Deal done; How SAP helps you prepare for Brexit?

What Is Brexit?  

Brexit is an abbreviation for “British exit”, referring to the United Kingdom’s (UK)  decision to withdraw from the European Union on the 31st of January 2020.  

This means the UK becoming a ‘third country’ for the remaining European 27 member states.

Changes/Opportunities came into effect 

It is more important than ever that businesses continue to focus on managing the new ways of working that the deal brings with it. And this comes at a challenging time – cashflow is still under huge pressure in many sectors and some industries are being fundamentally reshaped by the pandemic. 

Different organizations are affected in different ways depending on size, location, sector and supply chains, amongst other considerations. However, there are common areas that are affected in almost all organizations exposed to international activities: Finance and Taxes, Logistics, Global Trade Services, Supply Chain and Sourcing and Procurement. 

According to Mike Wilson, chairman of the British Automation and Robot Association, Brexit  represents a unique opportunity for British companies to expand their use of automation –“Over many years, the UK has attracted workers from other countries, with businesses preferring to hire people rather than invest in automation equipment… After Brexit, businesses have to ensure that they use their workforce effectively and find alternative ways of performing tasks for which they have a shortage of staff—robot automation being an obvious solution.” 

SAP helps customers in this journey by delivering the Intelligent Enterprise.

What does Brexit mean for SAP customers?

We see that Brexit brings with it great change for virtually all organizations operating in, or with, the UK. While the full repercussions are still being identified, SAP is today helping customers with the changes and ensuring our solutions remain compliant with the relevant regulations in both the UK and EU. 

Globalization Perspective 

SAP Globalization Services (GS) has a commitment to empower businesses with local solutions for global and local success. The Brexit topic is no different.   

GS gathered the requirements by working closely with the relevant tax authorities and our esteemed partners.  We then analyzed the impact across SAP products and modules, bringing together several development teams across the SAP organization.  The outcome of this work was to produce a single point of entry to our solutions in the format of a central SAP notes for impacted products (accessible with S-User)- 

SAP ECC and SAP S/4HANA Any-premise: SAP Note 2885225  
SAP S/4HANA Cloud: SAP Note 2999933 
SAP Business ByDesign: SAP Note 2756341 
SAP BusinessOne: SAP Note 2519116 

More details Go Global with SAP Globalization Services 

In addition, three online sessions were conducted to SAP customers and partners across the globe. Check out this PDF – document  

Feedback from Early adopters 

Although the political negotiations went down to the wire and were not concluded until the 24th of December 2020, early feedback from our customers indicated that they understood the direction of SAP’s solution approach and the fact that there are still several changes that are still to come.

SAP Globalization Services will continue to monitor and provide guidance notes in a timely manner. Here is FAQ document to help with general queries. 

Please share this information with others and provide feedback in the comment section. Stay tuned for more!