Transnet National Ports Authority uses HANA to predict trends over eight ports

[NelusRossouw3]

Close your eyes and try to picture the world without efficient transportation and logistics services for a second. It would be a pure chaos, right? In fact, it’s almost unthinkable, even more so when it comes to a country like South Africa with a majority of its revenue resulting from international trade.

Transnet Group, South Africa’s national freight’s logistics company, plays a key role in ensuring shipments move efficiently to help their customers provide South Africans with items they need to run their businesses. Without Transnet Group there would be no gas to light stoves and cook boerewors (a traditional South African sausage). There would be no coal oil to fuel the lamp of a child doing homework in Soweto. Simply put, their services keep South Africa’s economy growing stronger and stronger each day.

Shipping delays can mean significant losses and cause disruptions in the supply chain. To avoid this and keep maritime operations running efficiently, Transnet National Ports Authority (TNPA) measures the speed of cargo loading and unloading with the SAP® Business Warehouse application powered by SAP HANA®. Prior to its implementation of the SAP NetWeaver Business Warehouse and SAP Business Planning and Consolidation applications powered by the SAP HANA platform, Transnet ran reports manually, which was an incredibly slow process. The massive volumes of data took up to 8 days to aggregate, resulting in reports that were outdated before they could even be reviewed. With SAP HANA, Transnet shortened report turnaround from 8 days to 35 minutes and can now dissect the data in real time to predict future trends.

In addition, now Transnet can analyze data in real time to predict trends over eight ports. With that, they can provide customers with insights into logistics like the best and worst times to ship giving it more confidence in data-driven decisions that will keep goods moving and Africa growing.