Why you should ramp-up to SAP SRM 7.0 EhP2 - Part 1 Strategic Sourcing Innovations

[tridip_chakraborthy]

1.0 Overview

If you have read my earlier posts on Introducing an SRM Consultant to terms like Sustainability  http://scn.sap.com/community/srm/blog/2011/07/13/introducing-an-srm-consultant-to-terms-like-sustain... the series, you will understand why Sustainability has become key when we use the term Procurement or Supply Chain.

SAP Procurement is not far away from the adoption of Sustainability metrics from inside the SAP SRM: SAP Supplier Relationship Management product from SAP Procurement suite.

This is one of the many great functionalities that are going to come in with the SAP SRM 7.0 EhP2 release which is currently going under ramp-up.

I brought in the flavor of Sustainability today because SRM 7.0 EhP2 which happens to be the area that has caught my recent interest has it embed in the ordering and registration process.

2.0 My Date with SAP SRM 7.0 until now

If you have been a veteran user of the SAP SRM 7.0 Ehp1 and prior releases, am sure you would love the offerings that are making their presence in EhP2

Sometimes, you’d wonder why these are not thought out up-front during the launch of a major release and in our case, I am reflecting to the release of SAP SRM 7.0 hitting the customer base in early 2007. It was a great release with stand-out features like the concept of Central Contract Management, Harmonized Procurement roles, Extended Sourcing & Auctioning capabilities that were weak in the SAP SRM 5.0 and lower releases.

I was lucky to get to implement SAP SRM 7.0 in the PDP with Plant maintenance scenario for a US Oil Field services major and I had penned down my experiences of crafting the entire process in my blog post read that here and I had great help from Ramakrishna Potluri who happens to be my inspiration to pen this one down.

We bent the scenario in crafty ways to achieve what worked for the client keeping it as close as possible with the Best Practice.             

3.0 Overview of the series & today’s topic

Throughout the series we will cover the breadth of the new enhancements coming in with SRM 7.0, ECC 6.0 & SAP PPS. SAP Procurement in the Business Suite 2011 (BS70i2011) has stuff coming in with the following enhancements

This blog, will draw your attention to SAP SRM 7.0 EhP2 enhancements in the area of Strategic Sourcing Innovations and since the topics are large at breadth, we don’t want you to get lost, so we expect you to take baby steps in understanding each functionality. We will have sequels connecting the dots.

Emphasis: Procurements focus has been and will continue to be in these areas

-          A continuous focus on the Growing Costs and Supplier Risks

-          The need for a Sustainable Procurement policy in the enterprise that aims at the reduction of Carbon footprint

-          At the same time being able to drive innovation and efficiency in the Procurement process

-          Increased Compliance and Governance which further enhance Supplier Relationships

4.0 Scope of this Blog: Strategic Sourcing Innovations in SAP SRM 7.0 EhP2

We would be focusing on the functionalities for the Enhancement Package 2 for SAP SRM 7.0 especially STREAMLINED SOURCING FUNCTIONALITIES.

What are some of the dependencies that must be satisfied

Am sure that most of you consultants or customers would really appreciate the integration aspects to leverage the usage of SRM along with ECC

5.0 The Enhancements in Strategic Sourcing in SAP SRM 7.0 ehP2 revealed and some visuals

INnoV1) Automatic Info Record and source list Update from Central Contract

INnoV2) Direct Materials procurement in classic deployment

INnoV3) RFx Creation Before Shopping Cart Approval for quick quotes

INnoV4) Active Bidders report during bidding event

INnoV5) RFx Response Comparison

INnoV6) Sourcing Graphical search

INnoV7) Shopping Cart Modification in sourcing application

I8) Embedded analytics in RFx POWL: POWL Reports : RFx Status Reports

I9) Embedded analytics in RFx POWL: POWL Reports - Average RFx Cycle Time Report

Please follow the sequels to understand each functionality and what it means to SAP Procurement customers, add your color to these posts by dropping in valuable comments

If you have follow-on questions, you can always ask the expert Ramakrishna Potluri well known as Ramki to many of us in the SRM fraternity, e-mail ramakrishna.potluri@sap.com ramakrishna.potluri

And as always, here’s leaving you on a sign-off note to be tuned in Socially into our SAP Procurement timeline

6.0 SAP Procurement : The Social Outreach

Please follow @SAP_Procurement on twitter for the latest trends from the SAP Procurement portfolio of solutions, you can also follow my handle@tridipchakra for a dope of procurement xChanges in the SAP world (articles, blogs, whitepapers).

Focused hash-tags for SAP Procurement: #SAPSRM #SAPSourcing #SAPCLM #procurement #SAPSLM #SourcingOnDemand #SAPCatalog and there will be more in the making as we tide along with like-minded Procurement aficionados like you.

In the next blog we will discuss more on each of the Strategic Sourcing innovations in detail and how you look at it from a Consultant & a Customers view to derive benefits to help save those dollars for the Sourcing, Contracts & the Procurement function