Tag: SAP

Dynamic visual storytelling using SAP Analytics Cloud can reimagine your business intelligence, analytics, and reporting with real-time data. Here’s how. 

“Storytelling is our obligation to the next generation. If all we are doing is marketing, we are doing a disservice, not only to our profession but also to our children and their children. Give something of meaning to your audience by inspiring, engaging, and educating them with story. Stop marketing. Start storytelling.” These impactful words from Laura Holloway, Founder & Chief of The Storyteller Agency, sets the tone for this article.

Business storytelling is a powerful communication tool. It is a process and approach that helps establish a brand’s identity by making its message meaningful and memorable.

SAP Analytics Cloud helps you create this impact by creating visual stories with your brand or product in the spotlight. Moreover, it can help your product or brand stand apart in its essence and what it stands for. Visual storytelling contributes to your brand’s alignment with customers who ascribe to the same beliefs.

This blog discusses how SAP Analytics Cloud helps analysts create dynamic visual stories and how businesses can benefit from the same.

What is SAP Analytics Cloud?

SAP Analytics Cloud is a solution in the SAP portfolio to meet the needs of data visualization in the cloud. It enables analytics (analysts) to create storyboards about your products and services faster. SAP Analytics Cloud empowers all businesses to shape their ideas in the form of fun-filled, illustrative stories.

Interestingly, studies have revealed that the human brain processes visual information 60,000 times faster than text. Defining products and services has always involved long functional specifications. As a result, they are easily misinterpreted and cannot be validated by the users. On the other hand, SAP Analytics Cloud can help analytics create dynamic visual stories that show the value of your ideas and product vision making messages more memorable and understandable.

SAP Analytics Cloud is delivered as an all-in-one, SaaS-based product. Its primary function is to create data reports that originate from various sources such as real-time data, budget forecast data, or data formatted as an MS Excel table. This solution is intuitive and user-friendly, allowing users to produce reports of varying complexity with complete autonomy.

Analysts understand that data can be a powerful influence only when it is presented in the right way. Mind-numbing spreadsheets or uninteresting charts can be turned into powerful and appealing stories with the help of SAP Analytics Cloud. Undeniably, data has a lot of potential. With an expressive storyline, you can unleash the potential of the data making it convincing and remarkable.

Read more: 8 ways business intelligence in SAP serves as your centralized suite for data reporting  

Top 5 benefits of SAP Analytics Cloud

SAP Analytics Cloud is a pre-configured ready to deploy true cloud solution. It is convenient, secure, and can scale with a business of any size. Consider 5 top benefits of SAP Analytics Cloud.

1. Gain insight into what drives your business

SAP Analytics Cloud is powered by augmented analytics features driven by AI and ML technologies. So, you can automatically gain insight from any level of detail and use those key influencers of past results to predict future scenarios and outcomes.

2. Create dynamic visual stories for better decision making

Hasty decisions made on assumptions can have disastrous consequences for your business. Conversely, you can make informed decisions by interacting with visualization as you can create dynamic visual stories based on your critical business areas with trusted data. Furthermore, this solution allows you to investigate thoroughly and answer essential questions of business on the fly.

3. Simplify analytics landscape

As SAP Analytics Cloud seamlessly integrates with your data and planning solutions, you can connect to data from multiple sources. This simplifies your analytics landscape, enabling you to get the complete picture and make better decisions.

4. Drive better business outcomes

Your organization can gain complete alignment across all business aspects by aligning financial, strategic, and operations planning in SAP Analytics Cloud. Subsequently, you can now predict future scenarios and outcomes with collaborative enterprise planning in one simple cloud solution.

5. Strategize with business growth in view

Strategic planning ensures business growth and helps businesses to remain resilient despite challenges. Collaborative enterprise planning empowers you to create a fact-based plan for your business’s success. Moreover, it allows you to modify your planning data when required to drive better budgeting, forecasting, and analysis for your business growth.

Read more: 7 crucial business challenges solved by SAP Analytics Cloud

SAP Analytics Cloud help analysts tell a story with your data

Just as in writing or speaking, analytics must keep their data design simple, crisp, and to the point. Telling a compelling, dynamic visual story requires both common sense and imagination. Here are some best practices to follow:

• Consider your target audience and identify what they already know about the subject.
• Ensure the colors and style are unique to your story to avoid confusion.
• The arrangement of the dashboard must be self-explanatory and user-friendly.
• Use symbols, icons, and pictures to help your audience understand the story at a single glance.
• Do not just beautify the visuals. Instead, explain the data.

Read more: Healthcare analytics reaches new heights with SAP HANA  

Use cases of how SAP Analytics Cloud helped create dynamic visual stories

Use case 1: A conservation society in Australia improves its operations with data-driven decisions

Taronga is a non-profitable organization that works to create the next generation of conservation champions. With the help of cutting-edge technology by SAP Analytics Cloud, Taronga is leveraging its data to improve operations and expand its impact. It is experiencing transparency, flexibility, and scalability while streamlining and digitizing all its business processes.

SAP Analytics Cloud provided Taronga access to real-time reporting that enabled the organization to make data-driven decisions which in turn contributed to a positive impact on wildlife conservation and enhanced visitor experience.

Use case 2: A dairy cooperative in Belgium makes informed decisions with real-time financial reporting

Milcobel is the largest dairy cooperative based in Belgium. It is a vast company that processes and commercializes 1.8 billion liters of milk from 2,400 dairy farms. The larger the organization, the greater the volume of data. So, Milcobel chose to implement SAP Analytics Cloud along with other SAP solutions. This implementation resulted in the reduction of time-consuming manual processes.

Moreover, it provided real-time data to the financial team to better understand the product margins and profitability of each of its dairy plants. Thus, the leaders can now trust that they are confidently making informed decisions based on up-to-date data. In addition, SAP Analytics Cloud ensures that all users have access to real-time data. Consequently, Milcobel has control and flexibility over their data quality and can benefit from an end-to-end strategy that combines data volume, quality, and usage to create data value.

Read more: SAP S/4HANA journey: 8 ways C-level leaders and executives can derive business value 

Beyond visual storytelling

The capabilities of SAP Analytics Cloud go far beyond just visual storytelling. As an SAP Silver Partner, Fingent has worked with many clients globally and helped them bring out the best from their business using the SAP Analytics Cloud landscape.

Read more: How Fingent helps CFOs gain new insights and reliably enable key decisions   

Fingent will help you create a cloud-first business environment, provide data visualization and reporting solutions, and empower your company with unparalleled business intelligence while leveraging your existing cloud and on-premise data solutions. What more could you ask for? Well, there is a lot more, and Fingent can help you tap into it all. So give us a call, and let’s get talking.

What are the benefits of implementing SAP ERP software into your business?

With businesses transforming themselves digitally, SAP ERP systems saw a rise in popularity for the past few years, especially since 2019. What makes the system so unique? For one, SAP ERP can be implemented by all businesses, big or small, and reap the benefits of the software. That said, SAP software is providing solutions that are helping businesses adapt to the ever-changing technology landscape.

Read more: SAP for Business: 9 Ways to Maximize Business Performance 

What is SAP ERP?

SAP stands for Systems, Applications, and Products in data processing. SAP is the market leader among ERP software providers. SAP ERP comprises several modules that help companies gather, maintain, store and interpret data from functional areas such as;

• Sales and distribution
• Financial accounting
• Manufacturing and material management
• Logistics and warehouse management
• Supply chain management
• Business intelligence

In other words, the SAP ERP system produces a precise process that offers a complete perspective (internal and external) of your business.

Read more: 8 Ways Business Intelligence in SAP Serves as Your Centralized Suite for Data Reporting

What are the uses of SAP ERP software?

With over 230 million cloud users and more than 100 solutions covering all business functions, SAP is the largest cloud portfolio provider in the ERP market.

SAP facilitates effective data processing and information flow across organizations. Also, software like SAP S/4HANA leverages in-memory computing to process vast data volumes and simultaneously supports advanced technologies such as machine learning and Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Read more: 6 capabilities of SAP S/4HANA that will help you become an intelligent enterprise

SAP software connects different parts of a business, such as finance, accounting, sales, supply chain, assembly line, HR, etc., into an intelligent business suite that is entirely digital. You can purchase or customize any module based on your business needs.

Simply put, SAP software can manage almost all your departments, revolutionizing the way your business operates. Also, it helps organizations eliminate the redundancy and duplication in data. This can help organizations to run even more efficiently.

If you’re new to SAP and looking for an SAP consultant, get in touch with us, and we will assist you further.

Case Study: Fingent helped a real estate giant reduce manual work, improve TAT, and increase profitability by integrating multiple role-based mobile apps into their SAP ERP system. Download now!

Business benefits of implementing SAP ERP software

1. Offers innovative technology

SAP ensures you are equipped with the right tools and technology that will help you prepare for the future. SAP software also provides you with future-proof cloud ERP solutions that will power the next generation of your business.

Read more: Create Intelligent Organizations with SAP Model Company

2. Improves cost-efficiency

SAP ERP software reduces the administration and operation expenses by using accurate and real-time information. In addition, the software enables manufacturers to control operations and avoid delays in production and break up information, which eventually allows the management to make decisions effectively.

Additionally, SAP offers complete power to the administrators over the breakdowns of crucial company processes and future disturbances.

3. Advances data management

Performance metrics and measurements help businesses assess their performance and set future objectives as well. However, as the business expands, it will become difficult to manually measure the profit ratios, sales margin, and other metrics.

SAP ERP helps automate processes and allows the staff within the organization to view shared data without retaining manual records. It also helps in generating synchronized reports on essential company metrics. Immediate access to such information will augment decision-making.

Read more: What are the benefits of adopting SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation (IRPA)

4. Avoids duplication and upgrades transparency

As all your business information is stored in a single database, the possibility of duplicate records and data entries is reduced. In addition, the system will automatically report the present system records. It improves the quality of the data and lets you create exact pictures in most cases.

Additionally, SAP software upgrades the transparency of your business to a new level. The ERP system will screen and monitor every marginal operation and task from an inventory product level, purchase orders, or billing and delivery. This will provide a clear view of the performance of all the tasks.

5. Integrates other members of the value chain

SAP ERP helps bridge the gap between the suppliers and customers by integrating other value chain members. This allows your organization to gain a competitive edge by engaging in the design and development of new products that add value to their experience.

SAP ERP is a great tool that helps you get more information and improve quality. For example, the availability of up-to-date data lets you adjust production orders and purchase according to your requirements. Also, you can get a segmented database of your customers, making it easier to carry out your marketing campaigns targeting specific segments.

6. Enables better analysis and forecasting

In most cases, it is difficult for a person to provide accurate information evaluation along with reports. SAP ERP system eliminates information risk as there is no duplication of data. In addition, the system provides real-time reports of even the minor business tasks that serve risk assessment and generation of performance reports.

The ERP system reviews purchases and changes in the inventory as they happen. It provides customers and, most notably, managers with the tools and resources needed to make accurate forecasts.

Read more: Why is SAP Commerce Cloud a Complete Digital Business Solution 

7. Allows effortless scaling

If you are a prospective start-up organization and aspire to become a more prominent and successful company in the future, you will have to handle the expansion. It is required to extend your company operations.

Right from the development stage, you will have to consider the machinery, workforce power, and extensive data. SAP software is designed to suit all the fundamental market criteria. Initially, you can do some simple integration and then scale up according to the precise industry specifications.

8. Enhances data security

The SAP ERP system improves data quality and security. The software provides better data protection using built-in security systems and firewalls. 

Additionally, SAP allows you to access the relevant information to allocate and limit data usage to every employee or a group of individuals.

Read more: What is business process expertise in SAP and why you need it

Fingent offers SAP ERP consulting and implementation services

SAP has an extensive portfolio of programs designed for all major roles, including project teams, IT administrators, key users, and end-users. Fingent is a certified SAP Silver Partner authorized to deliver a broad range of ERP services across the wide spectrum of solutions offered by SAP. We enable our clients to customize and implement SAP ERP solutions to accelerate their digital transformation journey. We also provide continuous support, SAP AMS, and quality management services to monitor your ERP environment.

Feel free to contact us for any SAP consulting requirements. We are committed to quality and innovation to help deliver optimal results for your business.

SAP ATTP Enables COVID Vaccine Manufacturers to Overcome Supply Chain Vulnerabilities. Find How!

Vaccinating the whole world and making everyone resistant to COVID-19 is a daunting task. From managing product life cycles to supply chain tracking, and massive distribution, SAP Advanced Track and Trace for Pharmaceuticals (SAP ATTP) is helping the world’s leading vaccine manufacturers. 

With regulatory requirements looming, meeting the target of delivering COVID vaccines to millions will require an efficient system that will eliminate any hiccups in the supply chain. Pharmaceutical companies must examine serialization and track and trace solutions to control the chain of custody to prevent tampering, counterfeiting, theft, and diversion. 

Read more: 7 Practical Steps to be Implemented by Organizations that Engage in COVID-19 Vaccine Delivery

Thankfully, SAP ATTP (SAP Advanced Track and Trace for Pharmaceuticals) has emerged as a solution. It can enable your company to comply with serialization and associate reporting requirements. As SAP ATTP was co-developed with the leading pharmaceutical companies, it can be tailored to address the specific needs of your pharma company and your stakeholders. This blog will explain how SAP ATTP can quicken and smoothen the race to vaccinate the world. Let us begin by understanding what SAP ATTP is.

What is SAP ATTP?

As the name SAP Advanced Track and Trace for Pharmaceuticals suggests, SAP ATTP involves the journey of the vaccine from its source (the pharmaceutical company) to the destination (the end-user) within the supply chain. SAP ATTP enables companies to enforce specific measures to identify the product and view its journey to reduce counterfeit and stolen vaccines.

It addresses the regulatory requirements for serialization, tracking, and tracing of all pharmaceutical products, including COVID-19 vaccines. It is specifically designed to solve the issues with expected data volumes, queries, and reporting as per the guidelines. SAP ATTP is now playing a critical role in major pharmaceutical companies across the globe. 

Leading COVID vaccine producers like Moderna, German vaccine manufacturer CureVac, AstraZeneca, and others are relying on SAP to manufacture and distribute vaccines on a global scale. According to SAP’s report, 18 of the world’s top 20 COVID vaccine producers run their entire product lifecycle and supply chain processes on SAP for better traceability, tracking, and serialization. 

Read more: SAP for Business: 9 Ways to Maximize Business Performance

What is the significance of SAP ATTP?

If you have experienced a delay in delivering an urgently needed pharmaceutical product, you can understand the potential impact it can have on people and society. If the first challenge was to create and test vaccines at record speed, the next challenge is to vaccinate people across the globe before the virus mutates and becomes more virulent. This demand is stretching the supply chain to its limits. Digitizing their production to achieve production scale and flexibility is critical as most vaccine producers are data-heavy industries.

What are the advantages of using SAP ATTP software?

SAP ATTP is a solution that facilitates data exchange with packaging lines, supply chain partners and contract manufacturing organizations, and warehouse applications. Here are a few benefits of this software:

• Integrates serialization with business processes
• Enables compliance with directives across markets
• Reduces compliance costs for all serialization requirements
• Streamlines and manages a secure pharmaceutical supply chain
• Packaging line integration
• Boosts efficiency of your supply chain
• Enables simple reporting processes

How can SAP help win the race to vaccinate the world?

For perhaps the first time in history, pharmaceutical companies were pushed to focus all their resources on the development of vaccines in record time. And for the first time in history, they are expected to win the race to vaccinate the global population. This is an opportunity for intelligent enterprises to make a difference. SAP rose to assist by providing various solutions to address this pressing need.

1. Enables collaboration with supply chain partners

SAP helps pharmaceutical companies comply with international legislation, which focuses on ensuring genuine medicines reach patients and product authentication. SAP applications enable serial number management and regulatory reporting capabilities. Companies can use SAP to facilitate collaboration with supply chain partners, such as contract manufacturers and wholesalers. SAP cloud platform enables trading partners to exchange large amounts of serialization and associated data.  

• Pharmaceutical companies must guard against product counterfeiting, reimbursement fraud, diversion, and medication errors. 
• A company must include verification in case of the return of vaccine packs or an apparent tampering of the products. 
• SAP’s digital network consists of a blockchain-based verification repository to eliminate such counterfeit products along the supply chain. 
• Once manufacturers push data into the blockchain, wholesale distributors can execute verification requests. Since these solutions can be integrated into a pharmaceutical company’s backbone, your company enjoys a holistic view of its end-end processes. 

Read more: 6 Tips for Logistics and Supply Chain Leaders to Plan COVID-19 Vaccine Distribution Strategies

2. Ensures patient safety and eliminates the risk of fake vaccines

Pharmaceutical thefts have cost billions of dollars worth of losses annually. One measure taken to overcome this challenge was to implement serialization. Serialization of pharmaceuticals protects the end-user and prevents manufacturers from producing fake goods. 

SAP serialization allows you to provide a unique identifier (UID). It enables manufacturers to define regulations based on the laws of each country. For example, certain countries may require the entire product dose to be serialized, while others may require each unit to be serialized. SAP allows you to comply according to your country’s regulations. However, serialization is just the first step.

3. Helps you gain visibility of the vaccine from its source to destination

SAP ATTP allows for a transparent journey of vaccine from its source to the destination. Tracking involves knowing the current status, such as the current location of the shipment, in whose possession it is, and the condition of the vaccine, while Tracing involves knowing the past, such as where the vaccine has been, who had it, and was it handled appropriately.

SAP ATTP is beneficial to companies since the early stages of production and distribution. As it allows you to enter all the product details into the system, it is easy to locate where the product is at any given point in the supply chain. Furthermore, SAP can enable withdrawing a specific compromised batch instead of an entire shipment saving a considerable amount of money.

Pharmaceutical regulations vary from country to country. Nevertheless, all pharmaceutical products must be serialized for easy identification within the supply chain. Apart from this, certain governments may require companies to report data to regulatory bodies or authorities. They may also require verification of the products to ensure it is an authentic product. SAP can make these tasks more efficient as it allows you to:

• Generate and format serialized numbers
• Aggregate goods for quick and easy scanning of the vaccine units

Read more: How SAP Helps Realize Voice-enabled Warehouse Operations 

Leave no loopholes in the vaccine supply chain

SAP ATTP helps pharmaceutical industries to gain real-time visibility into the location and condition of their product along the entire supply chain. In addition, it helps them perform better management by allowing real-time reporting and analysis to turn insights into actions fueling the mission to vaccinate the world.

As an SAP Silver Partner, Fingent can help you implement SAP ATTP seamlessly and cost-effectively. Time is of the essence right now, and vaccine producers need to get the vaccine out faster while ensuring safety and compliance. So let’s save lives together. Connect with our SAP expert to see how you can benefit from implementing Advanced Track and Trace for pharmaceuticals. 

How Business Intelligence in SAP Helps You Become a Data-driven Organization

Business Intelligence is the data powerhouse essential for the survival of your business. BI can help organizations evaluate and transform complex data into meaningful, actionable information. This information allows organizations to generate operational insights and supports effective, strategic, and tactical decision-making. Business Intelligence in SAP makes data-driven decision-making better, faster, and more effective. This article helps you understand all you need to know about Business Intelligence in SAP.

Read more: SAP for Business: 9 Ways to Maximize Business Performance

Business Intelligence in SAP

Business Intelligence in SAP is a centralized suite for data analysis and reporting. It allows you to gain data from multiple data sources and distribute it to different Business Intelligent systems. In essence, Business Intelligence in SAP can work as a target system for data transfer or a source system for data distribution.

Business Intelligence in SAP allows an organization to share information in real-time with all involved, from the CEO to lower-level employees. It offers a panoramic view of data to all those with appropriate credentials. Business Intelligence in SAP can be customized easily to your specific needs. This would also mean that you can access the information much faster. 

Read more: How SAP Supports Effective Business Continuity Planning 

Advantages of Business Intelligence in SAP

According to Statista, the global market size for business intelligence (BI) and analytics software applications is forecast to touch USD 17.6 billion by 2024. Such an increase is a clear indication of the wide range of benefits Business Intelligence in SAP can offer organizations. 

Here are a few advantages of Business Intelligence in SAP:

1. An entire range of BI-related products

SAP offers all the BI tools necessary for your company to leverage a data platform. Business Intelligence in SAP allows you to deploy these tools according to your requirement. The BI tools can be used for querying, analyzing, and reporting. You can also use them to identify trends in the data and discover any underlying issue that adversely affects the business. 

SAP Analytics Cloud allows you to centralize your BI tools. From this central point, you can provide permission-based data access to the employees according to their job requirements. Additionally, ad hoc reporting tools enable you to formulate questions and find instant answers. You can gather these answers and data into valuable insight, which can be shared with the rest of the relevant employees.

Read more: 7 Crucial Business Challenges Solved by SAP Analytics Cloud 

2. Information at your fingertips

Business Intelligence in SAP comes with an enterprise-wide sharing functionality. It simplifies the data to be understood easily in common business terms rather than complex semantic language. Simplifying data makes it easy to search for critical information and gain valuable insights. 

Moreover, data simplification and insights generation allow you to share your findings and insights with other users across your organization. For good decision-making, businesses need valuable insights into various business modules such as finance, sales, operations, and human resources. Business intelligence combines all the views from these modules to provide more accurate information. Now, each decision-maker is armed with relevant information to make critical decisions that affect your organization.

3. Self-service visualization capabilities

Dragging data from vast storage and introducing it to a user is a gigantic task that requires data-specific knowledge and engineering skills. SAP offers several self-service tools for BI users. The self-service visualization capabilities of Business Intelligence in SAP allow its users to view and analyze data more efficiently. With this capability, you can aggregate data, conduct trend analysis, and uncover valuable insights. This can reduce maintenance costs while considerably shrinking the time spent on reporting-related tasks.

Read more: How Fingent Helps CFOs Gain New Insights and Reliably Enable Key Decisions

4. Ability to create interactive BI dashboards 

Business Intelligence in SAP enables you to create interactive BI dashboards that can be customized for each user. Additionally, decision-makers can access and view these dashboards from anywhere and at any given time. 

You can access the dashboards via smartphones. The dashboards are also accessible through browsers, applications, or desktop widgets, even when you are offline. It means that all users can remain connected to the company’s server at all times. 

5. Integration with MS Office application

You can realize the true value of the data you possess if only you share those insights and reports with other users. Since most reporting and dashboard modules are integrated with sharing capabilities, your employees can easily share valuable insights. Integration with the MS Office application allows users to perform data analysis in multiple dimensions. It enables them to manipulate and filter data dynamically. 

Business Intelligence in SAP allows you to import large amounts of data to MS Excel, enabling you to analyze and forecast effectively. You can also embed information into MS PowerPoint. This feature is helpful when you need to present business insights to stakeholders and colleagues. 

6. Easy to use interface

Business Intelligence tools can be very complicated, with a complex interface designed mainly for skilled programmers or data analysts. However, Business Intelligence in SAP comes with a good instrument that allows for an intuitive user interface. With a bit of time and skill, it is easy to master the interface. Onboarding a new business user becomes more convenient as they can access all the instruments from a single web-based interface.

7. Greater flexibility and scalability

Business Intelligence in SAP is easy to integrate as it offers deployment options for most of its products. As Business Intelligence in SAP is service-oriented, it is easily scalable. Based on the need of the hour, businesses can either increase or decrease. Though you begin using business intelligence for a single project, later, you can expand to the rest of the organization. It means that both large enterprises and small businesses can benefit from Business Intelligence in SAP.

8. Allows your IT department to engage in more meaningful work 

Business Intelligence in SAP can automate mundane and time-consuming tasks. It also ensures that the employees in your organization have all the resources they need to perform their tasks. It reduces the dependency on your IT department and helps your IT professionals focus their time on more productive and relevant jobs. 

Read more: Top 7 Business Benefits of Adopting SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation 

Bottom line

Easier access to data, smarter insights, better business – you can’t go wrong with Business Intelligence in SAP. It helps you run complex queries and provides you with a highly scalable solution. What more can you ask for? 

Fingent is an SAP Silver Partner and is well-placed to help you get started with your BI journey. Get in touch with us and transform your business into a data-driven organization. 

How Can Your Business Gain Value from SAP S/4HANA Implementation?

Companies need a digital core to overcome complexity and drive digital transformation. SAP S/4HANA is a digital core ERP that can help companies overcome complexity and thrive in today’s disruptive market.

Businesses are growing by the minute and are moving faster than ever before. Thanks to the innovative developments and improvements of the digital world! 

However, today’s unprecedented disruption calls for more. Businesses need unique ways to emerge stronger from intense challenges that they might never have encountered before. C-level leaders and business owners are looking for ways to become more resilient. They understand that to keep up with ever-changing customer needs, they must invest in automation, analytics, and cloud technologies. The key priority has consequently been the move to SAP S/4HANA. 

S/4 HANA is an intelligent ERP software that helps you reinvent your business model by providing easy access to real-time data.

Read more: SAP S/4HANA: Redefining End-To-End Solution  

C-level leaders and executives need to understand that the journey to SAP S/4HANA is not just an IT exercise. It is an integral part of their broader digital transformation. Business owners need to review their business processes, end-to-end data, and system integrations. Such a review would assist them in developing an overall business value to guide their journey. This blog explores eight practical ways to raise business performance with your SAP S/4HANA journey. 

What makes your SAP S/4HANA journey complicated? 

Before we get into how to get your business booming with SAP S/4HANA, let’s look at why some C-level leaders and executives find this journey challenging. 

Planning and delivering your SAP S/4HANA journey is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for transformation and generates significant investment returns. Today, C-level leaders and executives struggle to answer these three hows:

• How to articulate the business value case to generate substantial returns on investment?
• How to ensure that the program remains business-led?
• How to leverage the power of the cloud?

Leaders and executives must consider creative ways to harness the power of SAP S/4HANA. It includes the design phase, building phase, and running phase. Business value can only rise when new sources are developed that enable the business to react quickly to recover from disruption. 

Read more: 6 Capabilities of SAP S/4HANA That Will Help You Become an Intelligent Enterprise 

8 practical steps to gain business value from SAP S/4HANA journey

Here are eight practical steps that answer the ‘hows’ and more:

1. Articulate the business value case

You may have already set aside a significant amount of resources, both in terms of finances and staffing, to embrace the journey to SAP S/4HANA. Beginning this journey with a holistic, business-led value case will help you realize its full potential and make the best of these resources. Thankfully, there is a distinct and compelling business case for every digital function. What does this mean for C-level leaders and executives? 

It would mean that they must take the time to create a fact-based business value case that can be used as an anchor throughout the SAP S/4HANA journey. Why? Because a well-defined business value case will help you fund all digital transformation efforts, including SAP S/4HANA.

Read more: SAP S/4HANA: Transforming The CFO into a Business Value Creator and Role Model 

2. Avoid a ‘technically configured’ approach

A technology-led approach might not deliver the expected results. Why? In most cases, C-level leaders may find it daunting to understand their role in the digital transformation journey. So they prefer to delegate the responsibility to others. Such delegation instantly turns the digital journey into a secondary priority. Since others may not understand the business as you do, it will become challenging to configure the transformation to be truly business-led.

C-level leaders and executives must realize the potential and take an active role in the transformation. You can then think strategically to create a clear path to a more agile and insight-driven business. 

3. Unleash the power of cloud solutions

To make quick and informed decisions, combine your internal and external data sources. Cloud-based applications and infrastructure will help you create a data strategy to deliver real-time insights. A well-defined cloud strategy will enable you to align the data, identify the best data sources, understand how to measure and maintain quality data, and manage your data. 

Read more: Why It’s Time to Embrace Cloud and Mobility Trends To Recession-Proof Your Business? 

4. Integrate suppliers before it is too late

For specific industries such as automation, supply ecosystems are strategically important. Though it may seem expensive, ensure to integrate your suppliers before SAP S/4HANA is well advanced. Such integration can be less expensive where custom developments are not warranted. 

5. Leverage AI to boost your current and future business models

Businesses worldwide face extraordinary challenges and disruption today. Automation-driven growth will be the only constant during this period of uncertainty. Though SAP may not provide everything you currently need to build your business, it allows you to integrate non-SAP automation for various goods and services. Marrying historically siloed data with AI techniques can thus contribute to demonstrable ROI.

Read more: How SAP Supports Effective Business Continuity Planning 

6. Integrate third-party content into SAP S/4HANA 

SAP S/4HANA has been the backbone of most IT strategies. It provides critical infrastructure to support a variety of use cases. Most organizations know that connecting to third-party content is crucial for their ongoing success and competency. Such integration can help you create unique sector-specific use cases, so do not hesitate to integrate third-party content. 

Read more: Deploying SAP S/4HANA: Methodologies and Tools to Adopt 

7. Use available data to speed up innovation lead time

Intelligent data management can help you break down information silos and provide you with the insight and control necessary to make tactical business decisions. When organizations collaborate to share and manage data, both parties can create tremendous potential value for their businesses. 

However, tapping into the value of data ecosystems can be a challenge. You can overcome this challenge by starting small and scaling later and involving partners early on. SAP S/4HANA allows you to effortlessly harness their data by breaking down your corporate strategy into different streams. Thus, businesses can dramatically lower risk and accelerate implementation.

8. Leverage SAP Cloud Platform

SAP S/4HANA cloud database allows you to make faster decisions. Since you can integrate data from across your enterprise, you can develop applications and tools required to store volatile data. SAP Cloud Platform allows you to avoid repeating failures and minimize cost. 

Manage the change impact

The SAP S/4HANA journey brings in a significant change. Treating this journey as a minor upgrade can lead to missed opportunities to leverage its full potential. This makes it extremely important to partner with the right service provider to guide you.  

As an SAP Silver Partner, Fingent has the expertise and experience required to help you make your SAP S/4HANA journey a success. Let’s talk. 

Why is SAP the Go-to Solution for Managing Your Complex Business Functions

SAP is a powerful ERP solution for all kinds of enterprises and their subsidiaries. From streamlining and automating to standardizing your business, SAP for business performs numerous functions and accelerates business growth.

Systems, Applications & Products in Data Processing or SAP is one of the world’s leading ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning ) software. The software consists of several integrated modules that cover virtually every aspect of modern business management. Fingent, being an SAP Silver Partner, helps you realize the full potential of the wide-ranging SAP solutions that can maximize your business performance and boost profitability.

How does SAP help businesses?

Most of the traditional business models have decentralized data management, with each department storing its operational data in the individual database(s). Decentralized data storage makes it difficult for employees from different departments to access each other’s information needed to complete their tasks. Moreover, duplication of data across the departments leads to data errors and increases IT storage costs.

SAP software centralizes data management and provides multiple business functions with a single source of the truth. This enables companies to manage complex business processes efficiently, allow easy access to employees of different departments, and gain real-time insights across the organization. It helps businesses improve operational efficiency, increase productivity, boost customer experience, and eventually increase profits.

SAP for business

SAP for business offers solutions across different areas such as:

• ERP and Finance
• CRM and Customer Experience
• Network and Spend Management
• Supply Chain Management
• HR and People Engagement
• Business Technology Platform
• Digital Transformation
• Digital Supply Chain
• Small and Midsize Enterprises
• Experience Management
• Industry Solutions
• Industry 4.0
• Intelligent Enterprise Solutions
• Cloud solutions

SAP for business maximizes business performance by giving companies step-by-step guidance to set up their tech infrastructure. 

Here’s how.

1. Wide-ranging experience

From government financial institutions to small businesses, SAP provides tech solutions to everyone. We extend our support, right from identifying your requirements to implementing and testing your SAP solutions to maintaining them once they are in place.

Read more: Why partner with an SAP AMS provider like Fingent

2. Efficiency improvement

In the past, companies were forced to repeat tasks day in and day out. Thanks to technology! The situation has changed today. Technology has provided companies with more innovative ways of doing repetitive manual tasks. From collecting large amounts of data to filling the databases, SAP offers an efficient and faster way of doing things. 

Enter SAP IRPA. This Intelligent Robotic Process Automation suite accelerates your move towards Intelligent Enterprise. With SAP IRPA, you can redirect your resources to high-value functions.

Read more: Top 7 Business Benefits of Adopting SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation

Additionally, SAP provides several options to streamline different business processes and improve efficiency throughout your organization, such as SAP S/4HANA, SAP Analytics Cloud, SAP Fiori, etc.

3. Affordability and scalability

Small businesses and start-ups face the challenge of ensuring that their technology infrastructure is scalable. It means you will have to accommodate the growth in every aspect of your business. You will have to consider fitting more data, equipment, and employees. For this, you will need a system that can accommodate growth easily without the need to make changes from the grassroots level. That is where the SAP system comes into the picture. It is designed to scale up smoothly according to your business requirements post the initial implementation.

SAP for business ensures that you never invest in resources that you don’t need and instead try to derive the most out of your IT budget. 

Read more: SAP Preconfigured Solutions Boost Efficiency Among Industries

4. Enhanced predictability

As a business leader or owner, you must have access to the most accurate information related to your business so that you can plan well for your business. As SAP ERP solutions are designed to provide you with options in generating company forecasts, you can easily access the real-time facts and figures stored in the SAP system.

You can use the data, facts, and figures saved in the SAP system to prepare realistic forecasts of your business and make informed decisions.

Read more: Empowering CFOs to Derive Crucial Insights and Implement Strategic Decisions with Confidence  

5. Flexible solutions

SAP helps you achieve significant flexibility in adapting to changes in the market dynamics. Your business must adapt its functions to the changes in the market dynamics if you want your company to grow and expand.

It is well-known that user perspectives change over time, regardless of the industry. Hence, it is crucial to attain enough flexibility and provide what your target audience demands. SAP-enabled company structure will help you adapt to the changing market dynamics and cater to the industry demands.

Read more: How Organizations can Gain a Competitive Edge by Implementing Digital Core ERP

6. Smarter data management

Organizing data is one of the most crucial features of the SAP ERP system. Businesses need to store data in such a way that it could be accessed quickly and securely when required.

If you have multiple sources to feed information to your company, SAP helps you gather all the distributed data in one place and keep it organized.

With SAP, you can collect all the information in one place and keep it organized. For example, you can integrate your CRM with the SAP framework and keep all your customer-related information centralized. Fingent offers SAP HCI (HANA Cloud Integration) and PI (Process Integration) capabilities to integrate multiple independent systems/ applications required to run your business processes.

Read more: Create Intelligent Organizations with SAP Model Company

7. Improved compliance

SAP ERP offers the unique ability to track company regulations. Using SAP for business ensures that all operations comply with your company policies and the geographical regulations in the regions where you trade. The system will reject any exceptions automatically or set off an alert to notify you on time.

SAP helps you implement active cooperation among all your company departments and employees.

8. Cost and time savings

SAP will serve as the single source of data for all your company needs. When your employees access more accurate and up-to-date information from a single location, it will automatically reduce your organization’s operational complexities and expenses. Also, regardless of where your employees are working from, connecting to your company’s network will give them access to the centralized SAP system for trusted information, thereby saving a lot of time.

9. Streamlined communication

Whether it is marketing communication or company-specific communication, you can integrate SAP ERP to create compelling modes of communication. For example, you can create a more robust reputation management structure and focus on marketing strategies that help generate higher ROI.

Additionally, you can use flip books or online catalogs to create content that drives traction. If you are looking for business presentations for marketing or a professional portfolio, SAP can help you achieve a great level of finesse.

Read more: SAP Focused Industry Templates & Automation Solutions

To sum up,

Apart from the benefits mentioned earlier, there are many more ways that SAP for business can add a touch of sheer magic to your business endeavors and maximize your business performance to a significant level.

At Fingent, we provide SAP implementation and customization services that will help businesses phase out old infrastructure, upgrade to the new systems efficiently, and save money. If you are ready to get your business on to this revolutionary business suite, get in touch with us. 

Why partner with an SAP AMS provider like Fingent

SAP AMS provides many benefits in managing and maintaining a company’s SAP ERP system. IT management’s role in companies has changed dramatically during the pandemic. The demand for SAP AMS (Application Management Services) is no different. As a result, applications must be adapted and kept up-to-date with the latest technological developments. Moreover, problem-solving takes time. This is a risky situation for businesses that are dependent on perfectly functioning IT.

Therefore, it is clear that to derive all those benefits from Application Management Services (AMS) while managing complex SAP applications would require an expert technology provider. An experienced partner like Fingent can ensure successful SAP application support and management. Fingent is a certified SAP Silver Partner authorized to deliver a defined SAP application support process. This blog discusses the top six benefits of working with an SAP AMS provider. Let us begin by understanding what AMS is and why it is crucial for your business. 

What is SAP AMS, and why is it important?

SAP Application Management Services (AMS) are processes used to maintain, enhance and manage enterprise SAP environments. It includes development, implementation, testing, maintenance, and support. These services can be delivered by a qualified consultant that can leverage their expertise and business knowledge to provide maximum value to your company. Because they do this repeatedly, the time value is saved. An AMS provider gives you the ability to be more strategic with your SAP solution. 

Read more: What is Business Process Expertise in SAP and Why You Need it

Here are three reasons that make AMS vital for your organization:

• Your IT becomes more strategic and less tactical
• Tailored AMS solutions can meet your specific business needs
• You will receive 24/7 assistance for your applications

Top six benefits of partnering with an SAP AMS provider 

Gaining control of your digital landscape is imperative for business success. You will find it challenging to meet business requirements if your application demands too much attention. Working with an AMS provider allows your IT team to focus on strategic projects, giving your business the needed technology boost. Here are some key benefits of working with an SAP AMS provider:

1. Enhanced flexibility

We live in a world where you cannot predict what might turn everything on its head. This presents a need to be flexible in business. No matter which industry you are from, you are expected to adapt to any new situation and forge ahead. In other words, the more flexible and adaptable your business is, the more successful it will become. This makes it a smart move to keep up with new solutions constantly. Partnering with a capable SAP AMS provider will reduce the burden of suddenly having to implement more extensive projects. 

2. Strategic overview 

A mature SAP AMS provider will know what is essential to obtain more value from your SAP solution. With that aim, the provider will enable your organization’s IT team and resources to be more strategic than tactical. A good AMS provider will ensure that they fit seamlessly with your IT staff as an extension that enables your team to drive and deliver value-added SAP solutions. 

3. Round-the-clock, follow the sun operation 

Businesses looking for highly efficient, stable, robust, and cost-effective operations of their SAP environments must work with SAP-certified partners to enjoy maximum benefits. Most SAP AMS providers offer maintenance for daily operations, 24/7 production support, database services, etc. However, supporting more critical aspects such as functional and technical consulting of various SAP modules requires an experienced AMS provider who can bring in the prowess to turbocharge your applications’ landscape. 

Fingent as a certified SAP Silver Partner delivers beyond the promise of regular maintenance. You can rest assured of an infrastructure that is ready to meet future challenges.

Read more: How SAP Supports Effective Business Continuity Planning  

4. Tailored AMS solutions to fit your business requirements

The ideal SAP AMS partner knows your business so well that they will quickly adapt to fit your needs. Such knowledge about your organization is gained over time by maintaining a long-term relationship with your company. When you work together in partnership, you can define a right-sized and right-stored delivery model that perfectly fits your organization’s specific needs. A wide range of AMS solutions along with a capable AMS provider offers the possibility to custom-make your solution package to fulfill your unique requirements. 

5. Well-equipped to positively improve ROI

Many successful organizations look for new and innovative ways to help them improve their ROIs. Partnering with an SAP AMS provider will help your business adopt new technological changes without requiring to train your employees rigorously. The AMS provider can help your business handle demands more productively. Well-maintained AMS can generate automatic reports that can help your business determine the actions taken to improve your ROI.

6. Save money with AMS 

Working with an SAP AMS provider can help businesses save money. Your organization will no longer have to hire employees to carry out separate tasks. You could hire a team of professionals from your SAP AMS provider and pay only for the services you have used rather than pay for every employee individually. The amount thus saved can be directed to another department and used in the best way to generate more profits for your business. 

Choice of SAP AMS provider

Remember, the choice of your SAP AMS provider directly impacts your business operations. To find a perfect match when choosing an SAP AMS provider, you must ensure that they provide deep SAP expertise along with an in-depth understanding of your IT infrastructure and process. Apart from technical expertise, your provider must have the industry know-how to understand your company’s unique needs and possess the ability to add immediate value. 

Read more: How Fingent Helps CFOs Gain New Insights and Reliably Enable Key Decisions

We assure you that you can benefit from our SAP AMS approach at Fingent. Our AMS program can help your organization irrespective of your company’s size or your industry type. Fingent’s SAP AMS practice excels at helping you achieve operational and strategic objectives with superior technical expertise and industry knowledge. We ensure uninterrupted business operations and ongoing productivity improvement in your organization. Talk to an expert to learn more. 

SAP IRPA (Intelligent Robotic Process Automation) enables businesses to hyper automate their mundane processes to achieve process excellence, improve operational efficiency, and augment human intelligence. 

How businesses can successfully attain hyperautomation with SAP IRPA

The concept of hyperautomation has created a buzz across the business landscape. As more and more businesses turn to hyperautomation as a solution and adopt RPA, you must be eager to know what it is and if you need to implement it in your business. RPA, IRPA, SAP IRPA … It can get a little confusing, so this blog will aim to decode all this for you and help you on your journey to hyperautomation. We have compiled a list of advantages of embracing hyperautomation with SAP IRPA along with industry use cases for your benefit. 

What is IRPA? 

IRPA (Intelligent Robotic Process Automation) refers to software programs that can be easily programmed to perform repetitive, tedious, or mundane tasks. One typical example is data manipulation, such as filling in forms, updating spreadsheets, and more. SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation powers this automation through SAP’s Business Technology Platform. 

Read more: Top 7 Business Benefits of Adopting SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation

Advantages of SAP IRPA

By 2020, 53% of enterprises have already started their RPA journey. Interestingly, according to Grand View Research 2020-2027, the RPA market size is expected to reach USD 25.56 billion by 2027. However, just RPA is not enough. Gartner puts it this way: “Enterprise architecture and technology innovation leaders lack a defined strategy to scale automation with tactical and strategic goals. They must deliver end-to-end automation beyond RPA by combining complementary technologies to augment business processes. Gartner calls this hyperautomation.”

It is a clear sign that starting your hyperautomation journey is worth all the effort. Thankfully, hyperautomation with SAP IRPA brings together multiple components that stimulate the ability to automate work.  

SAP IRPA: Accelerating the hyperautomation journey of businesses

Here’s how SAP IRPA helps enterprises with hyperautomation:

1. Automate interface monitoring

The application interface helps complete all transactions on any given day. However, the feedback from a transaction failure may not be apparent immediately. Users tend to realize transaction failures only when they check the interface. Checking the interface to ensure that there are no transaction failures is a repetitive and mundane task. Automating this task can save a great deal of time lost in checking for an error within the system. Hyperautomation with SAP IRPA can be used to automate interface monitoring. 

Read more: How Automation Ensures Businesses Stay Afloat During COVID-19 Crisis

2. Source-to-pay (s2p) and procure-to-pay (p2p)

Procure-to-pay involves extracting invoice and payment data from multiple systems such as ERP (enterprise resource planning), supplier email, CRM, banks, vendors, and so on. However, not all these systems provide easy integration methods. There will be some form of repetitive tasks on the part of an employee. Thankfully, this is one area SAP IRPA can be an enabler. Hyperautomation with SAP IRPA can fill integration gaps. Since SAP IRPA bots work on the front-end, automating integrations is made easy. 

Companies receive information from various sources like invoices, estimates, and quotes. It is crucial to extract the data from these forms and validate them. Hyperautomation with SAP IRPA automates the entire process of procure-to-pay. This will ensure that you are following procurement’s best practices and that there is a single source of truth for all transactions. 

SAP IRPA Case Study: Villeroy & Boch

Villeroy & Boch was initially set up as a pottery company in 1748. Currently, it operates internationally, which requires impeccable operational efficiency and seamless workflow across all business functions. Villeroy & Boch thus decided to embark on their hyperautomation journey with SAP IRPA. They chose to rapidly automate simple, mundane tasks such as responding to starred email queries using SAP IRPA. This paved the way to create a fully automated invoice error handling process. IRPA bots increased the efficiency of the workflow while freeing their employees to focus on strategic tasks. SAP IRPA also enabled the organization to assist their wholesale customers in improving Villeroy & Boch’s top line. 

3. Purchase order follow-up

A company will have to follow-up on purchase orders sent to their vendors, and the business has to make numerous follow-ups. However, the process of each purchase order remains the same, and it can be very costly. Companies can make their follow-up system much more efficient by embarking on a hyperautomation journey with SAP IRPA. An SAP IRPA bot can be programmed to hunt down and categorize these disparate points into a single report, saving a lot of time and precious resources for the company.

Read more: How Fingent Enables e-Invoicing for SAP Users to Stay Compliant with GST India Regulations 

4. Improve user experience

Businesses that see lasting organizational change prefer to start small and eventually progress to change their organization’s entire culture. SAP IRPA can provide a great foundation to begin the hyperautomation journey. It allows you to transform one department or process at a time and then pick momentum. Such gradual momentum will have a positive impact, and your staff will be more inclined to embrace hyperautomation. Such implementation enables businesses to begin their hyperautomation journey with a small budget and in less time. 

Here is an example:

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) was able to do more with less and efficiently remove costly and ineffective work processes with SAP IRPA. The company achieved proof of concept in just 55 days and deployed the full portfolio in as little as four weeks. 

Read more: Top 3 UI Offerings from SAP: Fiori, Screen Personas, and Lumira

5. Customer relationship management

Level 1 of the customer contact desk processes a high volume of simple repetitive tasks. When a customer approaches a company with a query or complaint, a customer rep will have to perform the necessary actions by switching between various systems and applications before answering the customer. This has several disadvantages. Besides, this tedious search process may increase customer dissatisfaction. SAP IRPA can help avoid this as you can deploy intelligent RPA bots to manage repetitive tasks. 

6. Data consistency monitoring 

Most manufacturing companies rely heavily on live production data to make slight adjustments. Inconsistent data can lead to malfunctions across the company’s processes. At the same time, tracing data inconsistency is a mammoth task. However, it is a necessity to find the inconsistency and fix it. With SAP IRPA, a business can schedule automation to handle most of these issues. It can help collect and export the data stream details periodically. This will help in highlighting anomalies before they break the system.

Read more: How SAP Supports Effective Business Continuity Planning  

Are you ready to hyper automate?

Is your company ready to set about the journey of hyperautomation with SAP IRPA? Let’s find out together. Fingent works with clients across the globe, helping them understand and implement SAP IRPA in their business. Our experts understand the nuances of different industries and will help you on your journey to success with SAP IRPA.

Leveraging SAP solutions with a Silver Partner of SAP will help you realize the full potential of SAP IRPA hyperautomation. Fingent offers custom implementation and migration services to SAP and can help you move quickly and make the best use of this technology NOW when you need it the most. Let’s get talking.

Right ERP software helps CFOs contribute to organizational decisions more logically.    

Selecting the Right ERP Solution: Crucial Points a CFO should Keep in Mind 

The CFO is one of the most significant decision-makers in an enterprise today. CFO is the protector of your business’s financial records and has an ultimate say while making financial decisions for the company. However, in this digital age, the role of a CFO is evolving. A CFO takes a more holistic approach in the current scenario and guides the organization towards success by leveraging digital intelligence. CFOs must be equipped to keep their company afloat during an unexpected crisis such as the pandemic, identify new investment opportunities and help the business prosper in the face of intense competition. A tall order but not impossible. 

To achieve this, CFOs must look at their existing systems to upgrade or replace those slowing down the organization. CFOs are responsible for ensuring that any new technology they adopt has what it takes to turn the business into an effective market disruptor. 

This article covers a CFO’s top 5 considerations when choosing an ERP solution.

Read more: How Organizations can Gain a Competitive Edge by Implementing Digital Core ERP

1. Obtain hands-on knowledge on the process

CFOs might find it tempting to leave the ERP process knowledge to technical teams, but this could mean that they miss out on learning the crucial aspects of the ERP that will affect the organizational costs. Technology assists CFOs in controlling accounting and tax standards and in engaging with the business to drive value jointly.

Read more: SAP S/4HANA: Transforming The CFO into a Business Value Creator and Role Model

Technical jargon can be overwhelming for CFOs. But they need to clarify their questions with their ERP service provider. 

To get you started, here are some important software concepts related to ERP implementation.

• Installation: Know what is required of your current server.
• Customization: Make sure the ERP software suits your organization’s specific requirements. Compared to other ERP systems, SAP requires minimum customization. It has many customizable solutions that are suitable for all types of businesses. 
• Configuration: Ensure your software is in harmony with your workflow. Thankfully, SAP is suitable for any size organization. 

Apart from this, confirm the ERP is hosted on the cloud because it is easier to handle and more secure to manage. Those who have migrated to cloud-hosted ERPs reap the benefits during the pandemic, where remote working is the only option to ensure business continuity. Making sure the solution is rewritten for the cloud will help CFOs keep up with any future changes.

2. Invest in a service provider with vision and efficiency

Your ERP solution’s longevity is determined by your service provider’s efficiency and capability. Do not hesitate to clarify certain aspects of your service provider and the services they have to offer you. Find out if their financial situation makes it a viable option for a long-term contract. 

You also need to identify if your service provider can give you access to all the information you need for years to come. Additionally, consider if your vendor is relevant to the current market scenario and can stay relevant in the future. To that end, it may be helpful to enquire about their research and development plans to ensure they will provide you with high-end products now and in the future. 

Read more: Why Choose Fingent as Your Odoo ERP Partner

3. What are the aspects of integration?

ERP is one of the multiple systems that determine your organization’s performance. To achieve optimum results, you will have to enquire about integration with other aspects such as EPM, SCM, HCM, and CX, to make way for a smoother workflow. How? When you have various platforms working together harmoniously, you can avoid data inconsistency between two systems. 

Read more: 5 Reasons to Integrate Your E-commerce Application with Odoo ERP

To avoid cumbersome processes after ERP implementation, you must consider if the vendor you are planning to hire can provide you the best support required. Talk to them to ensure that all the different platforms function as one unit. The most relevant integration for a CFO is integrating ERP with EPM (Enterprise Performance Management). Picking the right vendor will help you with such critical integrations.

4. Choose the right ERP                      

ERP that fits one company does not match the other because each company has its own unique needs. Whether a business is small, medium, or large, a CFO must be aware of the need for financial planning tools. Hence, as a CFO, you must confirm your ERP caters to the size of your business. Additionally, your current ERP must be scalable to accommodate employees from various departments. In other words, you will need a scalable ERP system for your entire operation to work smoothly.

Read more: 5 Tips For Getting The Best Out Of Your ERP System

5. Identify the needs of all departments to ensure teamwork

The ultimate aim of a CFO is to ensure that the ERP they select is delivering excellent results. Hence, it is crucial to have all your employees on board and understand the ERP system. 

To achieve that, you need to identify the needs of each department in your organization and make sure that ERP meets all those needs. This allows for an enhanced workflow among all employees. Include your organization’s CIO and other leaders during the planning and implementation of ERP software. They can spread a positive outlook toward the new system among the rest of the employees.

Read more: How Fingent Helps CFOs Gain New Insights and Reliably Enable Key Decisions

Are you ready to steer your business to success?

Understandably, implementing ERP will take time and effort. Besides, as a CFO, you will have to identify the potential and tangibly justify the cost of ERP. However, choosing the right vendor can make implementation hassle-free and result-oriented. 

It is no surprise that successful implementation and deployment of ERP hinges on the right partnership with the right vendor. 

As an Official Ready Partner for Odoo and SAP Silver partner, Fingent is the right provider to assess and understand your unique business requirements and help you become a cloud-powered enterprise. We offer dramatically shorter implementation timeframes. Our ERP allows for rapid configuration, customization, and deployment, significantly reducing the implementation cost. We provide both cloud and on-premises ERP solutions. So, do you feel ready to steer your business to success? Give us a call!

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit retailers hard. Overnight, malls, boutiques, and shops teeming with customers were evacuated. As the days dragged by and shutters remained close, many retailers had to let go of employees and even shut their shops permanently. We will see how, but this blog aims to show that this does not need to be the case for your retail business. You can still stay afloat, beat the competition, and rise to success with a little help from SAP!

Changing market conditions show no mercy on retailers

With the pandemic raising its ugly head, 2020 seemed to paint a dismal picture for the future of retail. Major retailers have been canceling orders and delaying payments to their suppliers. This forced some brands to store their seasonal articles or move them into distribution centers or outlets. For some retailers, the coronavirus pandemic increased the risk of bankruptcy due to store closures, while others barely made it through. 

For example, Rubana Huq, the president of BGMEA (Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association), told the press that 3.18 billion orders were suspended. This had an impact on more than half of the 4 million garment workers in Bangladesh. 

At the other end, brick-and-mortar presence is seeing a shift to the online commerce environment, which picked up at an exponential pace. E-commerce proved to be a pivotal moment for retailers, making it necessary for them to invest in digital capabilities. A critical aspect of staying competitive in such unprecedented times is the growth of technology and its importance in operational success.

Read more: How Fingent Helps CFOs Gain New Insights and Reliably Enable Key Decisions

Read on to find out how SAP plays a crucial role in turning things around for the retail industry.

SAP enables a differential strategy in the competitive market

More and more companies are recognizing the advantages of implementing SAP solutions. In the current recessionary and competitive market, delaying digital transition may prove a costly misstep that retail businesses will find hard to retrieve. Solutions offered by SAP can help retailers control various aspects of their business and identify trends in customer behavior and capitalize on opportunities at the right time. 

With ever-changing customer behavior, SAP equips retailers to become customer-centric. It can help retailers analyze buying behavior by providing much-needed consumer insights. These insights will help them offer more personalized and delightful buying choices that attract customers and retain them. 

Here is how SAP equips retailers:

• Provides real-time behavioral information, both online and in-store
• Reduces cycle time
• Helps retailers identify newer ways to find leads and build loyalty
• Streamlines operational process

Also, SAP solutions can help retailers offer a real-time personalized buying experience as it influences buyers’ behavior at the point of purchase. To create such a customized offering, retailers will need insight into buyers’ purchase history, profile, and shopping behavior. That’s where SAP solutions come to your rescue. SAP can provide retailers with all the information required to help them stay competitive. 

SAP solutions help deal marketing and merchandise challenges

The retail industry can be volatile, especially during times like these. Retailers who manage seasonal merchandise might find it challenging to maintain multiple products and keep track of all that product data. Any incorrect data can prove costly for the organization. Such inaccurate data can also lead to a mismatch of data across all sales channels, presenting inconsistent product pricing and customers’ eventual loss.

Thankfully, SAP is the backbone for merchandise management, nullifying all these challenges. It comes with a simplified data model that offers end-to-end support for all retail functions. This concept works across the product lifecycle, from master data creation to stock management. It allows retailers to create and maintain the data effortlessly while ensuring pricing consistency across all the channels. These features can increase the organizations’ revenue, minimize data errors, enhance time to market, facilitate a better customer experience, and increase conversions. 

Here is an example of how SAP solution helps:

Fewer markdowns: Retailers such as consumer electronics and fashion deal with seasonal goods. To stay competitive, retailers must ensure that these products are available in good time. SAP solutions offer more efficient season management and optimized ordering. 

SAP solutions can help manage challenges in the supply chain

Inaccurate data can create challenges in planning, leading to longer response times and increasing the risk of losing the consumer to competitors. Fortunately, SAP solutions come with a single platform for all warehouse and transportation management. Features such as real-time analytics and advanced shipping capabilities can eliminate inventory challenges and enable live inventory management. 

Thus, the supply chain process becomes agile and leads to higher revenue. It can also reduce the operating cost of the warehouse. By simplifying and automating processes, SAP can redefine retail and bring value to any retail business. 

Read more: How SAP Helps Realize Voice-enabled Warehouse Operations

Following examples prove SAP helps with supply chain:

1. Fewer stock-outs

Supply chains are typically complex and need high levels of agility. SAP solution enables retailers to track procurement journeys automatically that helps reduce revenue loss due to the late arrival of seasonal goods. 

2. Lower inventory costs

SAP can harmonize stock information and keep it up to date. At any given point, a retailer can intervene centrally and place a repeat order when necessary. This reduces inventory carrying costs and enables better inventory management which increases revenue. 

3. Create seamless customer experiences

Retailers realize the significance of adopting sensor technology to create seamless and highly personalized business processes across all channels. SAP simplifies logistics and digital channel processes from order to payment, both in-store and online. 

Key solutions from SAP for retailers

Here are some key solutions that SAP has made available, which can help your retail business:

1. SAP S/4HANA Retail solution for merchandise management

With the SAP S/4HANA retail solution for merchandise management, you can perform necessary checks on inventory, offers, availability across stores, and more in a single, unified view. It is instrumental in engaging your customers with cross-channel interactions.

Read more: SAP S/4HANA: Redefining End-To-End Solution

2. SAP Commerce Cloud

Through the SAP Commerce Cloud, retailers gain the ability to “launch new digital experiences with headless e-commerce capabilities.” SAP Commerce Cloud empowers your retail business with Web apps, chatbots, messengers, and other capabilities to enhance your customers’ digital experience, engagement, and conversions.  

Read more: Why is SAP Commerce Cloud A Complete Digital Business Solution

3. SAP Ariba Strategic Sourcing

The SAP Ariba Strategic Sourcing Suite is “a single, closed-loop, source-to-contract solution bundle for managing sourcing and suppliers across all spend categories.” It helps retailers efficiently manage their direct materials sourcing without going through laborious and faulty manual processes.

Read more: SAP Ariba & SAP IBP Integration to enhance supply chain visibility in manufacturing

4. SAP Extended Warehouse Management

The SAP Extended Warehouse Management system is a brilliant solution to managing high-volume warehouse operations. It gives you complete visibility of your supply chain logistics, warehouse operations, and distribution process, giving you seamless control and maximizing the use of your resources.

5. SAP Business One for Retail

SAP Business One for Retail is a comprehensive digital solution that enables retailers to manage all their retail operations, including Point of Sale (POS) insights. It helps retailers with better inventory control, a streamlined ordering process, and seamless multi-channel e-commerce. 

Read more: SAP Business One vs. SAP Business ByDesign: Helping Businesses Pick the Best

Empower your retail business with SAP

An industry capable of adapting to new and evolving trends will rapidly recover from the pandemic’s effect. SAP solutions can help retailers examine those trends in great detail. SAP is a powerful tool that allows you to gather all the essential data needed to improve your business. Powered by insights gathered with the help of SAP solutions, retailers can redefine loyalty programs and stay competitive in the current market space. 

Fingent offers custom implementation and migration services to SAP and can help you move quickly and make the best use of this technology NOW when you need it the most. Leveraging SAP solutions with a Silver Partner of SAP will give your retail business an added advantage. Drop us a message, and let’s get you started.