The SAP S/4HANA Cloud 1608 was released on August 29th and brings along innovations and enhancements in all three S/4HANA Cloud solutions: SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management Cloud, SAP S/4HANA Professional Services Cloud and the SAP S/4HANA Marketing Cloud.
With SAP S/4HANA Cloud, SAP is providing a new generation of business applications, listening closely to the needs of Customers and Partners in developing a rich scope that delivers a simple, yet efficient enterprise software for big data and agility.
The SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management Cloud provides pre-configured content for core business processes in areas of finance, procurement, manufacturing and supply chain.
These processes are supported by SAP Fiori for a role-specific, intuitive and simpler user experience. To complement the business processes, embedded analytics and Fiori Overview pages add real-time insight into data.
The pre-configured content is based on SAP Activate and SAP Best Practices for SAP S/4HANA that are tailored specifically to accelerate and simplify the adoption of SAP S/4HANA for faster time to value, by providing tested configuration, content and methodologies for ready-to-run business processes, optimized for S/4 HANA.
In addition to core business processes, the SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management Cloud offers SAP Best Practices for integration to other cloud solutions, such as SuccessFactors Employee Central and Ariba.
SAP Best Practices for Migration complement the foundation and offer customers a non-disruptive, simplified transition to SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management Cloud.
The guided configuration allows a simpler configuration, automated testing, and content life-cycle management to support agile adoption of continuous innovation even after go-live.
Customers and Partners can accelerate and simplify the adoption of SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management in the cloud for faster time to value, using SAP Best Practices based business processes with the knowledge of being legally compliant in different countries.
The SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management Cloud helps you reduce cost of operations by using standardized processes, manage multiple geographies, divisions, subsidiaries, and ledgers with global and country-specific content, as well as update and change customer specific configuration using SAP S/4HANA life-cycle management tools, all the while complying with regulations.
This product version brings with it updates in its core content, in the form of enhancements to 35 existing scope items, as well as 21 additional scope items in core areas: like Optimized Order to Cash, Streamlined Procure to Pay, Accelerated Plan to Product, Project Services and Finance:
Optimized Order to Cash: Sales Contract Management , Accelerated Customer Returns , Credit Memo Processing , Debit Memo Processing , Fiori Overview Pages for Sales and Distribution;
Streamlined Procure to Pay: Serial Number Management, Supplier Activity Management, Supplier Classification and Segmentation, Ariba -Sourcing Integration, Requisitioning;
Accelerated Plan to Product: Make-to-Order Production - Semifinished Goods Planning and Assembly;
Project Services: Customer Project Analysis, Utilization Analysis, Event-Based Revenue Recognition - Project-Based Services;
Finance: Statutory Reporting Framework Reports, Accounting and Financial Close - Parallel Ledger, Asset Accounting - Parallel Ledger, Asset under Construction - Parallel Ledger, Bank Integration with Financial Services Network, Profit and Loss Plan Data Load from File, Ariba – Integration for Finance.
In addition, the new Flexible Ledger will allow companies to choose between single or parallel ledger accounting, by enabling them to adopt leading ledger to IFRS, switch assignment of accounting principles for preconfigured ledgers, change the leading ledger key name and deactivate the not needed ledger.
The SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management Cloud 1608 is covering 13 countries, with Switzerland newly added to the list, as well as 10 languages:
Countries:
Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Philippines, Singapore, Switzerland *, United Kingdom, USA
Languages:
English, German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, Portuguese, Chinese (simplified), Dutch, Hungarian
For a complete break-down of the scope, please take a look at the SAP Service Marketplace: http://service.sap.com/s4ce
As always, if you want a first-hand experience of SAP S/4HANA, you can start with the SAP S/4HANA trials: https://go.sap.com/cmp/oth/crm-s4hana/index.html
For user assistance for SAP S/4HANA Cloud 1608, take a look at the SAP Help Portal: https://help.sap.com/s4hana_ce_1608#section1
For an overview of highlights for 1608 and a sneak peek on hot topics like the SAP S/4HANA Finance Cloud, check out this blog: http://scn.sap.com/community/s4hana/blog/2016/08/30/product-management-update-on-sap-s4hana-cloud-16...
Curious what’s in store for the SAP S/4HANA Cloud? Now you can see what’s planned four quarters ahead. See the latest Roadmap updated on the 29th of August here: https://support.sap.com/content/dam/website/roadmaps/en_us/cross-topics/SAP%20S4HANA%20Cloud%20Road%...
