Moving to SAP S/4HANA?

Companies have been forced to drive digital transformation that would normally – without the heightened pressures of a pandemic – take years to pull off.

From facilitating remote productivity to keeping the workforce connected from anywhere, cloud solutions are a top answer to addressing pandemic-related challenges for 60 percent of enterprises, says 451 Research.

Digital transformation is one of the key reasons enterprises move to SAP S/4HANA. And like any major IT project, it can feel daunting when it’s first scoped out.

Let’s take a look at those challenges and how OpenText™ ensures you unlock maximum value from your move to the cloud.

Three challenges

Enterprises tend to face these three issues when transitioning to SAP S/4HANA – all of which can prevent them from realizing fast gains in productivity and profitability:

1. Delays that lengthen time to value: Bloated SAP databases can complicate and delay your SAP S/4HANA migration, impose risks, and keep you from realizing transformation ROI as quickly as you need to.
2. Inability to scale to meet changing global demands: 80 percent or more of external communications are still paper-based, says Harvey Spencer Associates. But, with workforces more distributed than ever, you need the agility to scale according to needs that change on a dime, and manual, paper-based processes aren’t up to the task.
3. Disconnected and inefficient systems and processes: According to a study by Oxford Economics,47 percent of business users say they waste more than 10 percent of their day waiting on technology. That adds up to productivity issues that cut into your bottom line. Users need access to relevant documents directly in business processes so they don’t waste time searching and switching from one system to another.

The solution: OpenText productivity solutions for SAP S/4HANA

With OpenText productivity solutions for SAP S/4HANA, including OpenText™ Core Archive for SAP Solutions, OpenText™ Core Capture for SAP® Solutions and OpenText™ Vendor Invoice Management for SAP® Solutions, you can address these challenges and more, delivering value across your organization right away. Leverage intelligent automation that equips you to digitize information, accelerate key business processes, boost productivity, and respond to customer and supplier demand quickly.

The results: Streamlined, agile, and efficient

The OpenText productivity solution delivers a range of benefits to help you get full value and maximum ROI from S4/HANA, before, during and after your move.

1. Streamline your move to S/4HANA

Companies preparing for the move to S/4HANA can reduce their database size by 75 percent or more, simplifying the migration effort and lowering cost and risk. Engie Electrabel advanced their cloud strategy by archiving 27TB of information with Core Archive for SAP Solutions in preparation for the transition to S/4HANA.

By reducing the clutter with smart archiving before you begin in your new environment, you can:

• Streamline, simplify and accelerate your move to the cloud
• Eliminate complexity and create a clean data footprint
• Reduce risk and complexity with better document governance

2. Become agile through automation

Instead of manual processes, you can use intelligent technology to do the heavy lifting. For Foodstuffs, who can now say they “don’t even have to look at 90 percent of incoming documents,” use of Core Capture for SAP Solutions has translated to significantly reduced administrative overhead.

By automating content-related processes, you can:

• Cut data entry time, using intelligent capture to digitize documents as they come in
• Reduce user touches and boost efficiency using pre-configured workflows
• Automate exception handling so users can address issues before they become problems
• Transform order-to-cash and procure-to-pay processes to improve cash positions, business efficiency and customer-supplier relationships

3. Connect users and systems to boost efficiency 

By giving users access to all relevant content directly in SAP S/4HANA business processes, you can minimize the need to switch back and forth between systems searching for documents and information. For Celestica this transformation via Vendor Invoice Management (VIM) for SAP Solutions resulted in a 20 percent reduction in overall cycle time.

By providing document access directly in SAP S/4HANA business processes with VIM, you can:

• Provide customer or supplier portals with instant access to transactional documents and real-time status updates
• Gain complete visibility of the end-to-end process that lets you measure cycle times, analyze productivity, identify outliers or duplicates, and highlight process bottlenecks

Digital transformation made easier

Cloud-based tools are delivering value, not only as tailored solutions to specific digital transformation challenges, but also as more comprehensive and complementary solutions to your most ambitious strategic projects.

OpenText productivity solutions for SAP S/4HANA speed and streamline your move to boost productivity, accelerate business processes, and achieve fast time to value. Check out this video to learn more.

Be sure to join OpenText at SAPPHIRE NOW 2021, starting June 7. Book a meeting with us and receive a free copy of the IDC report on moving to SAP S/4HANA.  See you there!