improved management of customer knowledge
MARKETING PLANNING AND CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT
mySAP CRM enables the banks marketing department to run campaigns at any level and through any channel. Using the campaign generation tool, the bank can manage information about a campaigns description, the definition of its targets and phases, and its economic objectives, terms, and environment. It also sends the information to Banco Urquijos data warehouse system, where it can be used in decision making. Using the campaign tracking tool, the sales force can execute a campaign and help sales representatives generate commercial actions, activities, or tasks. The sales staff has immediate access to campaign documentation. Information generated during a campaigns execution can also be sent to the data warehouse. And reports can now be generated to review campaign tracking, the extent of campaign fulfillment, and the objectives achieved.
INTEGRATED ACCESS TO IMPORTANT CUSTOMER INFORMATION
AT A GLANCE
SAP solution components Operating system Database Number of users mySAP CRM IBM AIX servers DB2 Universal Database 360 1
mySAP Enterprise Portal, the SAP role-based enterprise portal, gives the banks 360 users from the commercial and marketing divisions access to both mySAP CRM and the banks preexisting systems. A role or profile is assigned to each user, depending on
The decision to adopt the SAP solution for customer relationship management, mySAP CRM, is in line with the evolution the banking industry is experiencing. The Spanish financial system is now highly competitive.
Pedro Martnez, Organization and Virtual Banking Manager, Banco Urquijo
Number of sites Length of implementation Desired change
5 months A single point of access to information systems for all the commercial area to improve efficiency in relationships with customers SAP Consulting and CSC Ploenske
Implementation partners
the individual users department and responsibility. That role determines what set of activities the user can access. In the commercial banking management division, assigned roles include commercial banking manager, business area manager, territorial manager, office manager, and agent. The marketing department has a similar series of roles. Users can also personalize mySAP Enterprise Portal to meet their individual needs. For example, they can add Internet addresses and often-used transactions. And Banco Urquijo was able to customize mySAP Enterprise Portal screens to reflect the institutions corporate image.
BANK OF IRELAND
SAP FOR BANKING SOLUTIONS INCREASE PROFITABILITY AND DELIVER GREATER CONTROL
The Bank of Ireland faced the difficult challenge of maintaining profitability in an unpredictable global economy. It needed to increase profits through better management of resources and by cutting costs. To realize operational savings, it streamlined core business processes in finance, payroll, human resources, and procurement by choosing software from the SAP for Banking portfolio of solutions and services. The result: reduced costs, integrated information, and standardized processes across the organization.
With assets of 87 billion and more than 18,000 employees, the Bank of Ireland is the number one banking institution in the country. Although the bank has been in business since 1783 and has a long history of success, times have changed and so have the challenges of maintaining profitability in a highly volatile global economy. Like most banks today, the Bank of Ireland was being asked to show increased profits through better management of resources and by cutting costs. The bank realized it needed integrated solutions to help streamline core business processes in finance, payroll, human resources, and procurement. In response, the Bank of Ireland turned to industry-relevant SAP solutions from the SAP for Banking portfolio of software and services.
BETTER PROCESSES YIELD RESULTS
The Bank of Ireland needed improved control within key areas of the organization because it was hampered by fragmented, disparate business processes. Finance and human resources had multiple systems that were not integrated, and processes such as payroll were not standardized throughout the group. As for purchasing, there was no group procurement system in place to enable proper monitoring of expenses and supplier contracts. The bank took action by implementing a comprehensive banking portfolio from SAP, the first of its kind in Ireland.
SAP has worked with banking customers worldwide to understand their business challenges. The portfolio of solutions that the Bank of Ireland selected has a proven record of success, thanks to SAPs efforts to listen and react to customers requirements. Each solution applies best-practice business processes to solve banking problems effectively. Moreover, SAP provides a cost-effective and adaptable approach to integrating multiple systems throughout an organization.
Given the focus on cost control in financial services these days . . . we see SAP and the application of SAP for Banking as the key enabler of improved cost-effectiveness going forward.
Hugo Flinn, General Manager, Finance and Business Services, Bank of Ireland
Before we decided to go with SAP, we had a wide range of systems in place, says Hugo Flinn, former general manager for finance and business services at the Bank of Ireland. One of the key elements of our vision was to provide information more quickly and to enable faster action. The main business driver behind the project was to improve productivity in both finance and HR through the implementation of shared services. From a procurement point of view, we wanted a better way of buying. With SAP, the bank set its goal to reduce head count in finance and HR, along with cutting nonstaff costs.
Although other systems were considered, SAP was recommended as the best choice for a single, integrated system. The key message is integration; thats what we bought, says Flinn. The bank decided to rigorously standardize processes across the group using a single system. We didnt want the cost of building interfaces between separate systems and the expense of maintaining them.
GAINING CONTROL IN FINANCE
Finance was especially in need of integration and better visibility. We had perhaps 30 general ledgers, several payroll and HR systems, and no overall procurement system, says John Crabtree, the banks program manager. There was no integration with payroll, no agreement with HR, and data was always input twice, adds Flinn. Our objective was to achieve a significant increase in visibility groupwide, and understand what drives our costs. The Bank of Ireland applied the SAP finance solutions first before addressing other internal process challenges. We implemented the entire suite of financial applications that exist within mySAP Financials general ledger, fixed assets, accounts payable, and so on, says Mary Rice, finance team lead at the Bank of Ireland. Within a short time, the bank realized clear advantages from the deployment. The implementation of SAP provided people with an integrated system for the first time ever, says Rice, which means that instead of going in and manually digging around to find pieces of information, its now all available real time on the system. That is a huge advantage. Now we have one accounts payable system, one payroll system, one general ledger, and one chart of accounts, says Flinn. SAP enables us to close the books faster and to provide accurate, consistent information more quickly.
EMPOWERED HUMAN RESOURCES
The Bank of Ireland next chose mySAP Human Resources (mySAP HR) to extend its SAP finance solution. In HR, we had an opportunity to enable shared services, says Flinn. The issues we overcame were duplicated, diverse processes, multiple HR systems, a lack of integration with payroll, and MIS [management information system] unreliability which presented a real challenge. With mySAP HR, the bank took advantage of software applications for organizational management, recruitment, personnel administration, payroll, and time management all integrated into one system. The Bank of Ireland also rolled out employee
Return on investment is happening. Weve seen tangible benefits in procurement. Plus, were starting to see the same results in finance and HR.
Aidan Long, Program Director, Bank of Ireland
self-service (ESS) capabilities to extend the functionality of SAP to employees, enabling them to view, create, and maintain information related to their jobs. Expense reports are one area in which ESS has proven particularly successful. One of the key benefits of the HR solution is that employees can answer an awful lot of questions themselves through ESS, says Flinn. If you take employee expenses as an example, weve got 96% compliance.
BOTTOM LINE FOR BUYING
Without a central system and process for managing procurement, the Bank of Ireland lacked important controls. Orders could not be consolidated for better pricing and relationships with suppliers were more difficult to form. Prior to the implementation of SAP, we didnt have a groupwide procurement system, says Aidan Long, program director at the bank. So we didnt have visibility of costs, standard best-practice procurement procedures, and uniform purchase orders. The bank chose SAP Enterprise Buyer, an application from mySAP Supplier Relationship Management (mySAP SRM). With this new procurement solution, the bank can reduce costs, increase purchasing efficiencies, monitor buying
I think the beauty of the system is that it is completely scalable. It is a highly integrated platform on which to do business, and the seamlessness makes it transparent to all users. Its a robust and very stable platform.
Michael Rabbitt, IT Project Manager, Bank of Ireland
behaviors, and better collaborate with business partners. An online catalog is also available from which employees can browse and purchase items. Using a standard Web browser, bank employees can access electronic catalogs to quickly procure items within the banks established business rules and pricing policies. And with a global view of procurement activities, the Bank of Ireland can negotiate better contracts with suppliers.
Weve implemented [SAP] Enterprise Buyer as the front end of the procurement system, says Olivia Sinnott, procurement team lead at the Bank of Ireland. The catalog-based concept is excellent. Its just like Internet shopping, which everybodys familiar with, so thats worked really well for the users. The SAP procurement solution has also enforced higher compliance, improved supplier selection, shortened cycle times, focused sourcing strategies, and lowered process costs. We are seeing benefits from process efficiency and visibility, says Flinn. We have enabled management to challenge costs on a transaction-by-transaction basis. Plus, we are realizing benefits from better supplier management.
SMOOTH IMPLEMENTATION
The Bank of Irelands management approached the SAP implementation with well-thought-out planning. A stable project team, with clear, visible backing from senior management, added to the success and speed of the rollout. We implemented SAP out of the box, explains Flinn. Putting together uniform business processes to build the system reflected where we wanted to go with our processes. The implementation was divided into phases. Phase one focused on four business units, about 1,500 users, says Flinn. We had a full-time team from the beginning that came from HR, finance, procurement, and IT. Anne Murray, HR team lead, adds, In phase one, we launched with nearly all the functionality and scope. We actually went with a big-bang approach, so we would have personnel administration, work management, personal development, recruitment, training and events management, everything, on day one.
Phase two was a larger implementation, approximately 10 business units with 10,000 users in total and the same functionality, says Aidan Long, program director. Adds Flinn, Phase two went in on time and on budget. Phase three was essentially more of the same taking on more business units. During the deployment, SAP acted as the banks implementation partner, developing a mutual relationship based on trust and professionalism. The support from SAP Consulting was very good, says Flinn. We felt that SAP was on our side, and I think thats key. Michael Rabbitt, IT project manager, agrees: The SAP team has been superb from the start. Theyve shown a lot of professionalism. SAP also empowered the banks staff to expand their skill sets to take more responsibility for maintaining SAP for Banking solutions. For phase one and two, we had full support from SAP, says Long. In phase three, we needed only limited support. This phase is the first one that the Bank of Ireland group has done by itself.
BANKING ON THE FUTURE
The Bank of Ireland continues to expand its use of SAP for Banking solutions to gain maximum profitability by streamlining internal business processes. Says Flinn, Given the focus on cost control in financial services these days and the Bank of Ireland is no different in that respect we see SAP and the application of SAP for Banking as the key enabler of improved cost-effectiveness going forward. Return on investment is happening, notes Long. Weve seen tangible benefits in procurement. Plus, were starting to see the same results in finance and HR. I think the beauty of the system is that it is completely scalable, says Rabbitt. It is a highly integrated platform on which to do business, and the seamlessness makes it transparent to all users. Its a robust and very stable platform. One of the things we are particularly pleased about is being one of the largest SAP implementations in Ireland, adds Flinn.
BKK LANDESVERBAND BADEN-WRTTEMBERG

mySAP CRM HELPS ENSURE HEALTHY RELATIONSHIPS WITH BKK MEMBERS
In order to improve its customer service and remain competitive the BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg chose mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) and the SAP role-specific enterprise portal. As a result, the company can now provide customerfocused service and effectively recruit new members and ensure their long-term ties with the BKK.
HIGH-QUALITY HEALTHCARE
With more than 10 million members, health-insurance funds (also known as BKKs in Germany or health insurers in the United States) make up one of the largest statutory insurance groups in Germany. For more than 150 years, 20 of the largest companies throughout Germany, as well as many small and midsize businesses, have relied on these insurance providers. Today, faced with intense competition, health insurers are looking to capitalize on innovative concepts that will enable them to provide high-quality service for their members. This means enhancing relationships with insured members, as well as with prospective customers and partners.
SATISFIED MEMBERS AND FIRST-CLASS SERVICE
In order to improve its customer service and remain competitive, the BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg which is a federation of independent regional providers chose mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM). The SAP customer relationship management solution, along with the SAP role-specific portal, enables the company to provide customer-focused service and effectively recruit new members and ensure their long-term ties with the BKK. Heinz Kaltenbach, head of corporate development and competition at the BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg, stresses the goals of the CRM project: satisfied members and first-class service.
IMPLEMENTATION IN RECORD TIME
The implementation of mySAP CRM at the BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg started as a pilot project involving, among others, the BKK Zollern-Alb, which is a member of the Landesverband group. Under SAPs project lead, the new SAP solutions went live in a record time of just four months. More than 50 staff members of the BKK Zollern-Alb use the SAP solution in the BKK service center and in regional branch offices. All 1,700 employees will eventually work with it.
A COMPREHENSIVE RANGE OF SERVICES
The BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg chose SAP as its consulting partner because of its comprehensive range of services and expertise. SAP helped ensure a seamless integration with the BKKs existing system and helped optimize the companys business processes. In-depth knowledge of the product and continual collaboration with the CRM development team at SAP also guaranteed that customer-specific requirements could be realized quickly. Plus, SAP made sure it kept to the tight time frame. Collaboration between all the team members was good and contributed significantly to the success of the project, says Gert Bellmann, SAP project lead at BKK Zollern-Alb. SAP consultants helped BKK employees work with increasing independence, so we could gain maximum control of the rollout ourselves.
With mySAP CRM, we can improve our service significantly and increase our ability to compete.
Thomas Bodmer, Chairman, BKK Zollern-Alb Board
INNOVATIVE CUSTOMER SERVICE WITH mySAP CRM
AT A GLANCE
Software Hardware mySAP CRM Fujitsu Siemens Computers, Primepower Solaris Informix 7.3.1 ux9 1,700 employees
Today, mySAP CRM provides the BKK call centers in BadenWrttemberg with real-time, integrated information. All external customer data received from customer correspondence, telephone calls, e-mails, or the Internet is saved in a customer database and is always available to BKK employees in an up-to-date and standardized format. That means BKK employees can respond efficiently to member inquiries and provide advice tailored to their needs. And, with mySAP CRM activity- and campaign-management capabilities, employees can not only deliver effective customer and prospect care, but can also help the health insurer acquire and retain new members. All of this quickly translates into significant added value.
TAILORED USER-FRIENDLINESS
Operating system Database End users
Using mySAP CRM, the BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg employees access all information, applications, and services they need for their work via the SAP portal. The role-specific layout of the interface, which is supported by the Web browser, allows the employees to access precisely the data they require. The solution integrates both internal company information as well as external information from the Internet. In the intensely competitive health-insurance market, the BKK Landesverband Baden-Wrttemberg is now in a position to consolidate relationships with its members and respond to new prospects with high-quality offerings.
CITY OF BIEL
CITY OF BIEL CHOOSES SAP SOFTWARE TO ENABLE ONLINE TRANSACTIONS FOR BUSINESSES AND CITIZENS
With SAPs help, the Swiss city of Biel implemented a bilingual portal that enables online transactions between the citys administrative departments and those who live and work there. Thanks to software from the SAP for Public Sector portfolio of solutions and services, the administration now has seamless, end-to-end automated processes that enable it to prevent mistakes and save valuable time for all concerned.
A CUTTING-EDGE PORTAL FOR A FORWARD-LOOKING ADMINISTRATION
With a population of almost 50,000, the city of Biel in the canton of Bern is Switzerlands largest bilingual community. Biel justifiably calls itself The City of Communication: It is home to the Federal Office of Communications (FOCOM), and it was also one of four venues for the Swiss national exposition, Expo.02. Biels highly decentralized administration consists of 6 large and 30 smaller offices employing some 500 people. True to the citys ideals, it pursues e-government strategies that emphasize the quality of communications with its citizens. Rudolf K. Spiess, chief information officer, describes the vision: Citizens should be able to order a parking permit round-the-clock, seven days a week, from their own homes and print it out themselves.
A FRESH START
Biel launched its first Web site in 1997, but the project failed to gain sufficient in-house support to really make an impact. We didnt have enough personnel to really push it, says Spiess. After two or three years, the only feedback we received was complaints about out-of-date or missing information. Spiess continues: We decided to make a fresh start. With the new bilingual portal, Project eBienne, we wanted to enhance the citys attractiveness, and provide an extremely practical tool both for the administration and for all who live or work in Biel. We wanted to let citizens and businesses conduct online transactions with us. Old-style administration has had its day. Citizen services need redesigning. This e-government project gave us an opportunity to rethink and modernize the underlying processes.
Biel,which was already using SAP software for financial accounting and human resources management, chose to work with SAP once again. We wanted to automate business processes from end to end, and SAP makes that possible, says Spiess.
A UNIFIED SYSTEM
From front office to back office, software from the SAP for Public Sector portfolio of solutions and services which includes a comprehensive array of e-government capabilities
We wanted to automate business processes from end to end, and SAP makes that possible.
Rudolf K. Spiess, Chief Information Officer, City of Biel, Switzerland
provides seamless integration, linking Web-based forms to workflow and electronic records. It supports internal processing by linking online payment systems and accounting functions. Open and flexible, SAP software helps public administrations build a unified system that combines data from legacy and third-party solutions.
RAPID IMPLEMENTATION
SAP Consulting helped conduct an initial study in the summer of 2001, with an administration-wide survey to increase awareness of the portal initiative and to identify key processes to be put online. The contract was signed in September. After an eight-month implementation phase, the new portal went live in early May 2002.
Both internal and external team members showed great commitment. The project was completed very rapidly, says Spiess. Stage one is now in place, enabling online ordering of permits. Stage two will support automated payment, and by stage three, citizens will be able to print out permits themselves. The system infrastructure includes a portal platform and a Web content management system. mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM), a core component of the SAP e-government framework, provides the link between the front and back office.
AUTOMATED, END-TO-END PROCESS
Obtaining a dog license provides a good example of how the new system works. Formerly, police officers would visit homes to collect the fees due. Now, owners can register their pets online. The entire process is automated. The police officer receives notification, checks the facts, and confirms the application. This triggers the billing process. When the invoice has been paid, the license is mailed to the dog owner. This end-to-end process chain saves time and prevents mistakes.
EXTREMELY CITIZEN-FRIENDLY
Biels portal is designed to be extremely citizen-friendly, with navigation oriented around life events (for example, moving into a new house or the birth of a child). This way, citizens do not need to understand the internal workings of the administration to find the information they need. The new online service has received plenty of positive feedback from the local population and the media, while administration staff members are very satisfied with the softwares user-friendliness. Spiess believes that improving the design of internal processes will boost productivity. We are seeing signs of this already. The system reduces staff workloads, enabling them to concentrate on other tasks, he says.
MORE IN THE PIPELINE
This project is by no means finished; the city wants to improve other business processes with the help of SAP software. Plans include an intranet solution for procurement and material distribution, a staffing solution, and an Internet-based procedure for processing construction-permit applications.
CITY OF GHENT
GHENT OPTS FOR THE FUTURE WITH SAP
As with any large municipality, the city of Ghents activities extend into many realms from education to social issues to culture which involves many departments and complex processes. In order to integrate these processes and streamline its accounting procedures, the city turned to SAP. Today, it runs a full range of solutions from mySAP Business Suite to help it meet these challenges and enhance its services to citizens.
Any municipality is active in numerous realms, from education to culture to social issues to sports, and so forth which means its organizational structure is quite complex. The city of Ghent, which employs more than 7,000 people spread across 86 different departments, is no exception. And today, innovation and a forward-looking approach remain key guiding principles in the city of Ghent, which does everything in its power to optimize its service offerings. With the aim of bringing itself even closer to the citizen, the city implemented software from the mySAP Business Suite family of solutions. As a result, Ghent benefits from transparent administrative procedures, greater accessibility to services, and e-government.
THE NEED TO OPTIMIZE AND AUTOMATE PROCESSES
It was in 1989 that Daniel Verbeken, tax collector for the city, realized that Ghent needed to optimize its processes. The situation had gotten out of control, especially in the case of the municipal treasury and other fiscal departments. All departments
Our information became richer and better integrated. SAP also enabled us to use our financial resources more effectively. It has given us a clearer picture of our major expenditures.
Daniel Verbeken, Tax Collector, City of Ghent
were maintaining paper accounting records and entering data into the system manually, recalls Verbeken. It was obvious that Ghent needed a software solution to automate its processes. However, the solutions that the city subsequently deployed failed to provide the desired improvement in efficiency. The problem in short: isolated islands of information.
A PIONEERING ROLE
Finally, in 1997, the city of Ghent set out to find a solution that would enable it to fully integrate its processes across departments. It conducted an in-depth analysis to determine requirements, such as tools for effective tax and revenue management. We conducted market research and launched a Europe-wide tender for an ERP system, says Verbeken. Six candidates submitted bids, but only two could meet our requirements. After assessing each product in terms of functionality and expandability, SAP software came out on top. SAP was a strategic choice, says Verbeken. We were satisfied that we could use this platform over the long term and expand it to match the citys increasing scope of services. Ghent became one of the first European cities to deploy software from mySAP Business Suite.
SAP: MAIN PILLAR FOR GHENT
SAP and Ghent sealed a deal on January 14, 1999, and the project was launched on June 11. We opted for a phased approach and created task forces comprised of key users for each SAP component that we wanted to deploy, says Bruno Vanneste, project coordinator. The collaboration both within and between the task forces went smoothly. Everybody understood that the SAP project was more than just the deployment of an accounting system, says Vanneste. We also set up a steering committee made up of representatives from the various departments, our partners, and the deputy mayors. The committee met once a month to assess the projects progress. The city of Ghent worked together with SAP Consulting and its partners to implement the project, to ensure that every departments needs were met. Thanks to SAP Consulting and its partners, we now have a system which allows us to share information across departments and to increase the efficiency of our daily work, says Vanneste.
Ghent, which finally abandoned its legacy systems, implemented SAP with an eye toward the future. SAP will be the main pillar supporting our city administration in years to come, explains Vanneste. We also opted for the most standard implementation possible. SAPs broad functionality met most of our needs, and only a few issues required special programming effort. Vanneste was satisfied with the outcome and grateful to the core users for their enthusiasm and motivation. In fact, the users were key factors in the success of the project. These people dedicated between 60% and 70% of their time to SAP and
We hope to make our services more accessible to citizens using e-government. Our portal should also become an information channel for the citys partners. Thanks to SAP, all this has become possible.
Bruno Vanneste, Project Coordinator, City of Ghent
have even become experts in the system, he says. The city made a tremendous effort to familiarize the future users with the system; the results were well worth it. After an intensive round of testing on January 1, 2001, the citys financial departments launched the SAP software using a big bang approach; the software included Financial Accounting, Controlling, Materials Management, Sales and Distribution, Cash Management, Project Systems, Funds Management, and Asset Management.
USING RESOURCES MORE EFFECTIVELY
AT A GLANCE
Software mySAP Business Suite
The city immediately saw the advantages offered by SAP. Task duplication was eliminated. Employees no longer had any problem sourcing the information they needed without having to phone other departments, says Verbeken, the citys municipal tax collector. Thus, our information became richer and better integrated. SAP also enabled us to use our financial resources more effectively. It has given us a clearer picture of our major expenditures. The city of Ghent is confident that the advantages of running SAP will become even more apparent as it continues to extend mySAP Business Suite to other city departments. While we dont have a set timetable, says Vanneste, we see the SAP project as an ideal opportunity to bypass and restructure existing procedures.
A SOLID FUTURE WITH SAP
Hardware platform NCR Operating system Database Number of users Implementation time Implementation partners Windows NT Informics 160 to 170
1.5 years SAP Consulting PricewaterhouseCoopers, Cevi, Ardatis, Oasis Consultants
As a result of its success with SAP, Ghent opted for other solutions from the worldwide leader in collaborative business solutions. We deployed software from the SAP for Real Estate portfolio (of software and services) to manage city housing, says Vanneste. The city also set up its customer interaction center using mySAP Customer Relationship Management. But theres more to come: By integrating SAP Business Information Warehouse, we hope to use the huge amount of data contained in mySAP Business Suite for analyses and reports, says Vanneste. And, even though our departments are now reachable by e-mail, and our Web site is up and running spectacularly well, we are not yet making full use of the possibilities offered by the Internet. We hope to make our services more accessible to citizens using e-government. Our portal should also become an information channel for the citys partners. Thanks to SAP, all this has become possible.
DUTCH MINISTRY OF EDUCATION, CULTURE, AND SCIENCE

MINISTRY USES SAP FOR PUBLIC SECTOR SOFTWARE AS INTEGRAL FINANCIAL SYSTEM FOR CENTRAL GOVERNMENT
Four years ago, the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture, and Science (OCenW) decided to reorganize its financial systems, which lacked flexibility and were expensive to maintain. The ministry chose to replace its old system with software from SAP for Public Sector, a state-of-theart portfolio of solutions and services that were developed by SAP for governments and public organizations. Today, the software helps OCenWs Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs manage its accounting, budgeting, and funds-management processes, and provides comprehensive support for policy makers.
Until recently, the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture, and Science (abbreviated in Dutch to OCenW) used a custombuilt system, called GEFIS, to process all its financial matters. GEFIS was specially developed at the end of the 1980s for the core departmental processes: funding, budgeting, and financial accounting. This robust system had certainly proven its value, but the cost of maintenance weighed heavily on the internal budget. In addition, it always involved a long, drawn-out process to make adjustments to the system which were necessary because of changes in legislation and business practices. For example, not only has the number of schools decreased drastically in recent decades, but the funding regime in most education sectors has also changed from an advance payment system to a system of preallocated budgets. Furthermore, in 2000, the Ministry of Finance made plans to implement a new cross-departmental financial model (called KFI). Together that was enough reason for us to look forward to a new financial system, says Marcel Smits van Waesberghe, deputy director of OCenWs Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs (abbreviated in Dutch to FEZ). We were looking for a simple and flexible system that we could adjust and expand one module at a time. Moreover, it had to be standard software, because we wanted to save time and money we previously spent on maintaining the GEFIS system.
FLEXIBLE SOLUTION FROM THE BEST, MOST COST-EFFECTIVE PROVIDER
In addition, the providers system had to be set up according to the KFI model. SAP was one of the few vendors that could meet these needs. After a call for tenders in Europe, SAP for Public Sector a portfolio of cross-industry and industryspecific software and services proved to be the best and most cost-effective. SAP Consulting was appointed main contractor, with SAP business partner Align now part of CtacAlign as implementation partner. For OCenW, a key consideration in choosing SAP included the possibility of a phased implementation. By not being dependent on a big bang, it was possible to implement new
All budget proposals and corresponding statuses can be accessed directly from anywhere in the ministry.
Marcel Smits van Waesberghe, Deputy Director, FEZ, OCenW
functionality one component at a time, says Teun van Dijk, internal project leader at the Ministry of Finance. After all, the technology was completely new to us, so it was important to learn step-by-step.
The first phase of the implementation covered the relatively simple process of managing the administrative costing activities, which involves processing approximately 25,000 invoices a year. It also included replacing the existing general ledger and the expenditure accounting system with mySAP Financials, one of the cross-industry solutions within the SAP for Public Sector portfolio. Subsequently, the implementation team began designing and configuring SAP for the complex and cyclical budgeting process. The ministries internal budget is adjusted on a monthly basis, whereas draft budgets have to be presented to parliament every quarter. Preparing these budgets involves a considerable workflow. Because of the demographic, social, and
The transparency of the system leads to fewer mistakes. . . . SAP is flexible and dynamic something the old system was not and that is precisely what is important in an organization that demands quick and clear changes.
Marcel Smits van Waesberghe, Deputy Director, FEZ, OCenW
political consequences of budget proposals, ministries also need to calculate many alternatives, due to the fluctuating political climate. That fluid character, accompanied by very meticulous approval procedures, required a special SAP solution: SAP Strategic Enterprise Management (SAP SEM). This solution was originally developed to offer the business community a strategic tool for calculating alternative budgets, and accommodated the process of preparing departmental budgets extremely well. SAP SEM uses the data from SAP Business Intelligence, which in turn extracts data from mySAP Financials. We appreciate the effort SAP has put into making SAP SEM/SAP Business Intelligence suitable for government objectives, says Smits van Waesberghe. This effort has since then attracted great interest from other departments, because of the fact that this solution was implemented in only eight months. SAP has always been very willing to help. SAP stands out positively with reference to both lead time and costs.
The third phase involved policy-making processes, in other words, converting legislation into concrete policy or for OCenW, allocating and paying subsidies to schools, universities, and cultural institutions. The SAP SEM/SAP Business Intelligence workflow is also used for that purpose. Culture, the smallest department within OCenW, has already completed phase three. We will have reached the ultimate goal, of course, once all managers are working with SAP and we can finally take the old GEFIS system out of service, says Smits van Waesberghe. Schools are by far the most important target group, with more than 100,000 commitments and 700,000 payments, together amounting to more than 20 billion. We are now going to get cracking with SAP to set up a solid solution for subsidy management and payment. I have a lot of faith in this, especially in view of the enormous potential for SAP in the public sector in Europe as well as in the United States.
REDUCING OPERATING COSTS
Every day, the ministry realizes the difference SAP has made to the budget preparation process. Before, the process was primarily characterized by a document procession through the organization, says Smits van Waesberghe. Changes were often notes scribbled in the margins. If information was stored electronically, it was usually in personal spreadsheets. A central database for recording data was only ever set up in the final stages of the process. Now, the ministry has a fully automated system, which can be accessed locally and managed centrally. As a result, all draft budgets and corresponding statuses are directly accessible from anywhere in the ministry. The transparency of the system leads to fewer mistakes, says Smits van Waesberghe. In addition, the workflow dictates the speed at which documents are processed. Moreover, the budgeting process is integrated with the financial accounting component of mySAP Financials. SAP is flexible and dynamic something the old system was not and that is precisely what is important in an organization that demands quick and clear changes.
According to van Dijk, one of the biggest advantages of SAP SEM/SAP Business Intelligence is the vastly improved reporting functionality. Reporting is now an integral part of the process: status overviews, consolidations, draft budgets they all roll out at a push of a button, he says. Actually, you could call it continuous management reporting. Finally, Smits van Waesberghe ventures an estimate of how much the department will save once GEFIS is no longer in the picture. I foresee us reducing our operating costs by a factor of five.
GRADUAL AWARENESS
OCenW, which experienced quick success with its SAP implementations, put a lot of effort into training and postimplementation support to help users adjust to the new system. Of course, it takes some getting used to: from paper files to an inbox where you can find everything, says van Dijk. There was actually very little time for users to get acquainted with the new system; the budget has to be ready on time. I am therefore very happy that we decided on a phased approach. This meant that we could keep the project team small, work decisively, and acquaint our people with the new functionality one step at a time.
Van Dijk also explains that the organization has gradually become aware of how well SAP performs. Now everyone wants SAP, he says. Smits van Waesberghe acknowledges: There are still quite a few systems that need replacing in our organization. We will soon start on personnel administration (human resource management), for example. We chose to implement SAP there, too. I think well do the same for contract management. With SAP, administrative tasks can be performed separately, but the information can be easily consolidated. The way we invite in tenders has changed, too. Before, we asked for system providers; now we ask for system integrators.
AT A GLANCE
Software SAP for Public Sector software mySAP Financials mySAP Business Intelligence SAP SEM
Hardware platform HP L2000 (production) HP L1000 (development and test environment) Operating system Database Number of users Implementation time HP 11.21 Oracle 8.2 170 1 year (phase 1) 8 months (phase 2) 1 year (phase 3a) SAP Consulting, CtacAlign
Implementation partner
HOSPITAL BRITANICO DE BUENOS AIRES (HBBA)

HBBA ONCE AGAIN CHOOSES SAP SOFTWARE TO HELP STREAMLINE PROCESSES AND OFFER BETTER SERVICE
After a highly intense evaluation process, the prestigious Hospital Britanico de Buenos Aires (HBBA) implemented SAP Patient Management a key application from the SAP for Healthcare portfolio of solutions and services. The goal: to deliver better service to patients and to improve efficiency of its administrative processes. The hospital also made plans to implement SAP Business Intelligence to help it analyze the wealth of data captured with SAP Patient Management.
On July 1, 2002, Hospital Britanico de Buenos Aires (HBBA), one of the most prestigious hospitals in Argentina and an SAP customer since 1997 began using a new information system based on SAP Patient Management, a key application within the SAP for Healthcare portfolio of solutions and services. This is the first implementation of its type in Latin America, although many hospitals around the world have been using SAP Patient Management since 1994, particularly in Europe. Our initial aim was to have a tool that would enable us to offer our patients higher-quality service. We wanted to modernize and speed up patient care, and make administrative processes more efficient, by improving the quality of the documentation submitted to healthcare payers and welfare-fund offices, explains Osvaldo Mauro, director of the IT project at Hospital Britanico. HBBA was founded in 1844. It now boasts 260 beds, 3 outpatient care centers, and a health plan with 40,000 members. It also carries out important teaching work. Long-term thinking forms part of the hospitals culture. In fact, when it came time to confirm its choice of implementing SAP software, one of the hospitals most important criteria included the solutions ability to support continuous improvement. Almost 50 users participated in the highly intense evaluation process, along with a systems integration specialist, a business consultant, and the technical staff at the hospital. Aside from qualifying the functional and technical aspects of the software, the evaluation also reinforced HBBAs strong opinion of SAP as a company. The result of all the detailed comparative analyses carried out during the selection process can be summarized in one word: trust, declares Mauro.
HBBA implemented SAP Patient Management, which tightly integrated with the companys mySAP Financials solution. SAP Patient Management, which will enable us to share patient information across wards and departments, will help us meet our patients needs far more effectively by decreasing time spent on administrative processing, says Mauro. SAP Consulting in Argentina successfully managed the implementation and clearly understood our goals, which contributed to the projects success. Mauro also goes on to explain that SAP Patient Management stood out due to its reliability and flexibility. This ensured a minimum number of developments to adapt it to our requirements. Our previous experience with SAP the implementation of the financial management and controlling solutions
SAP Patient Management, which will enable us to share patient information across wards and departments, will help us meet our patients needs far more effectively by decreasing time spent on administrative processing.
Osvaldo Mauro, Director of the IT Project at Hospital Britanico
was quite positive, in terms of quality of support from SAP consultants. This time around proved just as satisfying. The solidity of the product and the provider and the seriousness and experience of the consultants inspired confidence; they stood by us during the project and after go-live, says Mauro.
The implementation project lasted a little under 13 months and was carried out using the AcceleratedSAP (ASAP) methodology. Once it completed the implementation, HBBA began introducing changes that had a direct impact on important administrative processes. For example, the hospital started developing the medical fees settlement functionality, which will enable some 500 physicians who work at the hospital to check the details of their accounts over the Internet. HBBA then began preparations for the implementation of SAP Business Intelligence, which it would use to analyze data from SAP Patient Management. The hospital created the Information Management Office strictly for the purpose of analyzing this wealth of patient-related information.
One of the hospitals immediate objectives includes integrating SAP Patient Management with its main clients online treatment authorizations system. We will interoperate with one of the biggest healthcare insurers in Argentina, despite the fact that it uses non-SAP software, says Mauro. Online authorization of treatments will enable better care and greater precision in the exchange of information. In the short term, we plan to use the same scheme with other companies with a similar technological base. Mauro continues, By taking advantage of the connectivity and security offered by SAP, we can open our system, within the limits of confidentiality, to the medical auditors of certain healthcare insurers. This will help facilitate their work and make our activities more transparent.
AT A GLANCE
Software SAP Patient Management mySAP Financials (financial administration, fixed assets management, treasury, controlling) HP UNIX HP-UX 11.0 (64 bits) 130
Hardware Operating system Number of users Length of implementation Implementation partner
13 months SAP Consulting in Argentina
HOSPITAL SAN JOS TEC DE MONTERREY

SAP FOR HEALTHCARE PORTFOLIO OF SOFTWARE AND SERVICES IMPROVES PATIENT CARE
Hospital San Jos saw that by improving efficiency and visibility of its operations, it could deliver better care to patients while improving business processes. Now that it selected software from the SAP for Healthcare portfolio, patient information is centralized and up-to-date, billing is fast and accurate, and resources are optimized for exceptional patient care.
Hospital San Jos located in Monterrey, Mexico prides itself as a medical institution committed to the highest level of patient care. The 138-bed hospital treats thousands of people each year, with 700 employees and an active staff of close to 200 physicians and medical professionals. The medical complex is recognized nationwide for its innovations in cardiology, cardiovascular surgery, pediatrics, gynecology, and obstetrics. Along with a medical school, it also specializes in ophthalmology, oncology, diagnostic radiology, and radiotherapy. Providing superior healthcare depends on people and the environment in which they work. Hospital San Jos realized that it could offer even higher quality care by centralizing information about patients and resources, streamlining administrative and billing processes, and analyzing key hospital data. To add more efficiency and visibility into its operations, Hospital San Jos selected the SAP for Healthcare portfolio of software and services specifically SAP Patient Management and mySAP ERP becoming Mexicos first implementation of the SAP portfolio for healthcare providers.
IMPLEMENTATION TEAMWORK
It becomes very clear when running a hospital where improvements can be made, says Ernesto Dieck Assad, Hospital San Joss CEO. A lot of our departments werent communicating as well as they could. We had billing process problems, patient record and information issues, and resource visibility challenges.
Seeing that its legacy systems, which were developed in-house for individual departments, needed to be replaced, the hospital evaluated alternatives and selected software from the SAP for Healthcare portfolio. The board of directors named the SAP implementation project Nosotros (Us), and adopted the project as their own. Jesus Diaz Garaygordobil, marketing and information technology director at Hospital San Jos, rolled out the project in three phases. A dedicated team of users from
SAP has given our hospital the opportunity to work with a best-of-suite technology.
Jesus Diaz Garaygordobil, Marketing and Information Technology Director, Hospital San Jos
all areas of the hospital took part in the implementation to define necessary requirements and business processes. The hospital also had the help of consultants who were responsible for adapting the SAP industry-relevant software to Mexican laws and healthcare practices. When we implemented the SAP software, it forced us to look at the way we were operating our hospital, says Dieck. We went through a process that helped us evaluate and then standardize procedures from department to department. We also adopted best practices as a result of implementing the system.
In October 2002 and in less than four months mySAP ERP went live; the payroll capability of mySAP Human Resources followed in November and SAP Patient Management in March of 2003. The transition from the legacy systems was quick, smooth, and almost transparent. SAP Consulting, together with its partners, helped to achieve a smooth and fast transition from our legacy systems, explained Diaz. Due to the extensive knowledge transfer, the learning curve was remarkably short.
INTEGRATION AND VISIBILITY BRING RESULTS
Having accurate, up-to-date information that was accessible to a variety of hospital staff was a major requirement for Hospital San Jos. When you work in a big hospital like this one, you cannot have different databases, says Dieck. You cannot go to one department for patient information and to another department such as the laboratory or operating room and start at the beginning. Now we have complete patient information that all departments can use without having to rekey it. SAP saves us time and information is more accurate. Plus, with integration you have centralized data to make better administrative decisions as well as make physicians more effective when treating patients. Visibility into operations is another major benefit that SAP for Healthcare delivered. Before, with separate departmental systems that were not connected, scheduling resources and managing supplies were difficult.
Today, when we ask the employees who manage our equipment and inventories if they can see what is needed for tomorrow in the operating room, they can immediately determine if any special equipment or medicines are required, says Dieck. Everybody is informed of whats going to happen tomorrow or any other day and what they will need for the operation. We didnt have that kind of communication before. The hospital also improved how it calculates supply needs to better oversee and manage purchasing and procurement. And, it now has a better view of what resources it uses such as diagnostic equipment and operating rooms to coordinate surgery schedules, diagnostics, and postsurgery care.
KEEPING TRACK OF COSTS AND REVENUES
Hospital San Jos is a nonprofit, self-funding hospital. As such, it needs to have a clear understanding of what needs to be billed, where revenues are coming from, and what is purchased. SAP software enables the hospital to handle complex insurance reimbursement and itemized billing requirements. The system helps us run the hospital, especially in our finance area, says Dieck. The billing process within Mexicos healthcare system is very drawn out. Everything is itemized, and the hospital obviously wants to recover its money as quickly as possible. The SAP solution helps speed up the invoicing and billing process.
SAP also gives the hospital a larger view of its operations, which is vital from a strategic and planning perspective. Today, I can go to my computer and see what is happening in any area of the hospital in real time. I look at costs for each department, how much money comes in, the income for each department and what we expected, versus what we actually realized. This is very good because people in every part of the organization have visibility into all our costs and revenues and where there might be some problem areas. Software from the SAP for Healthcare portfolio also provides the hospital with analytical tools to help it understand resource utilization and patient demographics. We can measure the length of stay for people, revenue per patient, revenue per hospital stay, and revenue related to diagnoses, says Dieck. In the future, we would like to use our analyses and compare how we are doing against some hospitals in the U.S. and around the world. We will also use SAP to help us plan for capital expenditures to determine whether we need additional equipment and resources. We need to have that kind of information to make good decisions going forward.
CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENTS
Hospital San Jos sees the SAP solution as a way to make a difference. SAP has given our hospital the opportunity to work with a best-of-suite technology, says Diaz. At the same time, we have been able to share our own best practices through the localization process, which makes us very proud.
Hospital San Jos can focus on delivering high-quality care to our patients, leaving the administrative responsibility to SAP. The biggest gain is that SAP is helping us to be the most efficient hospital in Mexico.
Ernesto Dieck Assad, CEO, Hospital San Jos
Dieck adds, Hospital San Jos can focus on delivering high-quality care to our patients, leaving the administrative responsibility to SAP. The biggest gain is that SAP is helping us to be the most efficient hospital in Mexico. We really have the opportunity to be more effective against our competitors and ahead of everybody in Mexico and Latin America.
HVB REAL ESTATE CAPITAL (HVB GROUP)

SAP OFFERS A BANKING SOLUTION TAILORED FOR INTERNATIONAL REAL ESTATE FINANCING
Working together with consultants from SAP, HVB Real Estate Capital France implemented a banking solution that encompasses all business areas and has set a new benchmark in international real estate banking. Highlights included streamlining and automating the syndication process and implementing new refinancing functions. This remarkable project was based on applications from the SAP for Banking portfolio of solutions. Rollout is scheduled for more subsidiaries in the future.
A BANK DESIGNED FOR PROFESSIONAL REAL ESTATE CUSTOMERS
HVB Real Estate Capital France SA called HVB REC France for short is the Parisian competence center for professional real estate financing of the HypoVereinsbank Group. HVB REC is part of the groups international real estate business, which has a loan portfolio of over 30 billion at its disposal and another 6 billion of syndicated loans. Due to an increase in business, commissions from securitizations, structurings, and syndications (similar to those in investment banking) amount to some 30% of the companys total income. The group is focused on continuing its expansion in integrated real estate banking and on strengthening its position in the European market.
LAUNCHING INTO A NEW IT ERA WITH SAP
HVB REC is staying abreast of the far-reaching changes in the industry with extensive consultancy competence and state-ofthe-art IT structures. Since April 2001, the company has been using SAP software for financial and cost accounting, and in July 2001, it went live with a banking solution based on the SAP for Banking portfolio of solutions. The SAP implementation included key capabilities for core banking mortgage loans (CML), used for loan management and object and collateral management, and corporate finance management (CFM), used for handling money market transactions. Never before has a financial company processed syndicated loans using the loan management capability offered in the SAP for Banking portfolio, so its a first in the area of banking, says Markus Plenk, project lead at SAP Consulting, who is proud of his teams achievements.
SUCCESSFUL COLLABORATION: WALLDORF MUNICH PARIS
In November 2000, the project got under way, and the team set to work on the business blueprint, concentrating on processes and user orientation. The central architecture, the remote
From marketing to payment transactions, the solution based on the SAP for Banking portfolio forms the central pool of information for everyone involved. Id particularly like to stress the system-supported syndication, which has increased our competitive edge in this area significantly.
Ulrike Umkehrer, Departmental Project Lead, HVB Real Estate Capital
connection of branches and subsidiaries, and the individual tailoring performed in the SAP standard system were important to us, says Elisabeth Hungley, technical project lead at HVB REC. Within just eight months, the team from SAP Consulting successfully piloted a demanding project and SAP truly established itself as a strategic partner for HVB.
OPTIMIZED WORKFLOW WITH AUTOMATED PROCESSES
Before implementing the SAP solution, the group had to deal with an older system that was extremely inflexible. A large number of manual interfaces and various workflows made it difficult for us to position new financial products on the market quickly, says Ulrike Umkehrer, departmental project lead at HVB REC. Now things are very different. New financial products can be rapidly established because they are easy to configure and set up. Unified terminology for transaction data and costing methods has improved global communication. The optimized electronic workflow and the reduced time and effort needed for controlling have enabled us to attain over 50% automation, says Hungley. Redundant data retention is a thing of the past, as are error-prone multiple entries and time-consuming reconciliations. In addition, auditable access authorization and security for individual transactions now protect customer and financial data.
CONSISTENT, HIGHLY ACCESSIBLE INFORMATION
The SAP solution plays a key role when it comes to displaying syndicated loans. All processing, product, and costing data is automatically saved and can be used for productivity and profitability calculations. Whats more, easy access to data improves risk and liquidity management, and user-oriented reporting allows business data to be consolidated in various ways to meet specific reporting needs. Whether an employee needs deal-specific or customer-specific information or a general overview, all data is available at any time. This has proved to be a great advantage for risk controlling, for example. Reports required by the parent company, which previously were very laborious to create, are now available at the click of a mouse. This is where SAP really comes into its own; it enables clear presentation of syndicated transactions plus global profitgroup analyses and profitability reports for user departments and the executive board.
INTERPOLIS
REALIZING IMPROVED QUALITY AND FUNCTIONALITY AT LOWER OPERATIONAL COSTS WITH SAP
With an annual revenue of 4.7 billion and approximately 5,600 employees, Interpolis is one of the top five insurers in the Netherlands. The head office in Tilburg can handle impressive transaction volumes and big numbers. Interpolis processes more than 12 million financial transactions every year. Phase three of Interopoliss companywide SAP strategy focused on quicker processing and better management of these incoming and outgoing cash flows. In this way the company gained a unique, threefold advantage: a new and efficient system landscape with more functionality, a higher level of quality, and a 12.5% decrease in operational costs.
SECOND IMPROVEMENT PHASE
Broadly speaking, insurance companies have two cash flows: incoming payments, consisting of premiums and debt collection, and outgoing payments, such as payment of claims. Interpolis, which is part of Rabobank Groep, processes a lot of transactions no less than 12 million per year, according to Willem van Duijn, director of Concern Finance & Control. The old payment systems used for this purpose were no longer adequate, van Duijn says, which is why we started looking to replace them at the end of 2001. This constituted the third phase of a big change program introduced by Interpolis in 1999. In the first phase we set up a financial service center and came to a clear definition of services, van Duijn explains. These services are mainly focused on the financial processing of insurance products, which allows our market organizations to focus on operational management and to dovetail with financial processing. The next phase was the implementation of a basic financial system for accounting and reporting. This project was completed in 2000 with the delivery of SAP R/3 Financials and Controlling (SAP R/3 FI-CO). After that the focus was on streamlining payment transactions. SAP Financial Services Collections and Disbursements (SAP FS-CD) was a logical choice, especially in view of our SAP as preferred supplier policy.
DISCIPLINED, STEP-BY-STEP PROJECT SETUP
Thirty-eight of Interpolis own insurance applications are interfaced with the services offered by the financial service center. Consequently, SAP FS-CD also had to be integrated with this system landscape. An implementation with such a wide scope and long lead time is unique in the SAP insurance world, says Eric van Mierlo, Interpolis information manager.
Other companies would have chosen a more modest setup. At the start of the implementation in April 2002, we set ourselves ambitious goals. For example, we wanted to collect two days earlier and completely replace three old systems. The total
The scope of this implementation is unique.
Eric van Mierlo, Information Manager, Interpolis Verzekeringen
cost of ownership was not to exceed that of the old systems and preferably be lower. For this purpose, the new software used had to be kept as standard as possible. By means of disciplined, step-by-step project planning, we completed the implementation within 10 months. The implementation team consisted mainly of our own people, supported by a few experts from SAP Consulting. Because of the projects complexity and the high targets, we paid special attention to the quality of project management, which is absolutely critical. In collaboration with Brighthouse Management, an organization specialized in this field, we were successful. We had excellent contacts with SAP in Walldorf, and together we developed new changes to the architecture. This fit in with our approach to automation, which stresses the importance of having a very efficient setup and making optimal use of the functionality. Together with SAP, we managed to convert our pursuit of cheaper, smaller, and quicker into results.
LOWER OPERATIONAL COSTS
Interpolis has derived tangible benefits from SAP FS-CD. This is most noticeable in reconciliation, that is, the automatic linking of bank transactions to outstanding receivables, says van Duijn. This is a key efficiency factor in the financial processing of claims and premium payments. Before the implementation of the software we automatically processed only 20% of all transactions. After the implementation of SAP FS-CD, we were able to raise this to 75%. The software also enabled us to reduce the lead time of the debt collection process from three days to only one or two days. At the same time we also implemented SAP Business Information Warehouse (SAP BW) and SAP R/3 Cash Management for SAP FS-CD. This gave us an insight into
Our operational costs have decreased by 12.5%.
Willem van Duijn, Director of Concern Finance & Control, Interpolis Verzekeringen N.V
how to realize the service levels of the financial service center and the actual cash flows per insurance product. Normally such improvements in quality and functional enhancements lead to higher operational costs. The costs of the complete system have, however, decreased by 12.5% since the implementation! Especially in view of the large volumes we process, the benefits can be regarded as extremely impressive. In addition, the functionality available to us has increased considerably and can be used to expand and improve our existing services. Interpolis is now also in a position to respond more quickly to the needs of new customers. When you think that all this has been achieved at lower operational costs, it only confirms that this was the right thing to do.
STRATEGY CONTINUED
AT A GLANCE
SAP software SAP BW SAP R/3 Cash Management, SAP for Insurance, and SAP FS-CD
Our implementation file has two tab pages, says van Mierlo. That is the metaphor we use. The third tab page is ready and represents the further implementation of SAP BW. At the same time we are extending SAP FS-CD with Broker Account, which has been included in the standard based on the requirements of Interpolis. As a result, the number of processed transactions will grow to 23 million per year. With the pursuance of its SAP strategy, Interpolis will gain further insight into the performance of its organization and products (via SAP BW). SAP R/3 Cash Management will be deployed where possible. This insight is essential for a sound investment strategy and to limit the risks involved. For Interpolis as an insurer, these factors have a direct influence on the financial well being of the whole organization. Incidentally, there will no doubt be more tab pages, to use this metaphor again. In our long-term planning, we always look at our organizational requirements and try to match them with the SAP software. The end is not yet in sight!.
Hardware platform Compaq Operating system Database Number of users Windows NT SQL Server 25 operational users, 125 informational users
Implementation time Implementation partners
10 months IBM Business Consulting Services, SAP Consulting
STATE OF BERLIN
BERLIN LEADS THE WAY WITH STATE-OF-THE-ART PERSONNEL ADMINISTRATION
Berlin was the first federal state in Germany to introduce mySAP Human Resources globally as part of its ongoing modernization of personnel administration and payroll. The advanced software replaced two old batch procedures for payroll, optimizing process flows and replacing manual tasks with automated workflow. The implementation became a showcase for public sector implementations.
The Landesverwaltungsamt (LVWA) in Berlin is the central administrative agency for Berlin local authorities, including the Berlin Senate, political entities, public institutions, and foundations. LVWA maintains personnel administration and payroll for all civil servants, salaried employees, and wage earners in both East and West Berlin, totaling around 180,000 employees.
ENTERING A NEW ERA OF PERSONNEL ADMINISTRATION USING SAP
As part of its strategy to streamline and modernize personnel administration and payroll processes, the LVWA embarked on an ambitious project to deploy mySAP Human Resources (mySAP HR) across all departments and to all employees. The project, called Integrated Personnel Administration (IPA), has a colorful history. It was in 1995 that the LVWA decided to move its payroll procedures to a state-of-the-art IT platform. After thorough analysis of the initial and subsequent costs, it became clear that Berlin required a standard solution that could meet all the requirements of a public personnel administration a solution that could be implemented throughout the entire federal state of Berlin. Invitations to tender went out to four different software providers, with market leader, SAP, emerging as the winner.
We chose a top-performing partner for our ambitious plan, says Hans-Jrgen Przytarski, director of the Berlin authorities and a member of the steering committee. There are many different positions involved, and the administrative regulations and collective agreements are much more complicated than on the free market. SAPs software functionality was as convincing as its professionalism.
COMBINED EFFORTS
In January 1996, a team of SAP consultants from Walldorf came on board to help kick off the implementation. The project involved more than 130 business processes and all 180,000 employees. While it initially encompassed the changeover to mySAP HR personnel administration capabilities, the project was subsequently expanded to include the complete payroll administration functionality of the SAP solution. The implementation phase proved very demanding on the project managers. At the same time as changes were made to the organizational flow, 8 Berlin senate administrations in 12 local agencies linked to other public entities, such as the fire brigade and regional revenue office installed the standardized SAP infrastructure. Data security and encryption had to be ensured and access authorizations set up for 4,000 users, who were subsequently trained to operate the system. At first, the users were somewhat resistant to the changeover, but they soon began to see the benefits of the new HR solution. In spite of these challenges, the LVWA met its tight deadline. It was a joint effort. We managed to achieve our goal only through the utmost commitment from each party, says Przytarski. Since January 1, 2002, all employees in Berlins payroll and administrative offices have been running mySAP HR.
We are not yet using all of the SAP softwares capability, but we have recognized its potential.
Hans-Jrgen Przytarski, Director of the Landesverwaltungsamt and Member of the Steering Committee
REAL-TIME DATA EFFICIENT PROCESSES
Before entering personnel data electronically, Berlin employees filed paper documents in separate areas for position management, accounting, and personnel data. This resulted in duplicate data, too many time-consuming manual tasks, an excess of paperwork, and frequent errors. The mySAP HR software enabled Berlin to link all positions, accounting, and personnel data entry, resulting in new areas of responsibility and stateof-the-art workplaces. In the area of position planning, automated workflow processes replaced manual tasks and standalone applications, making personnel processing much easier. Processors can now execute payroll simulations at the touch of a button, allowing them to check changes to references or avoid incorrect settings. This means that each personnel area has access to uniform and consistent data.
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE WITH SAP
The team is currently working on the third phase of the project: the implementation of mySAP HR capabilities for funds and position management. However, Przytarski says that this is not the end of the project: We are not yet using all of the SAP softwares capability, but we have recognized its potential.
THE UNIVERSITY OF BASEL, SWITZERLAND

The University of Basel in Switzerland has a strong commitment to excellence. In 1996, it became an autonomous institution, sparking a number of key academic and administrative reforms. But several legacy systems were severely undermining the efficiency and effectiveness of the universitys processes and its ability to provide services to students. Building on its positive experience with SAP Financial Accounting (SAP FI) and SAP Human Resources (SAP HR) capabilities, the University decided to implement SAP Campus Management. It has now eliminated many costly manual processes and boasts a system capable of steering the organization into the future.
STREAMLINING ADMINISTRATIVE PROCESSES, REDUCING RED TAPE, ELIMINATING ERRORS
Universities in many countries face exploding student populations, rising public expectations, and tightening budgets. They have widened their curricula to embrace new subjects and have introduced transfer credits to attract overseas students. But, at the same time, more students and more courses of study inevitably mean more administrative overhead, paperwork, and complexity. There is therefore an urgent need to critically review the way universities are run and students served. Resources must be deployed in the right place, at the right time, and at the right price. Not least because funding policy for higher education is a much-debated issue, with a high public profile. One answer to these challenges lies in putting to work the same technology that delivers success in the business world: technology that streamlines processes, reduces unnecessary costs, and helps make the most of staff, equipment, and buildings; technology that provides decision makers with vital insights into university activities, enabling them to analyze their organizations from all possible perspectives and to respond to changing circumstances.
A DISTINGUISHED PAST, AN EVEN BETTER FUTURE
Founded in 1460, the University of Basel is Switzerlands oldest institution of higher education. Like many other such organizations, the university maintained an IT infrastructure for core administrative processes that had outlived its sell-by date with systems that had been in place for a good 30 years. It was, to be frank, on the verge of breakdown massively overloaded and unwieldy. Moreover, there was no integration with other systems, such as financial accounting applications. As a result, many processes were still manual, causing major errors (for instance, when calculating tuition fees). As a seat of learning with an enviable reputation for quality, the University of Basel wanted something better.
AN AMBITIOUS UNDERTAKING, A POWERFUL SOLUTION
By October 1998, it had become clear to university authorities that the legacy infrastructure for student administration had outlived its usefulness. The university had to be efficient, agile, and responsive. The existing IT environment just wasnt up to the challenge. The new solution had to fulfill a range of criteria: It had to streamline administrative tasks (such as collection of fees), reduce manual work, and eliminate errors. Moreover, the university was looking for comprehensive reporting and analysis capabilities giving an accurate, complete picture of activities and of strengths and weaknesses. Improved information flow would help management to analyze, coordinate, and plan university operations at a completely new level. The ideal solution would also integrate with other IT systems and be a solid basis on which to build in the future.
TIME FOR CHANGE
In November 1998, the university issued a request for proposals, prompting a number of bids from major players. In early 1999, the governing body gave the go-ahead for prototyping SAP Campus Management which, at the time, was still very much in the development phase. However, SAP and Swiss-based implementation partner SAP Stfa, were convinced that SAP Campus Management would fit the bill. The university was already running SAP FI and SAP HR. SAP Campus Management was a natural extension. Whats more, the project offered SAP the opportunity to demonstrate the full power of its universityoriented software and the benefits of integration a real differentiator between SAP and competitor products. Prototyping was completed in late 2000, and a detailed report was submitted to the university governing body. SAP Stfa and SAP presented a comprehensive plan for the introduction of SAP Campus Management. The two partners invested considerable effort in demonstrating to the university the significant opportunities for value and efficiency that the software would unlock over the long term. University authorities had experienced firsthand the positive impact of SAP software. They also knew that, with SAP, they would gain the expertise of a partner committed to the higher education sector and a partner that would develop new functions and support new technologies in the future, too.
SMOOTH, RAPID IMPLEMENTATION
In spring 2001, the governing body gave the go-ahead. Detailed planning and initial user training began immediately. SAP Campus Management was installed between April and June 2002. The project was divided into three subprojects: applications and admissions, reregistration with fee calculation, and reporting. Three teams, each with two university employees, worked for a period of eight months under the leadership of external consultants. The consultants invested a total of 300 man-days in process reengineering, customizing, and go-live. For the process design work, the core team was able to draw on its experience at other universities. Users were given thorough training and were able to start work with SAP Campus Management in July 2002. User acceptance of the new solution is high, although there was a need for coaching and comprehensive process documentation. The students, too, have embraced the new technology.
SAP FOR HIGHER EDUCATION & RESEARCH EFFECTIVE IT SUPPORT FOR THE ENTIRE STUDENT LIFE CYCLE
SAP for Higher Education & Research is a portfolio of industryspecific solutions, applications, and services covering the entire student life cycle. It enables higher education establishments to handle core student and staff processes more effectively, to enhance service, and, ultimately, to increase satisfaction. The portfolio allows seamless integration of front-office and backoffice processes. It has capabilities for organizational management, teaching and studies, academic and student services, grants management, records management, human resources, material and services administration, and business support. As Tom Shirk, senior vice president of public services at SAP, explains, SAP Business Consulting is uniquely qualified to provide institutions of higher learning with the integration and openness of a collaborative business environment. SAP Campus Management uses the latest tools and technology available to steer institutions into the new educational millennium.
STREAMLINING FOR SUCCESS
The University of Basel has a total of 8,000 students 6,400 undergraduates and 1,600 doctoral candidates. It has been an autonomous, self-administering entity since 1996. We needed technology that could seamlessly integrate our administrative processes and ensure consistent processes across the university system, explains Elsa Sutter, the campus management project manager and head of student services at the university. An overhaul on the legacy system was long overdue. Processes that could not be automated were too bureaucratic and time intensive, not only for the staff, but also for the students. Standing in a line was a common and very frustrating feature of studying at the university. Enrolling and amending status or study details required a personal visit to the university registry. Paying fees and sorting out official paperwork often meant students traipsing to the university more than once. Communication and transparency between and among internal departments was poor, duplication of effort for certain tasks unavoidable. The various IT systems in place could not communicate with each other, meaning a complete lack of visibility. As a consequence, internal and external reporting suffered.
A NEW LEASE ON LIFE
SAP Campus Management has consigned these problems firmly to the past. Many key administrative processes are now carried out automatically, in a simple, user-friendly environment. Workflows distribute tasks to staff efficiently and effectively. And seamless integration with SAP Financial Accounting software provides improved cash flow and eliminates costly errors caused by manual processes. It also ensures that accurate, timely figures are available on income, costs, and outstanding payments, automatically triggering reminders. Whats more, staff no longer need to spend hours of expensive overtime balancing the books at the end of the academic year. Information is drawn directly from financials systems. The accuracy and quality of data has increased drastically. As a result, the university can now fulfill reporting obligations, with minimum manual intervention, and can analyze all aspects of core operations as and when required. As Elsa Sutter explains, SAP Campus Management eliminates physical boundaries and enhances communication.
A BETTER DEAL FOR STUDENTS
AT A GLANCE
SAP solution SAP Campus Management
Students also benefit, with access to better, more efficient services. The new system is based on postal correspondence drastically reducing the need for personal visits by students. At the beginning of each semester, students now receive a form containing their master data and a reply card. They use this form to notify the university of amendments to their status or of changes in faculty, subject, or personal details. The reply cards are then processed by the university, which confirms any amendments. Invoices for fees are generated automatically previously a manual process with a 15% error rate. Students receive their personalized university ID cards, confirmation of enrollment, and forms for details of courses to be attended, as soon as their fees are received. Payment reminders are generated and sent automatically. SAP Campus Management ensures compliance with all data protection regulations. Data is regularly backed up, and the stable SAP environment helps to minimize downtime. The solution also supports an internationally recognized transfer credits system. This is crucial in attracting and administering more students, who can now transfer more quickly and easily to Basel. Furthermore, applicants can now download registration forms from the Internet, and the system generates and sends automatic responses.
BETTER SERVICES ALL-ROUND
Hardware platform Fujitsu Siemens Computers PRIMERGY P200 2-way Operating system Database Microsoft NT Oracle
For the University of Basel, SAP Campus Management represents a new lease on life. Time-consuming manual processes have been eliminated, with the long lines at the university registry removed. Staff can now be redeployed to take care of other tasks. Moreover, the powerful SAP functionality allows the universitys decision makers to identify popular courses, analyze revenue streams, and critically examine cost structures. Most importantly though, the solution provides the university with a direct route to its goals and a strong, powerful, scalable basis for the future.
RICH FUNCTIONALITY FOR ALL CORE PROCESSES
SAP solutions are highly flexible. The capabilities installed at the University of Basel address pressing issues, but represent only a selection of the many features that SAP for Higher Education & Research offers. This portfolio provides a variety of powerful functions for coordinating universities and colleges, including: Teaching Academic structure/program of study Rules and regulations Event planning Capacity planning Event planning and scheduling Room and additional resource planning Students Student master data Academic history Individual study programs Administration Admissions Equivalency determination Student account management Registration for program of study Course registration Event, class, online learning, and examination registration Examination and grading Reregistration De-registration Progression Change of program Degree auditing Graduation Alumni Research Pre-award and post-award handling Reimbursements Administration Integrated funds and position management Records management
Customer relationship management (CRM) Interaction/call center, with activity management and contact management, including prospects, applicants, recruitment activities, student information, customer/learner (non-student) activities Customer service and support for interaction/call center, with activity management and contact management, including special events for students, alumni, new customers, applicants Lead generation and lead management, including identifying qualified prospects for programs of study Campaign management, particularly for university courses
A Before-and-After Comparison of Campus Processes at the University of Basel Process Student administration Feedback from students for upcoming semester, and enrollment Before SAP Campus Management With SAP Campus Management
Manual process Students receive an information sheet and bank transfer form (amount based on data from previous semester) result: 15% of amounts on bank transfer forms are incorrect Personal visits: Students go to university registry to notify: Change in faculty Change in status (from undergraduate to doctoral candidate) Extended leave De-registration Special cases Students pay fees via bank transfer Personal visits: Students go to cashiers office to: Verify payment of semester fees Hand in form with details of courses to be attended Get documents officially stamped Pick up certificates of student status De-registration, subject to objection, of students who do not pay their fees Batch input of student master data in SAP FI Manual checking of payments received
Automated administration of students Students receive a sheet with their master data, along with a reply card
on which they can indicate: No change in details De-registration Change of address Students return reply card by mail Personal visits required for: Change of faculty Change of subject to extended leave Special cases Students receive notice of fees due based on information supplied on reply cards (scanned to an archive) Students pay fees Students receive ID card and two certificates of student status as soon as fees are paid Students send back (or hand in) forms with details of courses to be attended in a prepaid envelope
Collection of fees
Automatic reminders sent to students De-registration details sent automatically to students who have not
responded despite reminders
Fees are calculated by the student administration department, bills are

generated by the financial accounting department (integration with SAP FI) Students pay fees via bank transfer. When received by the university, they automatically appear in the systems as paid and enrollment processes can be completed. Applications Data exchange
Manual process Manual process
Application forms available for download from the Internet All applicants receive automatic confirmation Conventions defined by legal department Statutory data protection requirements fulfilled One standard data interface
UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA
CREATING A UNIFIED BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT WITH mySAP BUSINESS SUITE
As resources for higher education continued to shrink, streamlining and optimizing business processes became more important than ever for the University of Nebraska. It needed improved solutions to replace inefficient and decentralized finance, human resources, purchasing, and payroll systems. After a thorough evaluation, the university selected mySAP Business Suite. Completed on time and under budget, the implementation delivered an integrated solution that helps the university consolidate resources, save money, and improve a variety of business processes.
The University of Nebraska understood that managing a multicampus university is just as challenging as managing a global enterprise. Systems to handle finance, human resources, purchasing, and inventory were spread throughout its four campuses and administrative offices in isolated departmental silos. A heterogeneous IT system landscape evolved over time, producing inefficient, repetitive processes. Information was inconsistent, with little integration and a reliance on paper-based reporting. In times when academic budgets were tight and resources stretched, the university saw that business optimization was a must. With a clear mission to improve its business environment and streamline its operations, the University of Nebraska began the considerable effort to evaluate business solutions to replace existing systems. This included several campus and central administrative financial systems, as well as a human resources and payroll system. After a thorough assessment of 10 vendors, the university selected SAP as its business solution provider. It based its choice on three primary criteria: a solid vendor reputation, a strong technical foundation, and an overwhelming preference by university end users. With a team of dedicated professionals from the university and SAP Consulting, the University of Nebraska completed the implementation not only on time but also under budget.
CLEAR FOCUS, CLEAR OBJECTIVES
Key decision makers were excited about the benefits that SAP would deliver. Implementing an enterprise-wide software system transformed the business infrastructure of the University of Nebraska, says Walter Weir, CIO at the university. For the first time, we had a fully integrated system supporting financial management, human resources, payroll, and related business activities. The university wanted to create a single business environment across four diverse campuses, which presented a significant challenge: Each campus had its own business processes and administrative offices supported by legacy systems that did not communicate with each other. Each department had its own finance, procurement, and human resources specialists. Moreover, with a paper-based environment for data entry, report generation, purchasing, and more, processes were slow and inflexible, with resulting resource and process inefficiencies specifically a lack of access to critical information necessary to properly run the university. Higher education has such a diverse IT landscape, says Loren Blinde, implementation finance team lead and director of the administrative systems group. There are so many different kinds of ERP solutions out there, and youll find a lot of them are homegrown solutions things that have evolved within an institution over a period of time. A lot more are probably 80s technology that theyre still struggling with. In fact, thats where we were before we implemented SAP.
SMOOTH DEPLOYMENT AND A NEW APPROACH
The universitys first SAP implementation was for procurement and finance, which took 20 months. It next implemented human resources and payroll, which took 24 months. The response at the university to the new system was extremely positive. In the first year, the number of users across the campuses grew from 300 to 1,000, with more than 1,600 users today. Throughout the implementation, SAP Consulting helped support the universitys one organization focus which created an enhanced atmosphere for collaboration and information sharing among the individual campuses. Decentralization and departmental isolation were replaced by centralization
Implementing an enterprise-wide software system transformed the business infrastructure of the University of Nebraska. For the first time, we had a fully integrated system supporting financial management, human resources, payroll, and related business activities.
Walter Weir, CIO, University of Nebraska
and integration. Departments took ownership and responsibility for their activities and operating results. By examining business processes, they launched a new strategy to streamline operations. For example, business centers were created in which several departments consolidated their administrative activities by pooling resources and giving individual staff members specific operational responsibilities. Consequently, the university eliminated duplicate systems as departments integrated their business activities within SAP. By centralizing business functions, the University of Nebraska created new efficiencies and reduced administrative costs. The collaboration between all the team members of SAP Consulting and professionals from the University of Nebraska was outstanding, notes Blinde. We have a relationship that is focused on the university achieving its goals. SAP Consulting worked hard with us throughout the project and contributed extensively to its success.
IMPLEMENTATION BRINGS SPECIFIC BENEFITS
People who are in charge of finance know the importance of managing resources and costs. With the right ERP system implemented the right way, you can do more with less, says Blinde. You can do business better; you can do it with fewer people. Finance was one of the first groups to see benefits from the SAP implementation. We have a very decentralized user base, notes Blinde. SAP allowed us to give users effective tools for entering data and the flexibility to extract information in ways that make sense for their operation. Previously, financial system reporting consisted only of hard copy reports generated monthly, which was neither flexible nor
SAP allowed us to give users effective tools for entering data and the flexibility to extract information in ways that make sense for their operation . . . With the right ERP system implemented the right way, you can do more with less. You can do business better; you can do it with fewer people.
Loren Blinde, Implementation Finance Team Lead and Director of the Administrative Systems Group, University of Nebraska
timely. Thats all changed. A large variety of reports are now available online in real time with SAP. Users can drill down to view underlying transaction details. They can also customize the reports using online reporting functions or by downloading reports into a spreadsheet for further data manipulation. The university also greatly improved its procurement processes as a result of implementing SAP. Previously, a time-consuming and cumbersome paper-based ordering procedure required that requisitions be mailed to the campus purchasing department for review. Once approved, users had to enter data into a legacy system before an authorized purchase order could be sent to the vendor. This entire process would take two days.
With SAP, the electronic requisitioning process can be completed the very same day. University buyers process and approve purchase orders electronically once end users create their orders. The process was streamlined and costs were reduced. The university uses several prime vendors with prenegotiated
The long-term success of any large ERP system depends on a continued commitment beyond the initial implementation to support both system and process improvements.
David Lechner, Vice President for Business and Finance, University of Nebraska
contracts for certain materials and supplies. Staff can make purchases from specially developed Web sites. Purchase information is transmitted directly into SAP using Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) format, eliminating data reentry and unnecessary paperwork. The implementation also enabled the university to improve relations with suppliers. Before SAP, payment to vendors was time consuming, with authorized personnel having to sign every invoice and then enter it into the system. With another SAP feature the parked invoice the university streamlined the payment process. Today, buyers create a parked document to begin the payment process. Accounts payable then reviews the document online and posts the transaction so payment can be made immediately.
HUMAN RESOURCES BENEFITS
Effective reporting and accurate information are key to a good payroll system. Before the university implemented SAP payroll capabilities, payroll results were stored in temporary files that were discarded after printing preliminary journals. This made reporting and examination of both individual and group results difficult. Plus, employees had to manually calculate and enter payroll adjustments, which often required multiple iterations to get the desired results. Because the SAP system offers multiple correction cycles and online access of payroll results, users now have more confidence and control of the final payroll results. Between payroll runs, departmental payroll offices can use simulations to determine the impact of payroll changes to an employee, reducing the types of payroll errors that previously occurred.
IMPROVED INFORMATION ACCESS
For the university, human resources reporting was, for the most part, a centralized operation with departments submitting individual report requests and waiting days for results. Better processes were needed to make managing human resources more effective. The SAP human resources solution solved that information bottleneck by significantly expanding access to personnel data. Virtually every department of the university now has online access to the human resources records of their faculty and staff, says Steven Rowley, human resources team leader at the University of Nebraska. Previously, this access was reserved for human resources administrative staff and payroll offices, so paperwork had to be returned from administrative offices before departments could verify personnel activity. Now they can directly query the system to determine the status of employees. Thus, human resources reporting has become a more valuable tool for both administrative and departmental users. With SAP, human resources reporting is provided at the department level with online submission and results returned in minutes instead of days. Additionally, online access to training and development data, equipment checkout information, and a variety of other activities are now stored centrally in SAP. The bottom line: a reduction in resource costs as a result of eliminating numerous shadow systems.
From a technical perspective, SAPs foundation is very stable. Its technology is state-of-the-art, and its certainly one that we will continue to build from.
Don Mihulka, SAP Technical Lead and Associate CIO, University of Nebraska
NEXT STEPS
Its been more than four years since the University of Nebraska implemented the mySAP Business Suite family of solutions the success of which was reinforced by a dedicated business and technical team focused on training and transferring knowledge. Since then, the university has taken advantage of further SAP capabilities including time entry, workflow, and employee self-service. SAP has given us a business environment that provides a basis for our ongoing growth and development as far as we can see into the future, says Blinde. Adds David Lechner, University of Nebraska vice president for business and finance, The long-term success of any large ERP system depends on a continued commitment beyond the initial implementation to support both system and process improvements. Over the coming year, new capabilities such as employee selfservice with mySAP Human Resources for benefit enrollment and personal data maintenance will be fully rolled out. The university also plans to further implement travel management and electronic workflow, streamlining key business processes. It also plans to complete a major system upgrade in 2003 for more functionality and to improve usability. The university will review and implement additional mySAP Business Suite solutions, such as mySAP Enterprise Portal, providing new, value-added functionality to its business community. The University of Nebraska experienced real gains with SAP and now has a solid platform on which to grow. From a technical perspective, SAPs foundation is very stable, says Don Mihulka, SAP technical lead and associate CIO at the University of Nebraska. Its technology is state-of-the-art, and its certainly one that we will continue to build from.
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SAP CONSULTING SOLUTIONS FOR SUCCESS

SAP CONSULTING SOLUTIONS FOR SUCCESS DECEMBER 2003

Henning Kagermann Chairman and CEO of SAP AG

Richard Stewart Senior Vice President, SAP Consulting

ALL THE ADVICE YOULL EVER NEED

THE FOUR KEY ELEMENTS OF OUR PORTFOLIO

SAP LIFE-CYCLE MANAGEMENT SERVICES: TOTAL COVERAGE

AVENTIS PHARMA ENTRUSTS SAP WITH UPGRADE

AN EASIER SELL WITH SAP

Duration Number of SAP consultants

BHARAT PETROLEUM CORP. LTD.

FIVE AREAS OF FOCUS

SAP Solution Manager SAP R/3 Software from

Database Number of users

Length of implementation Implementation partner

SAP India Pvt. Ltd.

Implementation partner Solutions

implementation times dropped from 6 months to 19 weeks

mySAP SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AT CJ

BW Historical and transaction data Sales order

Forecast by organization APO-DP Consensus forecast

Commitment APO-ATP (2003) Allocation S&OP data/plans from other divisions

SAP R/3 Materials Management

Material requirements plan

Key material requirement

SNP plan APO-SNP

Schedule optimizer APO-PPDS

Production schedule SAP R/3 Production Planning

Figure 1: Supply Chain Planning and Execution Processes

SAP R/3 Go-Live 2001 Business area/function 3 M1 4 M2 5 M3 6 M4 7 M5 8 M6 9 M7 DP Go-Live 10 M8 11 12 2002 1 2 3 4

SNP, PP/DS, ATP Go-Live

M9 M10 M11 M12 M13 M14 M15 M16 M17 M18

SNP PP/DS ATP

SAP R/3 ATP

Figure 2: Implementation Strategy

Enhanced logistics capabilities

Pursue global growth across diverse businesses

Reduced stock-outs by 41.2%; expects

THE mySAP SCM PROJECT

A MULTITUDE OF TANGIBLE BENEFITS

A GLOBAL PLAYER WITH AMBITIOUS PLANS

DEGUSSA AND SAP: A PROVEN TRACK RECORD AND FUTURE-DRIVEN APPROACH

A SOLID PLATFORM FOR THE FUTURE

END-TO-END SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AT DOW CORNING

INCREASED EFFICIENCY AND CUSTOMER SATISFACTION

ENTERPRISE-WIDE ROLLOUT TO FOLLOW SHORTLY

SAP: A CLEAR CHOICE

HIGH-QUALITY PRODUCTS FOR A GLOBAL MARKET

PARALLEL VALUATION WITH SAP

SAP BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE AT INFINEON

COMPLETE SOLUTIONS ALL UNDER ONE ROOF

PLANNING / BUDGETING PROJECT AT A GLANCE

THE ULTIMATE IN HOME ENTERTAINMENT

A HIGHLY INTEGRATED SOLUTION

DETERMINING MARKET REQUIREMENTS

mySAP SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT AT MARICO

Manufacturing Industries 92 Consumer Industries

NATO HELICOPTER INDUSTRIES

Manufacturing Industries 96 Consumer Industries

EXTREMELY DEMANDING REQUIREMENTS

BASIS FOR EUROPEAN INTEGRATION

100 Manufacturing Industries

Manufacturing Industries 101

102 Manufacturing Industries