Mastercard and SAP Concur partner to revolutionize expense reporting, promising a seamless and efficient solution for businesses worldwide. In the intricate world of corporate finance, few tasks evoke as much collective dread among employees as the dreaded expense report. It’s a chore that nobody wants to tackle, often likened to enduring a dental procedure. But […]
In a merger between two well-matched organizations, cultural integration can be the key to successfully transforming into a single high-performing entity ready to take on new opportunities. Notably, more than a few high-profile mergers have failed due to cultural incompatibility. Add a third organization into the merger and the cultural complexities increase exponentially. But some multi-organization mergers do successfully navigate these challenges and reap the transformational benefits.
Convista, a consultancy and SAP partner based in Cologne, Germany, emerged stronger and better positioned to serve its clients following a recent merger that brought together three former consultancies: Axxiome Health, ConVista Consulting, and enowa. With 25 years of experience delivering transformation projects to its clients, Convista used that expertise in its own rebranding to present its capabilities to clients and employees: a vibrant people culture as well as a respected and trusted brand supported by SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition for ERP and SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central for core HR.
“Trust and transparency are common values that we share at Convista,” declares Convista CEO Martin Hinz. “Combined with a dynamic team spirit and passion, it’s what we bring to our clients every day.”
With a workforce of around 1,200 employees, Convista has made a name for itself through its dedication and expertise providing end-to-end solutions to clients throughout the world with a presence in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Poland, Spain, Brazil, Israel, and further locations across the globe. It supports client projects primarily in four sectors: insurance, industry, healthcare, and energy/utilities. In recent years, Convista has twice been awarded SAP Partner of the Year in the Financial Services sector.
“At Convista you meet everyone on the same level, independent of your skill level or where you are in your career,” says Stefanie Weber, project lead of People and Culture – HR Systems, Convista. “Also, when we’re working with customers, we try to approach them at eye level, which makes quite a good working environment. The implementation of SAP SuccessFactors came as a natural extension to our brand and our culture.”
The Challenges of Data Siloed in Three Systems
Weber says one of the reasons she joined Convista in 2012 while studying business at university was the high priority its leaders place on trust and transparency, values that permeate the entire organization and empower employees in their work and career development. “Trust is one of our main values,” she underscores. “Also, the trust that people are willing to do their best to get motivated and move the company ahead.”
Convista grew quickly both organically and as a result of mergers with other consultancies. In 2019, IT service provider Axxiome Health joined the ConVista Group to deepen the organization’s expertise in the health insurance sector. In 2021, enowa joined the group, infusing its knowledge of industries and insurance. With the mergers complete, the incipient organization became the new Convista on January 1, 2023.
Though team members were highly motivated to collaborate from the start, Convista’s vision for itself as a modern organization was held back in both its daily work for projects and internal services. Using disparate tools based on older technology and a patchwork of third-party solutions that lacked integration proved to be inefficient and unsuitable as a basis for decision-making.
“Whenever we wanted to have a report, even something as simple as a headcount, we always had to go into three different systems, collect the data, and report on that,” Weber recalls. “It’s just one of the many examples of why we really urgently needed one IT platform.”
Project ONE Achieves Milestone Integration
To build a strong foundation for future growth, Convista embarked on “Project ONE” with the goal to have one digital platform flexible and powerful enough for the entire organization. For this, it chose SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition and SAP SuccessFactors solutions with self-service capabilities for employees to log time-off.
Overall, implementing SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central with SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition can result in streamlined HR processes; end-to-end integration with seamless connectivity between HR and finance functions for accurate and up-to-date employee data across the organization; greater transparency of data for analytics and reporting on workforce trends, costs, and profitability to enable better strategic planning and resource allocation; and compliance with regulatory requirements and data security.
SAP SuccessFactors solutions can fuel the success of every individual and drive org agility at scale
Among the key advantages is the ability for employees to access their own HR-related information, such as personal details and time-off balances. This self-service capability helps empower employees, improve transparency, and enhance the overall employee experience.
Convista’s project team decided for a phased approach to the implementation by first introducing the SAP solutions in Poland and later in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland – with SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition planned to launch in the German-speaking countries during the course of 2024. To optimize success, the project team used the combined best practices of Convista and SAP and hosted regular meetings that provided clear communication to steer the project. “We were always aligned on the requirements of the other teams,” says Weber, who managed the HR workstream. “We all knew the main goal of the implementation. This was helpful for everyone on the project.”
In-house experts from Convista certified on SAP SuccessFactors solutions contributed valuable knowledge for the implementation. Consultants from SAP Services and Support successfully integrated the cost center replication from SAP S/4HANA Cloud to SAP SuccessFactors and the workforce replication from SAP SuccessFactors to SAP S/4HANA Cloud, and delivered a detailed administration guide on the integration setup for Convista. Additionally, they provided an overview, the architecture guidance, and the navigation through major hurdles in performing the configuration to set up identity access governence (IAG), identity provisioning service (IPS), and identity authentication services (IAS). The SAP Early Adopter Care program supported Convista for the master data integration (MDI) during the implementation and helped to solve all roadblocks efficiently.
On January 1, 2023, Convista’s 80-person team in Poland was the first to go live with the new SAP solutions. “It was really a great experience for them and quite an advancement,” says Weber, citing the benefits of the new solutions that provide optimizations and intuitive workflows. The project took a pivotal turn on January 1, 2024, with the launch of SAP SuccessFactors solutions for Convista’s 800 employees in the German-speaking countries.
“The biggest milestone was to have [SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition and SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central] speaking with each other,” says Weber, who emphasizes how valuable it is for the team “to have an end-to-end process within one platform.” With an integrated IT platform in place, she says that it is no longer necessary to do workflows, authorizations, or any other processes in other systems.
The seamless synchronization of data by using a common data model for SAP business applications helps reduce the need for manual data entry and redundant processes. This means, for example, employee data that is maintained in SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central is available in real-time in SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition; while master data, like cost center data, flows seamlessly from SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition to SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central. Eliminating data silos enables the HR and finance teams to work with consistent, accurate data for all-important employment decisions and legal reporting obligations.
Now Convista’s team is unified in its brand, values, spirit – and employee data.
More Transparency and Intuitive Workflows Are Just the Beginning
Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, according to Weber, with employees speaking favorably about the improved transparency and workflows. “The first thing I heard from everyone was, well, this is simple and intuitive. They were so happy about it,” she says. “They are big fans of the mobile application. They find it very transparent and easy to use.”
For some colleagues, the new solution lets them view their own data for the first time. “When we went live, everyone was viewing their profile,” says Weber. “This was also quite new that you are able to see what data is maintained for your person, your address, but also job information – to view it and have this transparency. People like this very much and also the ability to have the self-services in SAP SuccessFactors.”
To strengthen communication between HR and employees, Convista will bring more people processes onto the new digital platform. In fact, the team very recently implemented the SAP SuccessFactors Performance & Goals solution for annual employee appraisals, goal setting, and project feedback. “It’s just the beginning,” Weber says. “There’s still a lot of work ahead of us.”
Hinz says, “We have been careful to preserve our workplace culture during the transformation. Now that we are rebranded as one organization, we are seeing the benefits of that early effort. With SAP, we now have the digital platform to build people-centered processes that advance our vision as a unified, high-performing organization serving our clients.”
In an era defined by digital transformation, the convergence of SAP in cloud technology stands as a guiding light of innovation. Today, as Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s telecommunications giant, embarks on a transformative journey with RISE with SAP, the telecommunications landscape undergoes a profound shift towards cloud-centric operations. For Deutsche Telekom, the imperative to modernize and […]
The era of the hard sell is over – companies are now focused on creating sales and service experiences that naturally attract customers and solidify their loyalty. But this winning approach requires much more than the traditional seller-buyer transaction of engagement, trust, personalization, and mutual benefit.
B2B and B2C customers are demanding virtual sales interactions and smooth, consultative customer service experiences, according to a report from Harvard Business Review Analytics Services. Yet, 51% of businesses still struggle to provide the right data, processes, and capabilities that allow sales and service teams to deliver moments that create lasting connections.
Now, with greater ease, SAP customers can access the content, guided expertise, resources, and planning methods essential to building a cloud-based technology foundation for this new era of sales and services. And all of this is possible through the SAP Preferred Success plan for SAP Sales Cloud and SAP Service Cloud, expanded edition.
Maximizing Value with Focused, Proactive Guidance
Offering a combination of omnichannel sales and value-added customer service is, by no means, a simple feat that can be achieved overnight. Making this transformation requires mutual understanding and close collaboration between sales and service teams, accessing data-driven insights on customer needs and expectations and delivering value at every touch point with effective technologies.
The expanded edition of SAP Preferred Success for SAP Sales Cloud and SAP Service Cloud can deliver that advantage with exceptional support from knowledgeable SAP experts throughout the lifetime of a cloud solution investment. Without processing another statement of work, SAP customers can move from planning and implementation to go-live and active operation with such speed and effectiveness that they can transform their customer experience faster and more efficiently.
Fast track the value of your cloud investment with SAP Preferred Success
For example, reviews and related analysis help maintain peace of mind throughout the deployment of a cloud solution, keeping organizations on the right path toward achieving their goals. This can include quality checks to help ensure integration integrity, in-depth release guidance for future feature adoption, targeted training programs on the latest topics and best practices, and service-level agreements for enhanced support.
But what makes the expanded edition of SAP Preferred Success for SAP Sales Cloud and SAP Service Cloud truly distinctive is the long-term, enhanced partnership it can provide to help advance and accelerate the cloud journey. Throughout the subscription lifecycle, organizations are continuously supported by experts and specialized services designed to meet their unique needs.
Access to Product Specialists
Appointed based on their technical and product-based expertise, product specialists leverage their knowledge and insights to help accelerate business outcomes and maximize the consumption of SAP solutions. They achieve this by recommending and overseeing the delivery and scheduling of crucial services, providing direct access to experts for targeted advice on solutions, and advising on SAP best practices.
This experience can allow sales and services organizations and their stakeholders to enhance the ROI of their overall investment in cloud solutions from SAP by:
Acquiring functional and technical knowledge when needed
Receiving answers to queries related to standard integration with other SAP solutions
Addressing critical implementation difficulties quickly and resolutely
Solution Reviews
During prescriptive solution reviews, SAP experts work closely with customers to analyze their usage patterns and advise on process improvements and transformation journeys that align with their success plans and business goals. Specifically, they focus on aligning usage with best practices, measuring the impact of changes on business operations, and identifying areas for improvement.
Customers can also benefit from collaborating with subject-matter experts during these reviews, receiving recommendations and advice on changes that can help mitigate or resolve business challenges, improve the customer journey, and reduce bottlenecks proactively. This service can offer stakeholders valuable insights into simplifying and optimizing operations, reducing administrative work, boosting process efficiency, and enhancing transparency for user adoption and cloud landscape stability.
New Feature Activation
SAP customers can also receive assistance in identifying, evaluating, activating, and maximizing the impact of the latest features to support their business operations better. Subject-matter experts help provide an enhanced adoption experience by aligning business goals with value and product capabilities, creating a tailored adoption plan, and providing guidance and enablement to activate features.
The new feature activation service can also assess and enable the impact of new configurations and simple customizations added to SAP Sales Cloud and SAP Service Cloud. By matching business needs to updates that offer better value, SAP experts can evaluate the potential benefits and risks of the new additions, pinpointing system changes needed to activate and test the update to measure business outcomes.
Reaching Mission-Critical Goals with Extra Impact
The right technology partner can make all the difference – especially as expectations for sales and customer service experiences continue to evolve. Providing access to expert guidance, resources, and support when and where needed helps ensure businesses drive customer loyalty and success.
The expanded edition of SAP Preferred Success for SAP Sales Cloud and SAP Service Cloud can deliver on that promise with a transformative approach to sales and customer service. This significant step towards creating personalized, value-driven experiences can help sales and services teams not only meet but exceed customer expectations, turning transactions into lasting connections.
Ready to amplify the impact of your sales and customer service experiences? Visit the SAP Preferred Success area of sap.com or contact your local SAP representative to learn more about SAP Preferred Success for SAP Sales Cloud and SAP Service Cloud, expanded edition.
Amitesh Tiwari is a solution manager for the Chief Innovation Office of Cloud Success Services at SAP.
Without a doubt, the world of work has dramatically transformed over the past several years, with generative AI initiating the latest wave of change for organizations around the world. In a more complex and less homogenous business landscape, top-down HR processes of the past no longer meet the rising demands of employees for flexible career paths, intuitive work processes, and two-way communication – not to mention the growing skills gaps and talent shortages that keep leaders up at night.
Leaders need to embrace generative AI as a way to address these challenges with talent intelligence and advanced analytics. According to Gartner, 26% of CEOs rank the talent shortage as the top damaging factor to business outlook, and 76% of HR leaders agree they will be lagging in organizational success if they don’t adopt and implement generative AI in the next 12 to 24 months.
Adopt the latest in HR innovation with SAP SuccessFactors solutions
At SAP, we have a proven track record of providing HCM solutions in the cloud for leading organizations around the globe. Our customers trust us to not only manage their sensitive employee data and payroll, but to help them understand their workforces as they prepare for the skills they need in the future.
The SAP SuccessFactors HCM suite provides truly global HR cloud software with powerful AI capabilities to help organizations meet the challenges of today and innovate for tomorrow. Our more than 10,000 customers – from startups and midmarket companies to large enterprises – use our solutions to help bring out the best in their people by harnessing the power of AI to elevate every experience, guide every people decision, and connect HR across every aspect of the business. We do this with:
Core HR and payroll: A single source of truth is key for any organization to enable insight into the entirety of its workforce: employees, contingent workers, and dynamic teams. The SAP SuccessFactors HCM suite can provide localized support for over 100 countries and territories and cloud payroll for 50 countries and territories, plus additional modular solutions for time, benefits, and HR service delivery.
Talent and learning: Skills gaps and talent shortages have been persistent challenges that continue to exist across all industries. Addressing them starts with an understanding of skills that currently exist, followed by pathways for employees to find new opportunities, learn new skills, and access mentors and feedback. The talent intelligence hub across SAP SuccessFactors solutions uses AI to continuously help organizations and employees understand their skills and match people with personalized career pathways.
A modern user experience: Every person has unique needs and preferences – in how they work, how they communicate, and what’s required for their role. Along with a refreshed, modern user experience, we’ve built in generative AI capabilities throughout our solutions to help people work smarter. And with Joule, SAP’s copilot, they can quickly complete HR tasks and get conversational responses to their questions.
HR connected to ERP, finance, and more: Having access to people data connected across the business is critical to building agility, speed, and resilience within an organization. With the power of the broader SAP portfolio, organizations can improve end-to-end business processes across the entire business. This is also complemented with our partner ecosystem, which includes over 350 apps for HR.
We firmly believe that when organizations invest in their people – in their passions and potential – they return the investment over and over. And with the rapid acceleration of AI, it’s more important than ever to build pathways to employee growth, including new ways to upskill, reskill, and discover opportunities that align with a person’s skills, interests, and aspirations.
SAP Business AI, a groundbreaking collaboration between SAP and NVIDIA, is poised to revolutionize the way enterprises harness the power of data and generative AI across SAP’s extensive portfolio of cloud solutions and applications. The partnership aims to deliver scalable, business-specific generative AI capabilities within the Joule copilot from SAP and throughout SAP’s ecosystem, all […]
Visa, a global leader in digital payments, and Taulia, an SAP company and leading working capital management solutions provider, have announced a groundbreaking partnership to make embedded finance accessible to businesses worldwide via SAP business applications. The recently unveiled collaboration will seamlessly integrate Visa’s digital payments technology into Taulia Virtual Cards, a solution that works […]
Although women comprise about 35% of the workforce at SAP, when it comes to shaping AI it seems they are punching above their weight.
Here, five SAP employees share about their roles, motivations, and tips for anyone wanting to step into AI. The women – Khawla Mallat, Camila Lombana Diaz, Xin Chen, Nadine Hoffmann, and Puntis Palazzolo – span four countries and three areas: Data Science Engineering, Product Management, and AI Ethics.
SAP Business AI: Revolutionary technology, real-world results
Dr. Khawla Mallat, Security and Quantum Exploration Team, SAP France
“Be ready to be challenged all times,” says Mallat, if you want to build a career in AI.
Unlike most data scientists at SAP, Mallat does not work directly on the product but is firmly anchored in researching and addressing “some of the technical challenges related to AI, namely fairness, explainability, privacy, and security.”
Photo courtesy of Khawla Mallat
Prior to joining SAP two years ago, Mallat was confronted with the unintended prejudices of face analysis systems. Certain demographic groups, explains Mallat, used to be inadvertently omitted or underrepresented in the underlying data sets, leading to shortcomings in the face analysis capabilities. Such cases highlight the broader issue of bias in other AI applications. In areas like HR, she continues, removing personal details in data sets might seem to solve the bias issues, but AI can still infer these details. This leads to potentially biased outcomes and the lack of explainability in AI models makes identification of such biases difficult. Letting data sets like this take root and grow into powerful data models not subject to scrutiny will only magnify the inherent bias or discrimination.
Today Mallat’s passion for addressing such unfairness aligns well with her role of identifying the inherent risks of AI, educating teams about them, and defining technological solutions to mitigate them.
“We need to adopt an interdisplinary approach to AI, with experts from ethics, legal compliance, and domain experts, for example, and abstract ourselves from the role of data scientists to succeed,” says Mallat.
“I love working in AI,” she continues. “Everything is progressing at an incredible pace so if you want to work in AI, you have to have a certain thirst for knowledge. And, regardless of your role, you must take AI ethics – regulations and regulatory frameworks – seriously because these have huge implications not only for SAP but for individuals and societies in general.”
AI Ethics
Camila Lombana Diaz, Responsible AI, Germany
“AI is a mirror of our capacities as humans. And the biggest responsibility for those working in AI is, what do we want to see in that mirror?” explains Lombana Diaz, AI ethics research expert in the AI Ethics/Responsible AI team located in the SAP Business AI growth area.
Lombana Diaz’s responsibilities include maturing and applying the SAP AI Global Ethics policy, creating and delivering enablement content, defining AI personas and processes, and giving guidance to make responsible AI an operational reality for development, as exemplified in SAP’s AI ethics handbook.
Photo courtesy of Camila Lombana Diaz
When she joined SAP eight years ago, initially as a UX designer and then a strategic designer, machine learning and AI were core topics. But it became increasingly clear to her that “understanding the human implications of AI for a responsible and ethical AI demands a human-centric perspective.”
Even though SAP is committed to the ethical development of AI – developers must now complete AI ethics assessment tasks and a steering committee scrutinizes all high-risk use cases – Lombana Diaz emphasizes the need to remain focused on the inherent risks and unintentional harms that AI may present. Part of her role is an ongoing assessment of the technology, identifying risks and limitations and communicating them to different teams.
As AI continues to evolve at speed, so do the roles. Lombana Diaz is passionate about seeing AI beyond the confines of a technology-centric perspective. “AI is now an omnipresent technology shaping our daily lives; hence, we need individuals working in the field who challenge AI technology to be community centric. AI ethics is a space for experimental, open, curious, collaborative, and human-centered individuals,” and, she concludes, “the time to step into AI and build a career is now because, unlike the technology, the business of AI, the legal and ethical aspects, are still being shaped.”
Data Science Engineering
Dr. Xin Chen, SAP HANA Machine Learning, China
“I have always enjoyed working at SAP since joining nine years ago. I like the work environment and the colleagues here and I really want to encourage others to join us here in AI,” says Chen, data science researcher on the SAP HANA Machine Learning team.
Photo courtesy of Dr. Xin Chen
The team works on a toolbox providing different kinds of machine learning algorithms for regression, classification, clustering, and so on for the SAP HANA predictive analysis library.
Part of Chen’s role is investigating research papers on the latest machine learning algorithms and, together with the team, deciding which algorithms would be beneficial to customers. Once the machine learning algorithms are implemented, Chen and the team evaluate feedback from customers and deliver enhancements.
Recently Chen and her team researched machine learning algorithms investigating notions of fairness. “Fairness is a very hot topic just now,” she says. “In mathematics, there are different notions of fairness, but it is still a complex and evolving topic.”
And Chen’s advice to would-be AI developers? “Critical thinking will become even more important to understand what solutions to offer, to make judgements on your own innovations, and to know if the generated output is right or wrong,” she says, reflecting on how this skill will become ever more important for future AI developers.
Product Management
Nadine Hoffmann, SAP Business AI, Germany
“I translate and I want to fascinate,” says Hoffmann, global AI product manager in the SAP Business AI growth area.
Even after more than 20 years at SAP, disruptive ideas and mindset shifts still energize Hoffmann. To be an expert in new technologies, and to be energized and enthused by the constant volume and speed of them, is critical to being successful in the AI product management teams of today because product management is the glue between partners, customers, the field, and development.
Photo courtesy of Nadine Hoffmann
“On the one hand,” says Hoffmann, “SAP has data scientists, software engineers, and researchers taking our software to the next level. And on the other, there are experts defining the legal and ethical guardrails.” Product management must be fluent in both “technical software speak” and “customer speak” to understand desires, pain points, and business processes.
Pivoting between these and aligning customer speak with technical software speak is akin to being a translator, Hoffmann says. Our software will only meet the requirements of customers if there is a common understanding between the teams responsible for the technological development, the legal teams responsible for ethical and legal compliance, and the customer.
Regardless of the latest innovation, Hoffmann says success in product management is “not only about convincing teams and partners about the ease and positiveness of a technology, but also infusing them with a fascination about it so that they become passionate advocates and are intrinsically motivated to find out more by themselves.”
Data Science Engineering
Puntis Palazzolo, AI Strategist & Ethics Lead, SAP SuccessFactors, U.S.
“The ethical challenges presented by AI have transcended the scope of individual enterprises, extending beyond entities like SAP. It is crucial that we collaborate with others to collectively address AI’s emerging concerns,” says Palazzolo, who leads the SAP SuccessFactors Data Science team.
The team acts as a consulting service on AI use cases for product teams in SAP SuccessFactors, analyzing the problem, developing code and algorithms, and building proof-of-concepts. Successful AI use cases are then integrated into SAP SuccessFactors solutions.
Photo courtesy of Puntis Palazzolo
Much of the data in SAP SuccessFactors solutions is sensitive customer data. With the dramatic increase in generative AI use cases, safeguarding customer data must take precedence, Palazzolo says. “Generative AI is a powerful technology that introduces new challenges, such as hallucinations and automated decision-making. In high-risk sectors like HR, we need to explain how we reach certain decisions, especially when we are impacting people’s lives.”
Palazzolo joined SAP 11 years ago and has been based in Palo Alto, California, since 2013, where she represents SAP on MLCommons – a collaboration of academia and companies, such as Google and NVIDIA, dedicated to developing safe practices and industry-standard benchmarks to improve AI models.
Her advice to current and would-be AI practitioners? Follow your passion, be ethical, and make your voice heard while we still have time.
“Legislators alone cannot write AI regulations for us because they do not have a full understanding of its complexities,” she says. “We cannot solve all the problems by ourselves, but we must make our voices heard to shape the future of AI.”
WALLDORF — SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) today announced that Deutsche Telekom, one of the world’s leading integrated telecommunications companies, has chosen the RISE with SAP solution to accelerate its journey to the cloud.
RISE with SAP: Improve compliance and build business resilience in a managed cloud offering
Deutsche Telekom is the first enterprise to implement RISE with SAP through SAP’s recently expanded partnership with T-Systems as a premium supplier of RISE with SAP, marking a significant milestone in the relationship between SAP and Deutsche Telekom.
As Europe’s largest telecommunications provider, with more than 252 million mobile customers, 25 million fixed-network lines and 22 million broadband lines, Deutsche Telekom operates in more than 50 countries. Aligned with the company’s vision to be the leading digital telecommunications provider in the world, Deutsche Telekom has chosen RISE with SAP to transform a major part of its ERP landscape to SAP S/4HANA Cloud. As a premium supplier of RISE with SAP, T-Systems will migrate, consolidate and manage more than 300 systems into the public and private cloud using T-Systems’ Future Cloud Infrastructure (FCI) and select hyperscalers. This is designed to enable customers to meet all German and European data protection requirements, as well as to benefit from tailored migration and orchestration of complex landscapes.
Peter Leukert, chief information officer of Deutsche Telekom, said, “SAP is a trusted and important partner for Deutsche Telekom in both reliably running core business processes and accelerating innovation in the cloud. Through RISE with SAP, we can drive business transformation and take our partnership to new heights. With SAP S/4HANA Cloud, Deutsche Telekom will be able to drive efficiency across key business functions such as logistics, procurement and finance.”
“Deutsche Telekom’s decision to select RISE with SAP to migrate and streamline more than 300 of their systems to the cloud marks an important milestone in their business transformation and continues a long history of our two companies innovating together for our customers,” said Scott Russell, member of the executive board of SAP SE, customer success. “This investment by Deutsche Telekom will give them new capabilities, drive greater efficiencies, and allow them to access key insights from across their enterprise so they can adjust to changing market conditions and seize new opportunities faster than they could before. We look forward to supporting Deutsche Telekom in this exciting new era of their cloud transformation.”
As a premium supplier of RISE with SAP, T-Systems offers “Thrive with T-Systems,” a collection of end-to-end transformation services that includes consulting, migration, implementation and operation of RISE with SAP and support for RISE with SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition.
SAP’s strategy is to help every business run as an intelligent, sustainable enterprise. As a market leader in enterprise application software, we help companies of all sizes and in all industries run at their best: SAP customers generate 87% of total global commerce. Our machine learning, Internet of Things (IoT), and advanced analytics technologies help turn customers’ businesses into intelligent enterprises. SAP helps give people and organizations deep business insight and fosters collaboration that helps them stay ahead of their competition. We simplify technology for companies so they can consume our software the way they want – without disruption. Our end-to-end suite of applications and services enables business and public customers across 26 industries globally to operate profitably, adapt continuously, and make a difference. With a global network of customers, partners, employees, and thought leaders, SAP helps the world run better and improve people’s lives. For more information, visit www.sap.com.
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In an ever-changing global landscape, businesses must be prepared to navigate shifts and changes while keeping their operations running smoothly. Recent years have seen a series of events that have underscored the critical importance of resilient supply chains. Rather than being caught off guard by these challenges, companies need to equip themselves with the right tools and strategies to not only adapt but thrive in uncertain times. Collaboration within a business network has emerged as a key solution for addressing these challenges and increasing resilience.
Supply chain resiliency has become a critical factor for businesses across industries. According to a recent IDC white paper, sponsored by SAP, titled “Enabling an Adaptive Supply Chain: Multi-Enterprise Business Networks and Supplier Collaboration,”* companies must develop a new level of resilience in their supply chains. This involves adapting operating models and gaining a true end-to-end understanding of supply chains. Outdated approaches to communicating and transacting with trading partners lead to issues related to visibility, compliance, and efficiency. SAP Business Network can provide a modern approach to digitally connecting people, processes, and systems with trading partners, revolutionizing supply chain collaboration. It can enable companies to adapt to changes more quickly and easily, ultimately helping them to meet customer expectations and comply with regulations.
SAP Business Network: A Solution for Visibility, Efficiency, and Compliance
In today’s complex business landscape, companies face numerous challenges that impede visibility, efficiency, and compliance. Outdated tools, siloed systems, and point-to-point connections often result in broken connections and fragmented insights into the supply chain. Collaborating with contract manufacturers or subcontractors becomes difficult, and identifying new or alternate sources of supply quickly is a challenge. Moreover, complying with new or existing regulations can be a daunting task.
To address these challenges, SAP Business Network offers a solution that can enable companies to overcome these obstacles and achieve their goals. It can provide a range of capabilities to help enhance visibility, efficiency, and compliance across the supply chain, and helps them be more resilient.
The largest and most comprehensive business network, trusted by millions of companies around the world
One of the key features of SAP Business Network is its ability to enable digital document and data exchange with trading partners based on automated business rules. This includes the seamless routing of various line of business documents, such as invoices and orders, as well as shipping confirmations, work orders, and quality notifications. By automating business rules and supporting multi-party scenarios, such as working with contract manufacturers or subcontractors, the network can improve efficiency and streamline processes as well as help ensure compliance with regulations. Additionally, SAP Business Network can support onboarding and system-to-system integration, helping to ensure seamless connectivity with various communication standards like EDI, cXML, and Peppol. It also offers interoperability with third-party systems and networks, working to further enhance the connectivity and integration capabilities.
The network can also provide intuitive dashboards and apps that can offer visibility into the status of orders and shipments. This helps companies track and trace batches and serial numbers, facilitating the resolution of quality issues in products when they occur. By leveraging these dashboards and apps, businesses can proactively manage their operations, improve decision-making, and enhance overall efficiency.
Furthermore, SAP Business Network includes a trading partner directory that allows suppliers to create and manage company profiles. These profiles can be viewed by buying companies, providing them with valuable insights into potential suppliers. The directory also incorporates environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ratings from EcoVadis, enabling buying companies to choose suppliers aligned with their sustainability goals. Additionally, the trading partner directory enables buyers to search for suppliers, facilitating the identification of new or alternate sources of supply. This capability can not only enhance supply chain resilience but can also present opportunities for cost savings, diversification, and innovation.
According to a recent IDC MarketScape report, SAP is recognized as a leader in the worldwide multi-enterprise supply chain commerce network market.** The scale and reach of the network, with annual commerce reaching US$5.3 trillion and 746 million B2B transactions in 2023, make it a valuable tool for helping expand supplier bases and enter new markets.
Supply Chain Collaboration in Action
SAP Business Network is trusted by millions of companies across 190 countries. One of these companies is Vestas, a leading wind turbine manufacturer. Vestas has implemented SAP Business Network and SAP Ariba solutions to address quality control issues and streamline its complex global supply chain. With over 10,000 individual parts sourced from suppliers worldwide, Vestas relies on the B2B platform of SAP Business Network to collaborate with suppliers, track orders, and ensure quality standards are met. The network allows Vestas to conduct quality tests, document them, and take corrective action if needed. It also provides transparency and an audit trail in case of quality defects or incidents. By leveraging SAP solutions, Vestas has improved supply chain efficiency, reduced friction losses, and advanced its sustainability goals.
Another customer that has benefited from SAP Business Network is Richemont, a global luxury goods company. Richemont has utilized the network to establish seamless collaboration with suppliers and partners, streamlining its supply chain operations. By leveraging real-time data exchange and visibility provided by SAP Business Network, Richemont has been able to proactively manage inventory, optimize production planning, and respond swiftly to market demands. This has significantly enhanced the company’s supply chain resilience and enabled it to deliver exceptional luxury products to customers with efficiency and agility.
These success stories highlight the power of collaboration and technology in building resilient supply chains. SAP Business Network can provide the platform for companies to connect, collaborate, and exchange critical data, enabling them to navigate disruptions with resilience.
Leveraging Technology to Strengthen Your Supply Chain
In a world where disruptions are expected and circumstances tend to change, building resilience in supply chains is crucial for the success of businesses. The ability to adapt and thrive in the face of uncertainty requires collaboration, transparency, and efficiency. SAP Business Network offers a comprehensive solution that can enable companies to achieve these goals.
