SAP Innovation Day for Partners is a Virtual Event that commenced on 10th November 2020, started around 2.30 AM Indian Standard Time. There were many interesting sessions and announcements that concerned SAP S/4 HANA, SAP Cloud Platform, SAP Success Factors, SAP Customer Experience, SAP Procurement Solutions- Ariba, Data Warehouse, HANA Cloud, etc.
This article will cover the broad level points which were announced/discussed in SAP Innovation Day for Partners on SAP S/4 HANA – Next Generation Intelligent ERP as SAP calls it.
The SAP ERP Journey
ERP started as a Core Software in 1990’s to 2000’s, a suite of applications to automate the operations of all the departments in a company under a centralized system. Today we are seeing a different form of ERP through innovation, following best practices, automation, flexibility and extensibility through which ERP along with additional features and external apps meet the the business needs. The foreseeable future is where ERP will be a composable suite where each business will use a well-connected Cloud-based modular version which is specifically designed for that business. Other features can be easily added as required on demand.
How S/4 HANA fits the Future Paradigm
SAP S/4 HANA is built with the future requirement/model in mind. It is becoming more and more decomposed. Cloud-Native – Business Technology Platform is where the industry-specific new modules/features are being added. While the core features like Finance/Logistics etc. are also being improved to support the decomposed/De-Coupled framework.
S/4 HANA Support to Customers
SAP S/4 HANA is supporting customers based on 3 main characteristics:
- Innovation in Business Model
- Operational Excellence
- Sustainability
The last point is more important nowadays since Futuristic Software can help an organization to be efficient and reduce the Carbon Footprint, thus helping to prevent Climate Change.
SAP S/4 HANA has proven its capability for many customers. It increases revenue, it increases existing customer retention, it helps reducing Inventory Working Capital, reduced days in sales outstanding and of course helped the environment as well. (Names of the Customer Companies were shown in the session; however, we are not disclosing this here).
Capabilities of SAP S/4 HANA
SAP S/4 HANA introduced many integrated processes, specific to different industries, thus it becomes an Industry-optimized comprehensive, integrated and intelligent ERP.
Examples of Integrated Processes
- Invoice to pay/cash
- Financial Planning & Analysis
- Governance, Risk & Compliance
- Engineer to Order
- Make to Order
- Make to Stock
- Return to Restock
- Source to Contract
- Procure to Invoice
- Engagement to Cash
Optimized for Industries (25+)
- Consumer Products
- Retail
- Wholesale Distribution
- Aerospace & Defence
- Automotive
- Travel & Transportation
- Chemical
- Mining
- Oil & Gas
- Banking & Insurance
- Healthcare
- Media
- Telecommunication
- Sports
S/4 HANA Deployment Flexibility
S/4 HANA Cloud
This is the Cloud-driven ERP offered as a Service. Upgrades are automatically implemented 2-4 times in a year, managed by SAP. Standardized Core and easy extensibility to external apps for additional requirements. It follows a Subscription-based cost model. It is ideal for organizations who need standardized industry-specific packaged ERP.
S/4 HANA On-Premise
It belongs to the same stack and core of SAP S/4 HANA, however, it is being deployed in the customer’s own infrastructure. Upgrade for this version is usually released yearly. It is driven and managed by the Customer/their SAP Partner. It gives flexibility towards customization as per the complex requirement to support their unique business scenario. It comes up with a Demo/Model company as an example to start the configuration.
Innovations in Finance & Risk – Preview 2021
Self-Auditing Finance
- Self-Monitoring and Self-Healing
- Automated Monitoring of all Financial Transactions
Parallel Accounting
- Single Source of Accounting
- Lower cost of Financial Management
Intelligent Processes
- Increase in Productivity and Efficiency
Procurement, Logistics and Manufacturing- Preview 2021
- Central Invoice Management – Global Accurate Invoice Processing
- Hierarchy in Services/Materials – Cost saving by having one place for Service and Materials
- Predictive MRP – Reduce Supplier Overloads and Avoid Out of Stock Scenarios
Sales, Service, Billing- Preview 2021
Manage Product and Services Sales in One Process – from Quote to Order Fulfilment. S/4 HANA bringing up capabilities to manage All Solution Selling in One Solution Order.
- Sales Order & Service Management
- Solution Selling in One Order
- Solution Orchestration
- Solution Order Progress Monitor
- Situations Handling
- One Invoice
- One Financial View
- Advanced Intercompany Sales
- Costs of Consumption Consideration in Profitability Analysis
Professional Services and Public Sector- Preview 2021
- S/4 HANA Cloud for Projects – Balancing Resource Utilization and Project Delivery
- Grants Management – Complete Grants Administration
- SuccessFactors Integration – Complete Hire-to-pay functionality
User Experience Improvement- Preview 2021
- Proper Harmonization of Classic and Fiori UI5 Apps
- Homepages improvement based on Fiori 3
- Smooth Transition between Fiori Launchpad, Fiori UI5 Apps and Classic UIs
- Mobile Enablement of SAP S/4 HANA UIs
Source – SAP Innovation Day for Partners 2020
Now, you can easily integrate your SAP ERP system with Ecommerce store or CRM to automate the business process!
