Scope and Benefits of SAP S4HANA Logistics

SAP has concentrated on developing one of the best enterprise ERP applications from a long time. SAP S/4HANA is an intelligent next-generation ERP solution which allows organizations to capture all the prospects of the present digital world. It eliminates mutual problems related to legacy ERP applications like complicated landscapes, and mutually-driven process. As far back as S/4HANA was declared there was a notice about Logistics and Finance. It is conceivable to come across a decent measure of documentation concerning the data model simplification of the SAP Finance and thus enables performance optimization. But, on the other hand, there are hardly few details included in the public domain regarding Logistics. When it comes to a business viewpoint the consultants, customers are trying to understand some details about SAP S/4HANA Logistics. This article shows about SAP S/4HANA Logistics and its scope and business benefits.

What is SAP S/4HANA Logistics?

SAP Logistics is also called SAP S/4HANA enterprise management. It includes all the essential modules under SAP ERP Business Suite, i.e. Material Management, Supply chain, sourcing and Procurement, production planning, manufacturing, contract management, etc. by decreasing and indexing the tables simplified process to enhance the effectiveness of logistics such as material requirement planning.

SAP S/4HANA imposed by the processing powers of HANA which will observe innovations created on new data models supported by easy-to-use FIORI applications, this shows the following benefits in the Logistics field:

1. Sales and Distribution (SD): With the help of Sales and distribution component of logistics modules the customers can solve the problems related to sales, order and billing transactions, which confirms the fulfillment of promises to the customers in the needed time and frequency for every enterprise. The sales and distribution component can work in association with Material management (MM) and production planning (PP) component of the Logistics module. It also allows organizations to upgrade their sales price, and observe open orders and other forecasts. Also, with the help of the SD component, it is easy to achieve better perceptibility and control on sales order execution through sales analytics and the smart sales fulfillment cockpit. It will also help in carefully observing the KPI and executing the essential remedial activities within time. The SD component specifically created to enable the various business process in an organization like Customer Master and material data, pricing, credit management, sales orders, deliveries, etc.

2. Production Planning (PP): SAP production planning is one of the essential component of SAP logistics which mainly deals with the planning processes, like capacity planning, material planning, execution of production order, bill of materials (BOM) activity etc. Production planning component helps in faster and quick implementation of material resource planning with collaborative simulation capabilities which will be particularly beneficial in retail and trading situations. It also helps in reducing the locking issues and post-processing time and therefore provides a faster and stress-free material evaluation process. The PP component will benefit those businesses that utilize standard pricing.

3. Material Management (MM): SAP MM component of Logistics assist in handling the procurement activity of an organization from procurement. It supports all the features of material management, i.e. planning, control, etc. With the help of this component, the procurement KPIs can be measured and observed easily with brand new analytics apps like spend and contract management, etc., which will results in enhanced efficiencies in the P2P processes. Also, intuitive integration with Business-network systems like Ariba network will confirm a smoother integration for PO order and procurement process. The organizations who want to explore key innovations will find such innovation using a material ledger and valuation methods according to various accounting laws such as GAAP.

Features of SAP S/4HANA Logistics: SAP S/4HANA Logistics provides several benefits and features, some of them are discussed below:

With the objective of recording transactional data Logistics is created in ERP, results in transactional processes of higher efficiencies, this allows users to identify the problems within their operations and apply corrective actions accordingly; these actions always requires a very high skills and expertise to analyze the issues and evaluate the possible solutions. It means that users may frequently settle for a sub-par solution because users don’t have sufficient time to execute and act on the right decisions. At this point Logistics in SAP, S/4HANA transform logistics from a system of records to a decision support system by attaching a data more effectively and proactively, this is possible with the help of innovation brought by the HANA platform. The skills enlarge the incorporated scope of logistics-placed together with main ERP functions from SRM, PLM, CRM and SCM including the support for technologies of value chain organization.

With the help of SAP S/4HANA Logistics, it is possible to predict and fulfill the customer requirements proactively. Along with this, automation of complex processes, the speed of innovation and enlargement of product configuration is also possible. Enterprises will also achieve instant visibility and profit with respect to customer modifications along with the additional capability to respond to such changes.

Transforming the Business and User experience:  SAP Fiori user interface works on a combination of all the applicable data and information required by the users to  perform great in their job role. With the help of its cockpit which includes tile-based applications the users do not have to remember numerous transactions. The need of every business role is achieved here by combining and integrating relevant information to perform each role and nothing more than essential. For example, The users will be provided with related data and information from all the departments like finance, procurement, production and logistics in real-time for sales order fulfillment. With the help of this data, the users can identify the best solution from the available set of possible solutions. With just a single click, the user are able to view the predicted effect of satisfying the recent and most profitable orders through simulation of the planned solutions simultaneously.

Empowering Users: It is possible to achieve signing alerts and generating the potential solution by allowing users to execute business decisions based on practical analysis of real-time data. For instance, production planners dealing with a lack of product in the present state of the market or industry will required to examine reports, extract data that exist in ERP which is generally unavailable. The planner should also wait for material updates through batch job processing. They may also wait for immediate interface from a third-party warehouse. SAP S/4HANA Logistics combines all these actions by removing such outdated and time-intensive processes. This also releases the users to focus on their actual job.

Effective Collaboration: The organization should listen to the customers in all matters to know where the enterprise should be, as customers are always producing an excellent income for any business. Integration of data related to social media enables the execution of real-time sentiment analysis to evaluate customers behavior. Social media is a valuable tool to connect customers sharing about particular products, their availability, promotions for the particular product and a lot more. Also with the help of SAP JAM, it is possible to associate, connect with partners, employees and customers with vital information to accelerate the process of solving acute business issues that collaboratively provide accelerated outcomes. The inputs of valuable customers are considered in designing the future product and service offerings; this will open incredible opportunities like supreme and steady customer reliability and retention.

SAP S/4HANA On-premise and Cloud Edition: Using the business scope of both these editions, the customers can gain utlimate choice in association with business necessities. The SAP S/4HANA logistics On-premise edition delivers a business scope with respect to functionality, languages, coverage, and industry which is similar to the current SAP business suite. Also, SAP logistics has transformational explanations provided with SAP finance along with strategic integration with SAP Ariba and SAP SuccessFactors network within its scope. The on-premise edition of SAP Logistics is planned to offer an annual innovation cycle via innovation packages.

SAP S/4HANA Finance covers particular business scenarios created for the marketing business lines including professional services industry whereas SAP Logistics cloud edition extends particular scenarios marketing business with the service industry entirely. It also supports dynamic scenarios to execute  business in the cloud driven by a digital core which involves maintenance of plant, manufacturing, procurement, finance, and accounting, etc.

The businesses can achieve the following benefits by implementing SAP S/4HANA Logistics:

• A huge volume of operational data can be processed quickly to gain business vision while the relevant operations are executing concurrently.
• With the help of SAP S/4HANA Logistics, execution of analyses becomes more comfortable by all the data from effective applications.
• The logical environments are reserved associated to the operational applications.
• The flexible analytic models are executed easily while working with the information to disclose business-critical trends and patterns.
• With the help of SAP S/4HANA, it is possible to lower the time interval between data collection and accumulation of vision into that data.

Following are various reasons which allows businesses to go with SAP S/4HANA Logistics:

• It has a scalable infrastructure, enhance system landscape including decreased systems count which offers the clients with lower TCO, i.e. Total Cost of Ownership and high performance.
• Its reporting and analysis feature allows real-time analysis at the lesser range granularity on significant transactional data.
• It has increased throughput that allows maximized performance by reducing data redundancies and footprint.
• SAP S/4HANA Logistics provides an excellent user experience. It offers largest user productivity including excellent, role-based user interfaces and availability on numerous devices.

Conclusion:

SAP S/4HANA is an exclusive platform provided to the organization. Using this unique ERP system the business can function in a pre-emptive and collaborative manner both with supplier and customers. It also provides users with real-time data required to focus on solving issues and executing remedial action towards issue resolution. SAP S/4HANA logistics acts as the catalyst for removing the barriers between the departments and extended lines of business. The highly streamlined data models will enhance throughput, whereas the new user interface provides coordination and simulation abilities, which means that the customers will have the correct information at the right time to take correct professional decisions.