With the advent of the new age IoT (Internet of Things ), you can control, monitor, analyze & predict data in a way which was unimaginable before. Mobility is helping you keep your productivity on the go, aided by the ubiquitous cloud technology helping you access and enter data even when you are not around your desktop. With SAP’s new in memory database – SAP HANA, data processing speeds have accelerated far beyond reach to open the doors to new horizons of technological development. With emerging technologies moving ahead with such blazing speeds, we need to hold on tight in order to stay with it and make the best use of the developments for our business success.
What are the Various Solution Offerings Provided by SAP ?
This articles aims to explain the basics of the SAP Solutions portfolio in order to better understand the offerings and help make an educated choice. So let us first discuss the broadest classification of the solutions, according your company size :
1. Small to Midsize Enterprise : SAP has the perfect business management software , if your business fall into this category which is the SAP Business One. Currently empowering 47,000 SME’s in over 150 countries this business tools covers you in all aspects of your business from accounting and finance, CRM, Warehouse and Productions, Procurement & Purchasing as well as reporting and analytics. Moreover, you get the choice of deployment – Cloud or on premise and the solution can be deployed as fast as in 2 to 8 weeks to keep minimum disruption to your critical business processes and achieve implementation in the fastest possible time.
2.Fast Growing Midsize Enterprise : SAP empowers its fast growing mid size enterprise customers with a truely all-in-one business management tool which is the SAP Business All-in-One. This solution is truly an affordable, comprehensive ERP solution prepackaged for fast growing mid size businesses. Its prime advantage is, the solution supports industry specific process requirements and can handle the complexity of the processes involved with an added advantage of being completely scalable to grow with you. With SAP’s rapid development solution- you can deploy in as little as 12 weeks.
3.Large Enterprises : If you are a part of an organization with global supply chains, multiple plants across the nation, complex warehousing and distribution network then chances are you already using or have definitely heard about the SAP Business Suite. With the capability to run your entire business from end-to-end – even on a global scale- this solution is truly the comprehensive business management software your large enterprise needs. Manage inbound and outbound logistics, production, distribution, sales, marketing, HR & finance seamlessly with an integrated experience to have a 360 degree vision into your organization and drive it towards unattained success.
So, let’s delve into details of the SAP Business Suite to fully understand the solution scope and be acquainted with the typical SAP keywords often used to explain solutions.
A large organization has several complex process which can broadly be divided into generic categories of inbound logistics and supplier relationships, manufacturing and production along with warehousing and storage, Sales and distribution , after sales service and customer relations, Human resource management and Finance. Also, R&D with new product development and marketing run parallel with these processes. SAP has divided the Business Suite into a bunch of applications which can handle specifically the processes discussed above, to give the business users an integrated experience of running a whole organization.
The SAP Business Suite consists of the following applications bundled together:
- SAP ECC 6.0 (SAP ERP) : SAP ECC – Enterprise Central Component is the core of the Enterprise resource planning software. As per the name, this application has modules which play a core central role in operating an organization. The main modules of SAP ECC consists of :
- Sales & Distribution
- Materials Management
- Production Planning
- Quality Management
- Plant Maintenance
- Human Resources
- FICO- Financial Accounting and Control
- Logistics Execution & Warehouse Management
- SAP CRM 7.0 : SAP CRM – Customer Relationship Management module helps you access accurate and timely customer information to make the most of every contact during a customer’s entire relationship with your organization. With a comprehensive database of all the customer info as well as industry leading tools for enhancing market reach, SAP CRM helps you make intelligent business decisions, improve sales efficiency and reduce costs of customer & field service.
- SAP SRM 7.0 : SAP SRM – Supplier Relationship Management module is very analogous to CRM. Rather, SRM & CRM are the two ends of the same value chain. The same way an organization has to deal with a number of customers, it also has to deal with a number of suppliers and managing supplier relations can be a vital aspect of business success. SRM system has specific functionalities to develop two-way, mutually beneficial relationships with strategic supply partners which include negotiating contracts, purchasing, managing logistics and delivery, collaborating on product design, etc.
- SAP SCM 7.0 : SAP SCM – Supply Chain Management software is a very advanced planning tool that helps you manage the complex supply chain challenges in demand planning, Supply Chain planning, Production planning, Detailed scheduling, Distribution planning and Transportation planning. SCM helps you manage the product , information as well as finance flow throughout your organization. SCM further consists of subparts of APO (Advanced planning and optimization), EWM (Extended Warehouse Management ) & TM (Transport Management). The modules within APO are :
- DP: Demand Planning
- SNP: Supply Network Planning
- gATP: Global Available to Promise
- TP/VS : Transportation Planning / Vehicle Scheduling
- SPP :Service Parts Planning
- PP/DS: Production Plan / Detailed Scheduling
- SAP PLM 7.0 : SAP PLM – Product Lifecycle Management assists in every stage of the product lifecycle from inception, through engineering design and manufacture, to service and disposal of manufactured products. SAP PLM provides you a portal to access all product-related information needed for collaborating with business partners and supporting processes including product innovation, design and engineering, quality and maintenance management, and control of environmental issues.
This article just sheds some light on the scope of the SAP Business Suite with some added overview of SAP Business one and SAP All-in-One solutions. Stay tuned for more articles coming soon on the most equipped, new age ERP solution , SAP’s brand new S/4 HANA.
To learn further details about choosing, optimizing, implementing , supporting or upgrading SAP Solutions to best fit your business, contact us on ContactUS@GeniusBSI.com. At Genius Business Solutions, we are experts in listening to your business concerns , understanding your challenges and empowering you to achieve your goals.
Genius Business Solutions is an ERP Consulting firm headquarted at Moline -Quad Cities, Illinois with clients based throughout the United States and India. Call us now to achieve the most ROI out of your SAP ERP investments. With over 12 years of industry experience and certified industry experts with software and business knowledge we can help run your business efficiently by optimizing your ERP system and re engineering your business processes to achieve unprecedented business results.
