Product Information

Sammar Razdhan

September 26, 2019 4 minute read

SAP Product Lifecycle Costing (SAP PLC) Overview

In fast changing world, it is imperative that R&D teams of companies get a view on cost implications of building a new product or making changes or improvements to an existing product.

SAP PLC solution plugs in this gap for R&D and other teams within an Organization. It brings visibility to teams on cost drivers for a new product or innovation or continuous improvements.

In this blog post we will gain high level insights into the SAP Product Lifecycle Costing (SAP PLC) solution features.

SAP PLC Overview

SAP PLC helps in the calculation of product costs quickly and precisely. We can simulate and compare alternatives to gain better visibility and control throughout the product life cycle. The solution can be used by design team to come up with product cost at a very early stage of product development.

From the below snap shot you can figure out that the solution works from Product development phase and goes right up to the product launch. The PLC solution works with both structured data (BoM, Routings, Business Processes etc) to unstructured data ( custom formulae, variable items, text items etc).

The SAP PLC can be deployed on HANA system as a stand-alone or as a side by side with an existing ERP system. From release 4.1 of PLC the solution is available in Cloud as well.

System Landscape – Standalone

It can be deployed as a stand-alone or integrated with an existing solution landscape to calculate variables of cost in real time using data from your enterprise software.

The standalone deployment is recommended whenever there is no need to consume data that is accessible in an SAP ERP system, such as existing master data ( BoM, Routings, Materials etc).

System Landscape – Side By Side with ERP

SAP Product Lifecycle Costing can leverage and access existing master data and transactional data using external communication channels. To accomplish this, the minimal system landscape scenario can be extended.

The application can access the master data available in an SAP ERP system using SAP LT Replication Server to make this data accessible for SAP Product Lifecycle Costing by copying the data into the SAP HANA system. The SAP LT Replication Server software component must be installed separately.

Depending on the license of the third-party database on which the SAP ERP system is running, replication may be used for initial load only (run-time license) or for continuous replication (full license). In order to access transactional data that is accessible in the SAP ERP system, such as a bill of material, routing or document structure, the expert front-end software component can access the SAP ERP system directly and pull data.

The SAP PLC 4.1 is now available as a Cloud Solution as well.

Comparison of SAP PLC with SAP CO (Product Costing)

SAP CO Product Costing

Standard ERP component, included in ERP license
Focus on standard cost calculation, actual costing and variance analysis
Based on existing SAP master data (BOMs /Routings) and cost rates
Tight integration with Accounting for inventory valuation purposes

SAP PLC

HANA Application integrated with ERP, separate license
Interactive product (structure) development for costing and engineering; focus on new product introduction, continuous improvement and quotation costing use cases
Works with both, structured and unstructured source data
Allows sourcing simulations and what-if scenarios
Pre-production oriented, no direct connection to Accounting
Complements CO-PC

Key Capabilities of SAP PLC

Preliminary Cost Estimate
Quotation Costing
Lifecycle Costing

Product cost calculation and simulation

Support modern, real-time cost calculation using SAP HANA
Handle calculations flexibly with manual override and recalculation capabilities
Enable versioning, what-if simulation, and target costing

Data modelling and Extensibility

Use custom attributes, fields, and formulas
Access multiple costing sheets and component splits
Manage local master data maintenance as well as integration with enterprise and Microsoft Excel software

Inbound and outbound integration

Import data from SAP ERP, Microsoft Excel, and other applications using the API
Export data to Microsoft Excel and other applications using the AP

SAP PLC – Main Views

Administration
Cockpit
Project
Calculation

Analytics

Analytics plays an important role for companies to keep track of future product costs. SAP Product Lifecycle Costing is using the whole SAP Analytics Suite which allows you analyze all calculation versions and project data in detail or provide a management reporting for certain KPIs. We have the following options available in SAP PLC to use for data analytics

In tool Analytics
Expert Cost Analytics
Management Analytics

Quick Reference Links for SAP PLC

If you would like to get more information on the SAP Product Lifecycle costing please visit the below links

Administrator’s Guide

https://help.sap.com/viewer/c9e2720cf3c0472f8c5fd6d110f0e70e/4.1/en-US

Application Help

https://help.sap.com/viewer/e4f727306ef741088ea1ac632d692cb4/4.1/en-USS

You can also make use of the excellent OpenSAP Course on SAP PLC.

https://open.sap.com/courses/plc1

I hope that the article provides you with insights into the SAP PLC solution. Looking forward to your comments and suggestions to make it better.

Thanks – Sammar

18 Comments

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Shubham Srivastava

September 26, 2019 at 12:55 pm

Good One Sammar

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

September 27, 2019 at 3:41 am

Thanks Shubham..

Balaji Parthakudi

September 26, 2019 at 4:33 pm

Good job Sammar

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

September 27, 2019 at 3:40 am

Thanks Balaji, How are you? Long time.. Where are you these days?

Ramesh Sankannavar

September 27, 2019 at 2:19 am

Great Work Sammar

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

September 27, 2019 at 3:42 am

Thanks mate..

Krishnan Venkataraman

June 18, 2020 at 4:57 am

Good One Sammar…. Really giving high level insights… Thanks for this.

I have few questions… plz help me with these

We are on S4 HANA and PLC is connected with S4 HANA… in this case do we need SLT to import BOM and Routing ??
I understand from open SAP course that we can replicate material prices from ERP… for this do we need to configure anything? please guide.
what all master data can be imported from ERP? and can we export anything back to ERP?
what are the main integration points with PLM & PS modules.. can you explain.

Sorry i have multiple questions… but it will really help me.

if you have any more detailed documentation… can you please share it with below email.

Thanks for your understanding and support.

Best Regards

Narasimham Thokala

+919986744789

tnr1983@gmail.com

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

June 18, 2020 at 5:45 am

Hi Narasimham,

PFB the answers

We are on S4 HANA and PLC is connected with S4 HANA… in this case do we need SLT to import BOM and Routing ??

The BoM and Routings can be pulled directly from Import function within PLC. You don't need SLT for it.

I understand from open SAP course that we can replicate material prices from ERP… for this do we need to configure anything? please guide.

To get materials and other master data you need to use SLT and later the prices get updated after each refresh. First data load of ERP data into PLC is license free, thereafter it is licensed.

what all master data can be imported from ERP? and can we export anything back to ERP?

we can import almost all the master data pertaining to FICO & MM like Co. Code, Cost Centers, Materials, Activity Types..

what are the main integration points with PLM & PS modules.. can you explain.

There is no integration between PLC and PS at this point in time, neither with PLM except DMS which can be integrated to generate document BoM.

SAP Help is the best place to check for details. I don't have any documentation to share..

Regards

Sammar

Krishnan Venkataraman

June 18, 2020 at 11:07 am

HI Sammar,

Thanks for your very quick reply.

i have few more queries, which are not clear for me to proceed further. Can you please help to through some light.

in our case S4 HANA and PLC are installed on same tenant , in this case can we use SLT for all master data replication?
if not SLT, do we have any alternative for replicating master data and prices?
How can we integrate quotation cost from PLC to quotation system(S4 HANA or any other)?

Thanks for your understanding and support.

Best Regards

Narasimham Thokala

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

March 5, 2021 at 4:00 am

Hi Narasimhan,

Sorry for the delayed reply..

Yes you can use SLT for data replication, even if PLC and S/4 HANA is on same tenant.

There is no native integration between PLC & ECC for data transfer.. this would be a custom development.

Regards

Sammar

Juandi Tanuwidjojo

March 5, 2021 at 3:50 am

Hi Sammar,

Thanks for the article. I have one question and I hope you could help me.

Would we be able to export the "latest version" of cost estimate from PLC back to SAP ECC to update standard price in SAP CO-PC?

Thanks.

Regards,

Juandi

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

March 5, 2021 at 4:03 am

Hi Juandi,

There is nothing in standard from which you can take the estimates from PLC to SAP CO-PC. this would be a development.

You can only fetch data from SAP ERP to SAP PLC or create your own master data in SAP PLC.

Regards

Sammar

Sanjai Babu Kopuri

December 15, 2021 at 5:07 pm

Good One Sammar!! Very informative , appreciate this document .

Prabhat Kumar

February 2, 2022 at 9:15 am

Hello Sammar,

the explanation in this article is very helpful when read along with opensap and sap application help. Thanks for that. Please help me in the below queries.

What are the use cases of the product ?
Whether these being used by customers ?
Which type of customers are looking for this product ?
Is there any specific road map to import the final cost from PLC to S/4 and automatically release the standard cost like mass release ?
When a customer has more than 100 products having a lengthy BOM structure with variant config , whether this product is useful ?

Thanks in Adv.

Prabhat

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

February 2, 2022 at 10:49 am

Hi Prabhat,

Please find below my answers to your queries..

What are the use cases of the product ?

Use case are for R&D team to estimate the new product cost or make a change in the existing one.
Understand the cost drivers for a particular product.

Whether these being used by customers?

Yes it is being used by multiple customers across geographies.

Which type of customers are looking for this product ?

They are very diverse ranging from Automotive to Hi-tech (Mostly Discrete Industry)

Is there any specific road map to import the final cost from PLC to S/4 and automatically release the standard cost like mass release ?

There are APIs available to transfer the cost estimates from PLC as a quotation in SD. But there is no roadmap to make it a standard offering.
The idea is to keep PLC a Independent estimation tool without impacting the cost objects or master data within S/4 HANA.

When a customer has more than 100 products having a lengthy BOM structure with variant config , whether this product is useful?

Yes the product can be used in such a scenario. We do support creation of multiple variants for a single product and you can also compare the value drivers for each case.

Regards

Sammar

Learning HUB

May 22, 2022 at 11:16 am

Hi Sammar,

from the technical point I missing there process of the integration for the following scenarios

C# development

when developing add-in, how to get data from plc or hana (custom developments)
how to trigger some changes from add-in in plc which is not available in add-in SDK (like update material master data)

Hana development

is there a preferred way, how to modify data in PLC tables (T_ITEM, T_CALCULATION..)
- direct sql queries or calling specific available procedures

are there any examples how to work with

thanks a lot

Michal

Sammar Razdhan

Blog Post Author

May 25, 2022 at 1:21 pm

Hi Michal

Please refer to the Admin Guide of SAP PLC for answers. There are APIs available to pull the information from PLC to any SAP or Non-Sap system.

To modify the fields in Item or Calculation, refer to the custom fields sections within the Admin guide. We do have procedures available to make the changes.

Here's the link for the Admin Guide..

https://help.sap.com/docs/SAP_PRODUCT_LIFECYCLE_COSTING/c9e2720cf3c0472f8c5fd6d110f0e70e/206bb4ca163b49c6ac974e042dc53779.html?version=4.4

Best Regards

Sammar

Zakhar Koval

June 14, 2022 at 8:22 am

Hello, Sammar Razdhan! Sammar Razdhan

Pls help me to understand how SAP PLC is integrated with S4Hana.

If PLC can take info about standard price for existing ROH and HALB materials from S4Hana in this new calculation process for new FERT product. (import data from S4Hana to PLC)

How data form PLC about planned materials and production time by cost centers will go to new BOM and Routing for new FERT process (import data from PLC to S4Hana)?

I would also like to understand how synchronization will occur. Will it happen online automatically or under duress? (for example: changing any values (creating material, etc.) in ERP will automatically change immediately? And vice versa, After changes in SAP PLC, will there be changes in ERP automatically?

Or if I created a material (for example) in the C4Hana system, will it automatically appear in SAP PLC or how will it happen?

Pls give answer in detail

Have a nice day!

Product Information

SAP Product Lifecycle Costing (SAP PLC) Overview

Product cost calculation and simulation

Data modelling and Extensibility

Inbound and outbound integration

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