What is SAP

SAP stands for Systeme, Anwendungen, Produkte in der Datenverarbeitung or in english ' Systems, Applications, and Products in Data Processing'.

SAP is the leading Enterprise Information and Management Package worldwide. Use of this package makes it possible to track and manage, in real-time, sales, production, finance accounting and human resources in an enterprise.

SAP is the third-largest software company in the world. Founded in 1972, The company now employs more than 22,000 people in more than 50 countries. SAP global headquarters are located in Walldorf, Germany, and the company is listed on several stock exchanges, including the Frankfurt DAX and the New York Stock Exchange, under the symbol "SAP."

SAP America is a subsidiary of SAP AG, the recognized leader in providing collaborative, inter-enterprise software and e-business solutions. A truly global software provider, SAP AG has more than 1000 partners, 22 industry solutions and 10 million users at 30,000 installations around the world. SAP America has contributed significantly to this leadership position, and it is the foremost provider of e-business and enterprise software in the United States.

Why use SAP ?

SAP software was developed to be modular, scaleable, open and flexible, allowing companies to tailor it specifically to their needs. SAP calls this approach to implementing software "configure to order" because each implementation will be different according to each customer's needs.

But SAP solutions don't stop there. Information integration is a major tenet of the SAP philosophy, and SAP places great emphasis on the creation of tools that facilitate it. SAP provides integration tools and methods for linking legacy and distributed systems as well as a host of third party software solutions, to get your information into the right hands, internally and externally.

Solution from Traditional approachTraditional Information technology systems used by many business today have been developed to accomplish some specific task and provide reports and analysis of events that have already taken place. Examples are accounting general ledger systems. Occasionally, some systems operate in a "real-time" mode that is, have up to date information in them and can be used to actually control events. A typical company has many separate systems to manage different processes like production, sales and accounting. Each of these systems has its own databases and seldom passes information to other systems in a timely manner.

SAP takes a different approach. There is only one information system in an enterprise, SAP. All applications access common data. Real events in the business initiate transactions. Accounting is done automatically by events in sales and production. Sales can see when products can be delivered. Production schedules are driven by sales. The whole system is designed to be real-time and not historical.

SAP structure embodies what are considered the "best business practices". A company implementing SAP adapts it operations to it to achieve its efficiencies and power.

The process of adapting procedures to the SAP model involves "Business Process Re-engineering" which is a logical analysis of the events and relationships that exist in an enterprise's operations.

Multiple country implementation

Comprehensive multi-currency translation Multiple language support Customized reporting and document generation for individual countries Multi-company support Local support in most major industrialized countries Country specific functionality

Flexibility

Customers can customize business modules to realize best business practices System provides necessary interfaces to incorporate external software. Scalability, accommodates acquisitions and growth System can be configured the way you want to do business in the future Allows customized screens processing and reports System runs on multiple hardware platforms

Enterprise-Wide IntegrationEnterprise-wide integration is the main functionality of SAP R/3 System. No other application software offers the breadth of open systems, client/server functionality, functional links between processes that multiply the power of each person's work. The R/3 System's components are fully integrated. Once you enter data, it resides in the central database shared by all R/3 components. Transaction-related process chains trigger the next activity as needed from engineering to production planning to sales and distribution. The R/3 System's full integration pulls your enterprise together, promoting data access, flexibility, and productivity. Real-Time InformationSAP provides up-to-the-minute, real-time information.

Architecture

SAP R/3 system is based on Client/Server architecture that is comprised of three tiers:

Presentation server: Your local PC that has SAPGUI.

Application server: The application server is used to run the business application programs in the R/3 client/server concept. The application modules are loaded from the data base server to the application server as required. Thus the application server requires only storage capacity to accommodate UNIX, Swapping and the SAP runtime environment.

Database server: The data base server stores the SAP application programs and data in the R/3 client/server concept. It also handles the SAP update program and batch jobs.

SAP Application Modules

SAP has several layers. The Basis System is the heart of the data operations and should be not evident to higher level or managerial users. Other customizing and implementation tools exist also. The heart of the system from a manager's viewpoint are the application modules. These modules may not all be implemented in a typical company but they are all related and are listed below:

FI Financial Accounting

CO ControllingAM Asset ManagementPS Project SystemWF Workflow IS Industry SolutionsHR Human ResourcesPM PlantMaintenanceMM Materials ManagementQM Quality ManagementPP Production PlanningSD Sales and Distribution

Financial Accounting -- is designed for automated management and external reporting of general ledger, accounts receivable, accounts payable and other sub-ledger accounts with a user defined chart of accounts. As entries are made relating to sales production and payments journal entries are automatically posted. This connection means that the "books" are designed to reflect the real situation. Controlling -- represents the company's flow of cost and revenue. It is a management instrument for organizational decisions. It too is automatically updated as events occur.Asset Management--is designed to manage and supervise individual aspects of fixed assets including purchase and sale of assets, depreciation and investment management.Project System -- is designed to support the planning, control and monitoring of long-term, highly complex projects with defined goals.Workflow -- links the integrated SAP application modules with cross-application technologies, tools and servicesIndustry Solutions -- combines the SAP application modules and additional industry-specific functionality. Special techniques have been developed for industries such as banking, oil and gas, pharmaceuticals, etc. Human Resources -- is a complete integrated system for supporting the planning and control of personnel activities. Plant Maintenance--In a complex manufacturing process maintenance means more than sweeping the floors. Equipment must be services and rebuilt. These tasks affect the production plans. Materials Management--supports the procurement and inventory functions occurring in day-to-day business operations such as purchasing, inventory management, reorder point processing, etc. Quality Management--is a quality control and information system supporting quality planning, inspection, and control for manufacturing and procurement.Production Planning--is used to plan and control the manufacturing activities of a company. This module includes; bills of material, routings, work centers, sales and operations planning, master production scheduling, material requirements planning, shop floor control, production orders, product costing, etcSales and Distribution--helps to optimize all the tasks and activities carried out in sales, delivery and billing. Key elements are; pre-sales support, inquiry processing, quotation processing, sales order processing, delivery processing, billing and sales information system.

SAP Glossary

GUI (Graphic User Interface)A graphical interface used by SAP environment as part of the three tiers. Also known as frontend.

IMG  (Implementation Management Guide)It is a hierarchical structure that reflects the R/3 component hierarchy and contains every configuration activity. Released from version 3.0 onwards.

InstanceIt means application server and each one has its own set of work processes.

SysIDA set of three letters or number that identify a system. Some sets are not allowed because they are used by SAP. They are informed when the system is installed.

ITS (Internet Transaction Server)It links the R/3 application server with one or more Web servers, thus enabling the R/3 to communicate with the Internet.

OSS (Online Service System)SAP's Online Service System offers fast and effective help for R/3 System problems. It is also the basic element of communications between customers, partners, and SAP.

RFC (Remote Function Call)A way to implement communication between application programs via Abap/4 function call.

IDoc (Intermediate Document)An IDoc is a data container for data exchange between SAP systems or between an SAP system and an external system.

Archiving – SAP’s terminology for the functionality that purges transactions and master data from the SAP database. The SAP literature states that archived data can be restored to the production system. For practical purposes however, this is not recommended.

DART – An acronym for Data Archiving and Retention Tool. This is SAP functionality which allows you to periodically extract and retain data from your R/3 system. The data is extracted into a sequential file. DART provides tools for viewing the retained data in different ways. 

Legal Data – As used in this document, this refers to the requirements imposed by the IRS, State tax authorities and other tax authorities for the long-term retention of business data to support taxes paid and other legal requirements.

Operational Data – As used in this document, this refers to the requests from customers, vendors or employees for business data.

Management Data – As used in this document, this refers to data that is used by management for business decisions.

SAP Hardware Platforms

The SAP R/2 system that was released in 1979 runs on mainframes like IBM, BS 2000 ( Seimens machines ) or Amdahl. The next version, SAP R/3 client/server software system has been designed for open systems like UNIX. SAP has established a partnership with IBM which provides a wide choice of servers, operating systems and databases for implementing R/3. These servers provide scalability, performance, high availability and investment protection needed to support a successful R/3 implementation. Some of IBM's server and database offerings include:

RS/6000 for UNIX , AS/400 Advanced Series for integrated server and database platform, PC servers for reliable Microsoft NT solutions, S/390 database servers and DB2 family for database support. IBM Netfinity 7000 and IBM PC Server 330 and 704 provide the reliable foundation you need for SAP R/3 applications for Microsoft NT. The platforms offered by IBM provide latest Pentium Pro technology, Ultra fast throughput, Storage flexibility and upgradable system components.

SAP R/3 runs on a variety of databases such as Oracle, Informix, Online, ADABAS-A, DB2 for Unix, DB/400, Microsoft SQL Server 6 and on an experimental version on DB2 for MVS.

SAP R/3 is based on various hardware and software architectures. It scales very well on SMP systems and MPP architectures. The latest version of R 4.1 which is still in the developmental stage provides the Internet compatible business application package.

Hardware Partners

Since there are so many different platforms available in today's market, compatibility between SAP and the customer's platform, Hardware partners play a very important role. Hardware partners are leading hardware vendors who provide the computing hardware necessary to meet a customer's system requirements. Working with both SAP and customers, hardware partners continually develop and optimize products to meet the running business applications with SAP software. Hardware partners have developed organizations to provide strong SAP support, from product selection to system set-up, installation and ongoing performance tuning. Some of the hardware partners are Amdahl, IBM, Bull, NCR, Compaq, NEC, Data General, Sequent, Dell, Tandem, Digital, Siemens Nixdorf, Fujitsu, Sun, Hewlett-Packard, Sun, Unisys, Hitachi and Intergraph.

SAP Skills that are in demand (USA market)

After the September 11 tragedy, the job market has been very bad. Lot of recruiters are  taking undue advantage of the market situation by offering unimaginable rates.  Many existing SAP clients have been holding on to new projects for various reasons and consultants who have been waiting for new projects for a while are now ready to get into any project at the recruiters terms and conditions. Besides market condition is forcing many consulting companies (big or small) to terminate their full time employees immediately after their current project is over. These are employees who have been serving these companies for a long period of time and is now facing termination any time. 

Independent consultants and full time employees of consulting companies that were laid off recently are the worst to suffer, they do not even have the option to get a full time job, because there are none available and/or there is a freeze on hiring in lot of companies. 

The good news is, there are still lot of on-going projects that are paying standard SAP rates of around $100 to $175$/hour to experienced consultants. Also, some clients are now upgrading to new version successfully with the help of in-house staff, independent consultants and small or mid-size consulting companies, a trend many project managers think will become a common practice. Benefits include, low cost and on-time implementation, client driven project and active participation of employees. 

Key for survival in today's market  is to gain experience in many areas of SAP, rather than specializing in one thing. Some of the new job requirements are in areas that was not implemented before, for e.g.. Travel & Expenses in HR module.  

 

Skills that are still in demand

Functional consultants: Experienced functional consultants in any module will always be in demand for a long time.  The hourly rates are expected to be in the range of $65 to $110/hour.

ABAP programmers: This skill has lost good market value but will continue to be around forever because of  changes done to existing projects and new developments. Demand for HR ABAP programmers have vanished. Programmers with experience in multiple modules, ESS,  SAP Script, BAPI, RFC etc. will continue to be in demand.  The hourly rates are expected to be in the range of $45 to $90/hour.

Human Resource (HR): Specialized knowledge of Travel and Expenses module, Recruitment, Tax configuration, extremely good Payroll functional consultants are still in good demand. Other areas of HR, like ABAP programming, Payroll, Time, PA & PD have lost demand, due to very less HR projects and more consultants available in the market.

BASIS consultants: Consultants that have good experience in upgrading new versions, UNIX or Windows NT skill and database administration will be in demand. 

APO (Supply chain) 

Business Warehouse (BW): many were thinking BW will be the next hot skill. Due to weakness in economy and tools created by third party,  this module has not picked up like expected.

Skills that has good potential

Project Management: Customers that are planning to upgrade will need experienced Project Managers & Team leaders to drive the project from scoping and planning all the way through implementation. There are few good project managers that can plan the entire project within the planned budget and implement the project successfully. Once upgrade picks up in full swing, there will be lot of demand for project management skills.

Human Resource (HR): SAP 46X version of HR is very user friendly and has many added functionalities. Once the market picks up, HR functional and technical analyst will be in demand. Because of slowing economy, there is not much upgrade activity in the market. Good payroll and time functional consultants will continue to be in demand. Once upgrade market improves, HR technical consultants will also have good demand. The other area in HR that has not be fully explored in Tax reporting. Companies can hire good tax reporter configurator and save money that is spent on third party vendors.

ALE: Very few consultants get opportunity to do ALE, so there is still shortage of expert ALE consultants. This skill will continue to be hot.

Sales Force Automation implementation IS-industry skills

 

Modules that may not provide better rates due to more supply of consultants

All modules in general

HR ABAP & Functional SAP Workplace

SAP Overview

What is SAP? SAP (Systems, Applications, and Products in Data Processing) is the leading ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) software package. SAP was the first to integrate a corporation's worldwide functions tightly into one application. Five former IBM programmers founded SAP AG in Germany, and released the first version of their software, SAP R/2, in 1979. Its domination of the market occurred during the 1980s, expanding first throughout Europe (early 1980s) and then North America (1988). SAP R/3, an advanced, client-server based version of the popular R/2 product, was released in 1992 and sparked a stunning takeover of America's largest businesses — 44% of US companies were using it within five years of its expansion.[1] In 1999, SAP introduced its newest major product upgrade. Named mySAP.com to emphasize its shift to an e- business focus, mySAP.com builds on the strengths of the SAP R/3 product in a fully Internet enabled architecture. MySAP.com also incorporates SAP's newest business applications for CRM, Supply Chain Management (SAP APO), and Data Warehousing (Business Information Warehouse or BW). Prior to the introduction of mySAP.com, these applications had been incorporated as add-ons to SAP R/3 and were known as New Dimension products.[2]

A Unique Software Approach Companies both large and small traditionally utilized multiple software applications from various vendors or developed their own applications in-house to process their critical business transactions. Prior to the proliferation of SAP, most companies supported a full staff of program developers who wrote their necessary business applications from scratch or developed highly complicated interfaces to allow pre-packaged applications from several vendors to pass data back and forth as necessary to complete any full cycle business transaction. This process was extremely costly, time-consuming, and error prone. It also made it very difficult for business managers and executives to get a timely, comprehensive view of how their business was doing at any given time. SAP was the first and, to date, the most successful company to integrate nearly all business processes into one software solution for use in any business in any country in the world. Not only did SAP's applications reduce the need for complex and redundant in-house development, but it also created new business efficiencies by automating many tasks across a corporation and incorporating business' best practices into each updated version of its software.

Using SAP's products, companies can now integrate their accounting, sales, distribution, manufacturing, planning, purchasing, human resources, analysis and other transactions into one application. SAP applications thus provide an environment where "transactions are synchronized throughout the entire systems, meaning a sales-order entry triggers action's within each application that relates and is relevant to the transaction." [3]

Competitors Although SAP is recognized as the ERP market leader, several competitors have found their footing in this arena. Oracle, perhaps SAP's most significant competitor, has set its sites on SAP's prestigious ERP leadership position. Other competitors include PeopleSoft, JD Edwards, and a range of mid-market ERP vendors who all provide similar packaged ERP applications.

SAP Company Timeline

1972: SAP AG founded in Germany 1979: SAP R/2 introduced for mainframe computers 1980s: Europe and N. American expansion 1992: SAP R/3 released as client-server application 1996: SAP R/3 becomes partially Internet enabled 1997: Develops and launches New Dimension product line including CRM, SCM

and Data Warehousing solutions

1999: SAP announces mySAP.com, the next generation of its Enterprise Application system based on an Internet architecture [4]

SAP - The Basics SeriesArticle 1

Who and/or what is SAP? How popular is it? Wow!(Updated July 2002)

SAP the company was founded in Germany in 1972 by five ex-IBM engineers. In case you’re ever asked, SAP stands for Systeme, Andwendungen, Produkte in der Datenverarbeitung which - translated to English - means Systems, Applications, Products in Data Processing. So now you know! Being incorporated in Germany, the full name of the parent company is SAP AG. It is located in Walldorf, Germany which is close to the beautiful town of Heidelberg. SAP has subsidiaries in over 50 countries around the world from Argentina to Venezuela (and pretty much everything in between). SAP America (with responsibility for North America, South America and Australia - go figure!) is located just outside Philadelphia, PA.

The original five founders have been so successful that they have multiplied many times over such that SAP AG is now the third largest software maker in the world, with over 17,500 customers (including more than half of the world's 500 top companies). SAP employs over 27,000 people worldwide today, and had revenues of $7.34 billion and Net Income of $581 million in FY01. SAP is listed in Germany (where it is one of the 30 stocks which make up the DAX) and on the NYSE (ticker:SAP). 

There are now 44,500 installations of SAP, in 120 countries, with more then 10 million users!

So what made this company so successful? Back in 1979 SAP released SAP R/2 (which runs on mainframes) into the German market. SAP R/2 was the first integrated, enterprise wide package and was an immediate success. For years SAP stayed within the German borders until it had penetrated practically every large German company. Looking for more growth, SAP expanded into the remainder of Europe during the 80's. Towards the end of the 80's, client-server architecture became popular and SAP responded with the release of SAP R/3 (in 1992). This turned out to be a killer app for SAP, especially in the North American region into which SAP expanded  in 1988.

The success of SAP R/3 in North America has been nothing short of stunning. Within a 5 year period, the North American market went from virtually zero to 44% of total SAP worldwide sales. SAP America alone employs more than 3,000 people and has added the names of many of the Fortune 500 to it’s customer list (8 of the top 10 semiconductor companies, 7 of the top 10 pharmaceutical companies etc). SAP today is available in 46 country-specific versions, incorporating 28 languages including Kanji and other double-byte character languages. SAP also comes in 21 industry-specific versions.

SAP R/3 is delivered to a customer with selected standard process turned on, and many many other optional processes and features turned off. At the heart of SAP R/3 are about 10,000 tables which control the way the processes are executed. Configuration is the process of adjusting the settings of these tables to get SAP to run the way you want it to. Think of a radio with 10,000 dials to tune and you’ll get the picture. Functionality included is truly enterprise wide including: Financial Accounting (e.g. general ledger, accounts receivable etc), Management Accounting (e.g. cost centers, profitability analysis etc), Sales, Distribution, Manufacturing, Production Planning, Purchasing, Human Resources, Payroll etc etc etc. For a full description of the modules

included in SAP, see the related articles. All of these modules are tightly integrated which – as you will find out – is a huge blessing ... but brings with it special challenges.

SAP are maintaining and increasing their dominance over their competitors through a combination of- embracing the internet with mySAP.com (a confusing name we believe) to head off i2 etc- extending their solutions with CRM to head off Siebel- adding functionality to their industry solutions

Article 2Who is it made for? Why might I need it?

We have all heard about the large (and very large) companies who have implemented (or are still busy implementing) SAP R/3. But SAP is gaining acceptance by smaller companies too.

There are many reasons a company selects and implements SAP – some are good and some are bad. The good ones include replacing an out-dated and inefficient IT Architecture (including the CIO’s nemesis … the burning platform), enabling business process change, and to gain competitive advantage. The bad ones are too numerous to go into here but would include the "why are we the only semiconductor company without SAP" question. More on the good reasons follows:

1. Replacing an out-dated and inefficient IT Architecture: In the beginning, computer systems were developed by individual departments to satisfy the requirements of that particular department. When someone finally realized that benefits could be had by linking these systems together, interface heaven was born. There are some companies today with literally thousands of interfaces, each of which needs to be maintained (assuming of course that there is someone around who understands how they work!). Sweeping them away and replacing them with an integrated system such as SAP can save much money in support. Of course, if you have a burning platform as well the question becomes even easier.

2. Enabling business process change – From the start, SAP was built on a foundation of process best practices. Although it sounds absurd, it is probably easier (and less expensive) to change your companies processes to adapt to SAP than the other way around. Many companies have reported good success from combining a SAP implementation with a BPR project.

3. Competitive advantage – The CFO types around have heard this old saying from the CIO types for many years now. The question still has to be asked … can you gain competitive advantage from implementing SAP? The answer, of course, depends on the company. It seems to us, however, that:

being able to accurately provide delivery promise dates for manufactured products (and meet them) doesn’t hurt ... and

being able to consolidate purchase decisions from around the globe and use that leverage when negotiating with vendors has gotta help … and

being able to place kiosks in stores where individual customers can enter their product specifications and then feed this data directly into it’s production planning process is pretty neat

etc etc

Ok. So you want SAP, you need SAP, you gotta have SAP.

Article 3How much does it cost? What will it take to implement it? Wow!

There is a defining moment in the journey of all companies on the road to SAP nirvana. This moment comes just after the company has concluded that it want’s SAP, it needs SAP, it’s gotta have SAP … then comes the question ‘so what does it take to implement it’?

This is the question which separates those who are ready from the wannabees.

Before being accused of being too negative, let me remind you that at the heart of every good business decision lies a cost benefit analysis. If this cannot be complete with a positive outcome, the initiative (whatever it is) should probably not be launched. Same goes for a SAP implementation.

Implementing SAP is expensive. No doubt about it. But the potential rewards can dwarf the costs (and have for many existing customers already). One customer reportedly made enough savings on the procurement of a single raw material to pay for the entire enterprise-wide SAP implementation! Of course these are hard to substantiate, but visit SAP’s website and take a look at the customer testimonials.

SAP sells it’s R/3 product on a ‘price per user basis’. The actual price is negotiated between SAP and the customer and therefore depends on numerous factors which include number of users and modules (and other factors which are present in any negotiation). You should check with SAP, but for a ballpark planning number you could do worse than starting with $4000 per user. There is also an annual support cost of about 10% which includes periodic upgrades. Again, check with SAP.

Then there is the implementation cost. Yowser. It is about now that you need to get the business case out again and remind yourself why you need to do this. The major drivers of the total implementation cost are the Timeframe, Resource Requirements and Hardware.

1. Timeframe - The absolute quickest implementation we have ever heard of is 45 days … but this was for a tiny company with very few users and no changes to the delivered SAP processes. At the other end of the scale you get the multi-nationals who are implementing SAP over 5 to 10 years. These are not necessarily failures … many of them are planned as successive global deployments (which seem to roll around the globe forever). Of course the really expensive ones are those we don’t hear about! For the most part, you should be able to get your (single instance) project completed in a 9 to 18 month period.

2. People – The smallest of SAP implementations can get done on a part-time basis without outside help. The largest swallow up hundreds of people (sometimes over a thousand) and include whole armies of consultants. This adds up fast. Again, get that business case out. The types of people you will need run the range from heavy duty techies to project managers.

3. Hardware – The smallest of SAP implementations probably use only three instances (boxes) … one for the production system, one for test, and one for development. The largest implementations have well over 100 instances, especially if they involve multiple parallel projects (otherwise known as a program).

Adding all this up, your SAP project can run anywhere from $400,000 to hundreds of millions of $$$’s. As you can see, SAP can be all things to all companies … so it’s best to talk to them (or your consulting firm) about your specific requirements.

Is there any help out there? What should I do next?Help From SAP AG

There is a ton of help available out there - depending on your companies budget and culture – to help you along your journey beginning with your strategy and ending up when you reach that hallowed (and sometimes distant) ground of post-implementation. This article concentrates on the help available from SAP AG. Article 5 discusses other sources of help.

SAP AG

As you read in article 1 of this series, SAP AG employs around 22,000 people. Although they re-organize as often as most other companies, you can think of them as being organized into the following four areas: Pre-Sales, Consulting, Training and Developers.

Pre-Sales. These are people with heavy-duty functional knowledge of one or more SAP modules and one or more industries. They give really excellent system demonstrations on particular areas of the system which – while thick with pre-sales features – are an extremely valuable source of information about SAP. I’m sure they have many other responsibilities as well, but if you can, get a demo from them. For an even more useful demo, ask if you can provide them with business process scenarios that are pertinent to your business or industry prior to the demo.

Consulting. While also knowledgeable in SAP (of course), these are mostly consulting types like those that can be found in the major consulting firms. Often a team will consist of consultants from SAP and a partner consulting firm and you will not know the difference. Expect them to have business process and/or industry knowledge in addition to detailed SAP knowledge. They are not readily available to non-customers as they are usually assigned to one or more customers. A good list of consulting partners is available in the links section of this website.

Training. In 1999 SAP opened up their training programs to non-customers and non-partners. This opens up a whole world of top-rate training programs at SAP’s facilities around the globe. These can be expensive, however, and up to three weeks are usually required to gain a sufficiently deep understanding of a particular module or subject. If you have lots of time and money, you could register for one of SAP’s ‘academies’ which are five-week crash courses (emphasis on crash … as in burn) in one of the following areas: FI/CO, MM/SD, and HR/ABAP. These end with an examination and 'certification' in your chosen area. More information on SAP training courses can be found on SAP’s website.

Developers. These heavy-duty techies are off limits to non-customers. Customers can sometimes get a message to them via the OSS system – which is an automated trouble ticket type system. If you ever actually see one, or have one on the phone, ask all the questions you can think of, as you may never have the chance again!

SAP AG Corporate OverviewJune 2000

3rd - SAP is the 3rd largest software company in the world

22,000 - Total number of people employed by SAP5,400 - Number of programmers employed by SAP

$5.240 billion - FY99 Revenue$550 million - FY99 Net Income

12,000 - Number of companies using SAP12,000,000 - Number of people using SAP120,000,000 - Total number of people in the 12,000 companies who are using SAP

28 - Number of languages supported by SAP46 - Number of country-specific versions of SAP22 - Number of industry-specific versions of SAP

1,000 - Number of pre-defined best practices contained in the SAP system10,000 - Number of tables requiring configuration in a full SAP implementation

55,000 - Number of SAP experienced consultants worldwide

28 - Number of years ago SAP was started

5 - Number of people who started SAP

SAP Modules and Solutions Overview(November 2002)

In the past when people were discussing SAP, the conversation very quickly boiled down to modules, for example:

SAP’s courses were structured along module lines so that you would attend MM 101, 102 and 103. While at the course you would learn many things about MM, but not much about the rest of the SAP system and how MM fits into it. 

A conversation with a SAP recruiter might go something like this:

Recruiter … “which modules do you work with?”Candidate … “well, I have a lot of purchasing process experience”Recruiter … “yes, but which modules do you work with?”Candidate … “well, it’s purchasing functionality … so that would be, umm, MM, FI and CO

mainly”Recruiter … “great I have just the job for you”Candidate … “fantastic, is it purchasing?”Recruiter … “well it says here that they want an MM, FI and CO person and that’s you,

right?”Not necessarily! A MM, FI, CO role might include Inventory Management (MM), Accounts Receivable (FI) and Profitability Analysis (CO) – none of which a purchasing person is guaranteed to have

Many programme teams were organised along module lines, so that you would have a FI/CO, an MM and a HR team, for example. Training courses were (therefore) often prepared and delivered along module lines too. The result of this was that solutions were frequently optimised along module lines, and less often well integratred, and as for users, well, they were pretty much trained up in a module and left to get on with it post go-live. Fortunately those days are mostly passed, and more and more programmes (from design to build to training) are being organised along process lines such as:

Order to Cash (including parts of SD, FI-AR and probably TY as well)

Purchase to Pay (including MM-Purchasing and FI-AP)

Record to Report (FI-GL etc)

SAP now are moving away from describing their system as a set of modules, and now are using the term ‘solutions’, which is much better. If you visit SAP’s website (as we urge you to do) you will find that they have structured their Solutions tab as follows:

Financials Human Resources

Customer Relationship Management

Supplier Relationship Management

Product Lifecycle Management

Supply Chain Management

Business Intelligence

We think that this is a quite intuitive way of breaking it down, and a big leap forward for SAP. Of course, most recently (this year) SAP have unveiled their latest initiative which is Xapps – but that is the subject of a yet to be written article (as soon as we understand it ourselves, that is).If you’re still looking for that list of modules, here they are:FI Financial Accounting – essentially your regulatory ‘books of record’, including

General ledger Book close

Tax

Accounts receivable

Accounts payable

Consolidation

Special ledgers

CO Controlling – basically your internal cost/management accounting, including

Cost elements Cost centres

Profit centres

Internal orders

Activity based costing

Product costing

AM Asset Management – track, value and depreciate your assets, including

Purchase Sale

Depreciation

Tracking

PS Project Systems – manage your projects, large and small, including

Make to order Plant shut downs (as a project)

Third party billing (on the back of a project)

HR Human Resources – ah yes, people, including

Employment history Payroll

Training

Career management

Succession planning

PM Plant Maintenance – maintain your equipment (e.g. a machine, an oil rig, an aircraft etc), including

Labour Material

Down time and outages

MM Materials Management – underpins the supply chain, including

Requisitions Purchase orders

Goods receipts

Accounts payable

Inventory management

BOM’s

Master raw materials, finished goods etc

QM Quality Management – improve the quality of your goods, including

Planning Execution

Inspections

Certificates

PP Production Planning – manages your production process, including

Capacity planning Master production scheduling

Material requirements planning

Shop floor

SD Sales and Distribution – from order to delivery, including

RFQ Sales orders

Pricing

Picking (and other warehouse processes)

Packing

Shipping

CA Cross Application – these lie on top of the individual modules, and include

WF – workflow BW – business information warehouse

Office – for email

Workplace

Industry solutions

New Dimension products such as CRM, PLM, SRM, APO etc

15 Things You Need To Know About mySAP.com1. What is mySAP.com?

In SAP's words "mySAP.com is an open collaborative business environment of personalized solutions on demand"

2. Ok, really now. What is mySAP.com?In our words, mySAP.com is actually a collection of three things.a) The Marketplace is a website where buyers and sellers can register themselves, and then buy and sell from each other.b) The Workplace is a piece of software which sits on your desktop, and allows you (after ity is setup correctly) to gain access to all of the systems you use in your company. It is, naturally, tightly integrated with both SAP and the Marketplace.c) mySAP.com is also the umbrella name for all of SAP's internet-enabled applications.

3. What is SAP's competitive advantage over other e-Business vendors?In a word, integration - especially for SAP's 20,000 customers. SAP have termed it "three-dimensional integration"

4. What is "three-dimensional integration"?a) Integration of core business systems within an organization - front-end to back-endb) Seamless flow of data between two organizations who transact with each otherc) Ability for participants in an industry to use any systems, and still communicate with other participants in that industry

5. Does the Marketplace exist now?Yes. It can be visited at www.mysap.com.

6. Is the Workplace available now?Yes. It was available 3rd quarter 1999.

7. Do you have to be a SAP customer to use the Marketplace?No. Anyone can register as a buyer or seller on the marketplace. But if you use SAP, it is much easier to transact with another party who also uses SAP - it's called a one-step transaction.

8. What's a one-step transaction?If both parties to a transaction use SAP, then all purchase orders, sales orders, etc etc are automatically entered into both parties' systems with one click (i.e. on approval of the purchase).

9. Does mySAP.com replace R/3?No. If you have SAP R/3 implemented, then mySAP.com sits "on top" of R/3.

10. Is this actually R/4?No. mySAP.com sits "on top" of R/3.

11. What is R/3's future?R/3, along with all other current SAP products, will become 'components' of mySAP.com.

12. Can mySAP.com run by itself?Yes. The Workplace, Marketplace and Internet-enabled applications can run without SAP R/3 as the back-office system.

13. How is mySAP.com priced?Not an easy question. Talk is of "pay per name", "pay per record" and "pay per transaction". Stay tuned.

14. Let's get technical. Does mySAP.com use XML?Yes. We understand it is in close co-operation with webMethods and Microsoft's BixTalk.

15. Which standards (W3C, OAG etc) are mySAP.com in compliance with?No clear answer yet. Their response is "mySAP.com will be compliant with all relevant content and protocol standards"

What is ERP?

ERP is often a confusing terminology but to put it in simple terms: ERP is an acronoym meaning Enterprise Resource Planning. It is a software package/solution most often used within the manufacturing environment. ERP is a business tool that management uses to operate the business day-in and day-out. It is usually comprised of several modules such as a financial module, a distribution module, or a production module. Each of these modules share information that is housed within the database structures on which the ERP system was coded. ERP helps to break down barriers between departments within a company. For example, many times the sales department may be selling 25% more product than the production department can produce. By utilizing an ERP system, the sales department, production department, operations management, shipping, financial department, purchasing department all have access to the up-to-date information that is needed to operate smoothly within any manufacturing environment.

In ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) solution there is only one database that is used by all departments, such as Sales, Production, Finance and Accounting, Maintenance and Engineering, Purchasing, etc. ERP applications contain several modules such as production, finance and accounting, sales and distribution modules, etc. those modules are totally integrated and need only one database (to ensure no duplicate data). Each module consists of the best business practice that can be implemented for that company's industry, for example a manufacturing company. ERP software should only require some customization to fit the requirements of the business process.

One main difference between non-packaged software and ERP, is the number of databases. When you develop a program for each department with a unique database, then you must integrate each database. In this situation, you must maintain several databases.

In one sentence, ERP is a combination of business management practice and technology, where Information Technology integrates with your company's core business processes to enable the achievement of specific business objectives.

Notice that there are 3-4 components to this definition:

a]Business management practice - over the years, management practice has evolved into a set of generally accepted best practices specific to particular businesses, e.g. if your company is in the textile business, there would be a set of documented best practices for your kind of business. These are generally arrived at after a long process of benchmarking and evolution, and are not static but will keep evolving into the future in response to changes

in the business environment. A good ERP solution would be expected to enable your company to implement these best practices in its core business processes.

b]Information Technology - this constitutes the sum total of your company's IT resources including hardware, software, networking, telecom and associated accessory equipment/material. Is it good enough to implement an ERP or will it require upgrading/replacement?

c]Specific business objectives - Why do you wish to implement ERP? Is your company clear about this? ERP is expected to enable the effective management of business processes, and as any business person or company will agree, effectiveness can only be defined as your company's ability to convert opportunities to earn into real revenue. Does your proposed ERP implementation take this into account?