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BW Reduces Our Total Cost Of Information Ownership – A Success Story

Pratap Gulabrao – Spectrolab Frikkie Koen – TechSoft Solutions Inc.

Session Code: 2804

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Agenda• The Challenge• The Expectation• The Preparation• The Timeline• The Prototype• The Calm before the Storm• The Scope• The Resources• The Methodology (Tricks)• The Challenges• The Results• The Lessons Learned (Tips)• The Rewards• The Future• Q & A Session

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Overview

• Spectrolab is headquartered in Sylmar, California. The company was founded in 1956, and is one of the world's leading suppliers of photovoltaic solar cells, solar panels, searchlights, and solar simulators. With an employee population of approximately 500, Spectrolab has been supplying solar array panels to the space industry for 40 years.

• Spectrolab implemented SAP R/3 in 199??• Was Acquired by Boeing in ???

• TechSoft Solutions Inc. is a small consulting firm focusing primarily on the implementation of SAP new dimension products. TechSoft has a history of delivering quality solutions for companies with limited resources based on our implementation methodology.

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Business challenges

• Time and effort required to maintain current custom development.

• Time required to consolidate data in meaningful way.

• Business challenge the validity of data.

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Business Expectations

• Standardized enterprise wide KPI’s.

• Visibility will drive business changes.

• Provide a more efficient reporting solution – no more downloading to excel from multiple sources.

• “One click” solution.

• Quick and low cost development time.

• Flexibility in reporting requirements.

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Prepare for BW

• Understand Spectrolab’s business needs for BW.• Choose vendor who is capable, flexible to deliver in the given budget

constrain Spectrolab had for BW implementation.• Use TechSoft Solutions consultant to train on data modeling concepts of

BW based on Spectrolab business process for later use in prototype.

• Use TechSoft Solutions consultant to demonstrate technical aspects of BW in development environment with Spectrolab specific business processes.

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Prepare for BW… continue

• Getting organization participation• ROI and buy offs from Executives • Collecting requirement• Flow charting process• Getting sign off on the process• Hardware sizing• Build Prototype on BW 2.1C for SD

• Benefit: Reduce cost of training and prototype and receive training in BW related to Spectrolab specific business processes.

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Prototype• Plan:

– Retire current custom reporting (ABAP) environment for Sales.– Create more Analytical reports to control the Key points of the process– Prototype ready to be migrated to production.– Prepare business users for involvement in the process.– Deciding on the strategy for requirements collection.– Release funding for full blown implementation

• Actual: – Create a logical data model based on the proposed business process.– Create a custom transaction extractor, standard master data extractors, custom

cube and queries within 3 weeks to replace the current custom reporting environment. (Flat file)

– Proof that BW can deliver the same results with all the additional functionality. – Receive funding for full blown implementation.

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• SAP conducted a business process audit to demonstrate the ROI on BW.

• SAP presented the benefits and advantages of BW in this areas to further confirm the results of our prototype evaluation.

• We decided to continue with BW 3.0B because of future compatibility with Portals and other new dimensions products like SEM

The Calm before the Storm

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• Based on the success of the of BW 2.1C we decided to go ahead and implement BW 3.0B with the following scope:• Sales : All the standard content and the backlog

process with the delta sales. Also in this custom process everything was suppose to settle to a sales order number.

• FI/CO : Standard content AR/AP, Cost center reporting.

• Product costing and cost of sales order settled and unsettled portion of it.

Scope

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• COPA – Cost based.• Purchasing standard content and get the open

PO commitment for a sales order and cost center.

• Custom queries and roles.• Custom Authorization Model.• Super User Training.• Developing BW skills in House for future

development and support.• The scope looked achievable in 10 weeks

based on the success of BW 2.1C where things seems to work well.

Scope… continue

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• Training: March 2002.

• Prototype: April 2002

• Review of prototype: May – June 2002

• Install BW 3.0B: July 2002

• Implement BW 3.0B: August – November 2002. (Not full time)

Timeline

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Resources

• Spectrolab:– 1 X Technical lead/ Data Modeler– 1 X Functional leads– 1 X Basis ( Part time)– 1X Leonard

• TechSoft Solutions:– 1 X Functional lead / Data Modeler/ Project

Manager– 1 X Technical lead / Data Modeler/ Developer– 1 X Basis ( Part time)

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Methodology

• Rapid Success Program:– The TechSoft methodology focuses on people. It considers how

people are using information to fulfill their roles within an organization. This ensures that technology focuses on delivering real value that can be measured as needed.

– Prototype form basis of the future integration solution

– Use pre-defined business templates to reduce time and cost.

– Resources understand business, R/3, BW and other technologies.

– Design, Build, Show&Tell, Review, Show&Tell.• This is an effective methodology but involves a lot of hard work,

flexibility, clear channel of communication and strong management support.

• The challenge was to make the user understand that each report is a process and it is not easy to redo it.

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Challenges

• BW is new – learning curb is steep.• Business requirements not fully defined.• Spectrolab used to custom development process,

change management was needed to see benefit of best practice business processes.

• Complexity of process not currently utilized (Product costing and cost of sales order settled and unsettled portion of it).

• Limited resources ( by constraints).• New functionality not previously implemented.• Management weary of using a small partner.• Limited selection of music.

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Results – BW specific

• 50 Standard extractors• 6 Standard extractors that was enhanced to deliver additional content.• 2 Custom extractors.• 14 Standard Cubes• 6 Custom Cubes• 4 Standard ODS objects• 12 Custom ODS objects• 1 Custom Multi providers• 20 Custom queries• 3 Custom Web Applications• none Process Chains• 6 Authorization objects• 6 Spectrolab specific Roles

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Sample - Data Flow

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Sample - Data Flow

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Sample - Query

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Sample - KPI

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Sample – Web Report

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Sample – Role Menu

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Results - Business

• 6 Enterprise wide KPI’s that can be measured with BW solution.• 1 Custom processes that can be retired and no longer need to be

maintained.• 80 Days/year Reduction in preparing the information.• A reporting solution that provides pro active decision making

capabilities.• BW Trained business resources to reduce the cost of future

implementation phases.• One Happy Leena!• In spite of all the blood and sweat shed, our executives have

enterprise wide visibility to the processes to ensure timely decision making capabilities. We went live on BW Purchasing , Cost center reporting and Sales and Internal cost providing the business with a leading edge.

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Lessons Learned• Get a subscription to Columbia House to ensure an ample supply of music.• Get a quick win.• Allow additional time for team members to learn the new tool.• Activate all content that is relevant to the project.• Define development authorization profiles as broad as possible, this will reduce “down

time”.• Implement standard business processes first.• If new processes are not defined take extra time to ensure everyone understands the

expectant results.• Document new processes extensively.• Involve the Power users extensively.• Spend enough time during design. One mistake and the whole process is affected.• Change to query is not like a change to an ABAP report. Could potentially involve ten steps

depending on the design flaw.• Do regular “show and tell” with the business owners to ensure buy-in and to

highlight potential pit-falls early. Users do not know what to expect and the sooner they see the better as it reduces rework and re design.

• Review the status regularly and adapt to changes when needed rapidly.

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Lessons Learned… continue

• Cannot validate expected results until total custom process is built. Make changes to the design much more painful down the line.

• Allow only one developer to manage transports. Will reduce locked objects and failed transports.

• When activating new objects ensure you do not overwrite objects already migrated.• Keep key figure behavior as over write or addition in custom info providers in mind

during design.• Allow extra time for transports. During go-live we transported objects for seven

days.• Keep meetings focused and to a minimum. • Design to ensure characteristics are constant when using multi providers.• Test new plug-in. Research of new content and bugs cost valuable time.• Do not under estimate the support required after go-live. With more than 175 jobs

running through the week even a 1% failure rate takes a long time to fix without help.

• Sign a support agreement for onsite or remote help.

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Reward

• Timely information to influence and guide business decisions.• A fully functional BW system to serve the business processes.• Standardized enterprise wide KPI definitions.• Standardized business wide reports. • A “one number” reporting environment.• A development team consistent of all-rounders.• A reduction in total cost of information ownership.• A methodology and company wide template that could be used for future

phases.• Less hair.• No more sleepless nights.• Reduction in missed flights.• Reduction in # times we heard Phil Collins say “everything is going to be

all right” because everything worked out all right.

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Future

• Use the skills built up internally and reduce further consulting cost.

• Use company specific template as base for future development phases.

• Spend time on getting business owners familiar with the new web based tool.

• Answer the following questions critically:– What worked well?– Was the plan a good one?– What can we do better next time?– Was the expectations realistic?– Were issues identified early enough?– Were estimates on track with actuals?

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Questions and Contact Info

?Frikkie Koen - Fkoen@techsoftsolutions.netCell:214 704 0902Pratap Gulabrao - Pgulabrao@spectrolab.com

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Session Code: 2804