SAP Blog

This initiation was taken by Dr.Peter Zencke in January 1996. Dr. Peter Zencke, a mathematician and economist, joined SAP in 1984. As a member of the Executive Board of SAP AG since 1993, he has led major development areas for SAP R/3 and SAP industry solutions.

The new solution was developed in conjunction with such industry leaders as Reebok International Ltd and VF Corp and today this solution is being used by more than 60+ SAP AFS Customers worldwide.

There you go, thanks to initiatives taken by people like Dr.Peter Zencke that SAP Continues to dominate in the world of ERPs and consistently spring out solutions for emerging industries.

S.Suren

ssurenlk@msn.com

In IS AFS 5.0, the specific functionalities that have been included in the SAP R/3 are:

In AFS Master Data:

Material Grids (refer to the earlier post on “Using 3D Options in SAP AFS”, by Azwath for more information on this enhancement)

Categories - AFS materials are based on a large volume of data. To order this data volume, AFS uses categories. Categories are used to logically segment materials. You can enter a specific schedule line for a material per grid value. You can distinguish a material by color and size, for example. Using categories you can also order the grid values at different quality levels, customer segments, and countries of origin

Seasons - In the fashion industry, seasons are an integral part of the business processes. Previously, seasons were only available in Sales and Distribution (SD). In SAP AFS, you can have a season at the stock side. It has been enhanced so that it can also be used for Material Management (MM), Production Planning (PP), and Inventory Management (IM).

In Sales & Distribution

Value Added Services – Some of your customers might request that you add customer-specific services to the goods they ordered before they are delivered. Customers frequently request special labels, packing according to certain criteria, or other special services for their goods.

Depending on what kind of service and how complicated it is, you will need materials, know-how and/or more personnel to provide the service. An added service that you provide upon customer demand is therefore not free of charge, but rather it increases the value of the goods that you will deliver. You can calculate price markups that your customer has to pay, to reimburse you for your resources and materials.

You can map these requirements including their costs as value-added services in the AFS system.

Multi-store orders – The multi-store order (MSO) facilitates the mapping of business processes in which a corporation requires goods from you for any number of stores You can process all stores in one single order.

You explode the MSO document in the following process steps. The system creates individual sales documents.

This allows you to make specific and clear changes to the order quantity for certain stores.

Available to Promise (ATP) – The AFS availability check is carried out in the order entry to see whether the desired AFS material is available for the requested delivery date in, for example, the selected color or size. During the order entry you check if there is enough stock to fulfill the order at the requested delivery date. If the order cannot be delivered immediately, the ATP specifies when enough goods are available and confirms this date as the delivery date.

Allocation Run – The special situation of the apparel and footwear industry requires an optimization of the assignment of existing stock to open requirements. If a stock shortage occurs, the allocation run ensures an optimal assignment of stock to the open requirements. The allocation run distributes the currently available stock to due sales orders according to certain calculation logics at a specific time. If the ordered quantities are larger than the actually available stock, you can use the allocation run to reach the best customer satisfaction under the given circumstances in your business.

In Production

Markers Production Lots

Combined Orders – With this function you can group several production orders. The combined production orders can use the same component or have the same operation in the routing.

The functions you can execute for combined production orders include:

• releasing combined production orders at the same time
• posting the goods issues for all component quantities from the combined orders at the same time
• confirming operations at the same time that are carried out for the combined orders

For more information on these features, I urge you to visit http://help.sap.com/saphelp_afs50/helpdata/en/b2/53ae56cda511d2aca20000e829fbfe/frameset.htm

Hope you found this post useful, feel free to send me your comments and suggestions to ssurenlk@msn.com

Have a nice day !!

S.Suren

• Banking
• Defense & Security
• Healthcare
  • Healthcare Providers
• Higher Education & Research
• Insurance
• Public Sector
  • Public Security
• Aerospace & Defense
  • Aerospace and Defense Manufacturers
  • MRO/M&E Service Providers
• Automotive
  • Automotive OEMs
  • Sales and Service Organizations
  • Automotive Suppliers
• Chemicals
• Consumer Products
  • Food
    Beverage
  • Home and Personal Care
  • Consumer Durables and Home Appliances
  • Apparel and Footwear
• Engineering, Construction & Operations
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    Construction
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• High Tech
• Business, Medical, and Consumer OEMs
• EMS Providers
• Semiconductor and Component Manufacturers
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• Industrial Machinery & Components
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  • Engine, Turbine, Pump, and Compressor Machinery
  • Industrial Machinery and Equipment
  • Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning, and Plumbing Equipment
  • Industrial Tools and Metalworking Machinery
  • Lifting, Material Handling, and Railroad Equipment
  • Measuring and Controlling Devices
  • Motion and Fluid Control Equipment
  • Oil and Gas Machinery
  • Semiconductor and Electronic Measurement Equipment
  • Textile, Paper, Printing, and Packaging Machinery
• Life Sciences
  • Pharmaceuticals
  • Biotechnology/Biopharmaceuticals
  • Medical Device/Scientific Instruments
• Mill Products
  • Building Materials
  • Fabricated Metal Products
  • Furniture
  • Packaging
  • Plastics
  • Primary Metals
  • Pulp and Paper
  • Textile
  • Timberlands and Solid Wood
• Mining
• Oil & Gas
  • Upstream
  • Supply, transmission, and trading
  • Refining and manufacturing Instruments
  • Downstream marketing and retail
• Retail
• Telecommunications
• Travel & Logistics Services
  • Logistics Services
  • Postal Services
  • Railways
  • Airlines
• Utilities
  • Generation
  • Retail
  • Transmission and Distribution
  • Water
  • Wholesale Distribution
• Media
  • Broadcasting
  • Entertainment
  • Newspapers and Magazines
  • Premium Content Publishers
• Professional Services
  • Consulting and Audit & Tax
  • IT and BPO Services
  • Commercial Real Estate
  • Business Services
  • Legal Services
  • Staffing
  • Facilities Management

For more information visit:
http://www.sap.com/industries/index.epx

1. Expand Scope of Check for AFS

IMG Path: Production -> Shop Floor Control -> Operations -> Availability Check -> Expand Scope Check at AFS

Activity Importance : Critical Activity

Here you can make additional settings for the control of the availability check (ATP). You can make AFS-specific settings for each combination of check group and checking rule within the ATP.

Checking rule for the availability check

Use 1:

This rule defines the checking procedure to be used for the availability check (or in Inventory Management, the missing parts check) in individual applications.

Use 2:

It defines, together with the checking group, the different MRP elements that make up this key figure in Flexible Planning.

Brief Explanation…

The whole purpose of this settings is to determine the type of availability check that the system needs to carry out and based on what criteria, if for example is we are to do an availability check for receipts of materials, then we can define the settings such that the system checks if the availability of the material comes from production orders or from purchase order, and as for issues, when checking the availability we can define if for example the sales order and dependant requirements are taken into account during the check.

2. Define General AFS Specific Control Parameters

IMG Path: Production – > Material Requirement planning -> Plant Parameters -> Define General AFS Specific Control Parameters

Activity Importance : Critical Activity

In this section you can carry out general, MRP-relevant settings for a plant.

Activities to be done:

Restrict the number ranges for planned orders, purchase requisitions, and planned independent requirements. Specify the SKU horizon and determine the pegging logic.

Brief Explanation…

Once the MRP is run, this creates purchase requisitions or planned orders for the planned order requirements, and the number ranges for planned orders, purchase requisitions, and planned independent requirements can be setup in this setting.

3. Define MRP Modules to Control Category Assignment (AFS)

IMG Path: Production – > Material Requirement Planning -> Planning -> Define MRP Modules to Control Category Assignment (AFS)

Activity Importance : Critical Activity

In this section you define the MRP modules you use in maintaining the category assignment during the planning run. The MRP module is used for the assignment of stock categories to requirements categories.

Example

Module M1 means that the entire stock, all purchase requisitions, and purchase orders that are available for the customer’s requested delivery date, are used to satisfy the existing requirements (FIFO – first in first out).

In the configuration you would need to setup the MRP Module and the relevant function module for this.

Brief Explanation….

The MRP module controls the assignment of the requirement categories to the stock categories. Module M1 uses a strategy where all batches of stock, purchase requisitions and purchase orders which are available on the requested delivery date (sales order) and assigned to the stock category, will be used to satisfy the requirement.

It is important that you have a clear idea of the function module in order to specify the setting for this MRP Module.

Hope you found the above post useful. I shall update more posts such as this in the future.

Have a nice day.

S.Suren

ssurenlk@msn.com

Following on from the previous post on SAP R/3 by my good friend Azwath, in this post I thought I’ll discuss more on how SAP is looking to show its dominance in the Small and Midsize Enterprise solution market.

SAP currently has 3 Solutions catering to the needs of companies in the SME Segment. Namely:

SAP Business One (also known as SAP B1)- This solution is meant for companies with 10 – 100 employees and a revenue of $5 million to $100 million. and those companies that do not need all the requirements of a complete ERP. However, SAP Business One is deemed to be a fully fledged integrated business management solution catering to all the different processes that a company in this segment would need to monitor and have control upon.

SAP Business One allows small and midsize businesses to grow beyond the piecemeal approach to business software, which prevents many businesses from managing effectively across their entire operations. It features an embedded customer relationship management (CRM) capabilities to ensure seamless integration among sales, service and other customer-facing activities. SAP Business One comes with industry specific solutions too and further enhancements are catered to with the installations of tried and tested add ons.

mySAP All in One (also known as mySAP A1) is designed to meet the needs of small and mid-market businesses, and specifically those with sophisticated business processes and ambitious development plans. This solution is targeted at companies with revenue of $100 million to $250 million and less than 2500 employees. Its the mySAP Business Suite scaled down and preconfigured for specific indsutries.SAP All in One takes extracts from the functionality of mySAP ERP suite and is integrated with all of its internal modules using best in class practice as per micro industry verticals.

mySAP A1 mainly caters to the higher end of the mid-size companies. It has more functions to cater to the complexities and customizations that would be needed in relation to particular unique practices of companies in this end. It is assumed that the implementation of mySAP All in One would normally take 3 to 4 months as per the industry solutions available. This has proven to be one of the most successful solutions provided by SAP , proven by its Market Leader position in the Magic Quadrant as published by Gartner.

SAP AG global strategy with the mySAP All in One solution is to partner up with channel partners who would be using their industry specific expertise in providing consulting and support services for mySAP All in One for their particular industry.

The final and the newest member to the family is :

SAP Business ByDesign (better known as SAP A1S) – This solution is catered to suit the requirements of midsized companies with 100 – 500 employees. Another important thing to note is that SAP A1S is the first to embrace the SaaS delivery model, its important as a up-to-date consultant that you know these terms well, as this is what is going to make up the future.

I should say as my personal opinion that SAP Business ByDesign does have an appeal to it, with its interface and the various ERP Logistical functions it caters too. Its not a surprise that other consultants who got to work on it first hand were quite enthusiastic about it. At present there are many installations and projects bring carried out with this new solution in parts of Europe and in selected industries. SAP AG have some aggressive plans with this new product and sure enough interested parties will be hot on their tracks, and me not being an exception will keep posting with the latest info.

Remember 2010 and 2014 are the magic target dates …so keep yourself in the game by knowing where to place yourself…… all the best!!

Hope you found this post interesting and informative, your comments and suggestions are welcome at ssurenlk@msn.com.

Your welcome to contact me on “+94 777 880605” for any quick queries.

S.Suren

There are many people out there who are trying to understand SAP. Although this site is mainly for SAP professionals, I thought of putting up a post on SAP R3 which will help people who are looking for information on SAP.

What is SAP R/3?

SAP standards for System Application and Products in data processing. And the term R/3 defines the SAP three layer architecture. Those three layers are;

1. Data Base layer
2. Application Layer
3. User interface Layer.

SAP is the largest business software provider in the world. They are based in Germany. SAP currently employees more than 40,000 employees and serves more than 41,000 customers all over the world. Total number of SAP users exceeds 12 million in number worldwide.

SAP is mainly an ERP or an Enterprise Resource Planner. It approaches business by covering key business elements from its modules which will be integrated to cater the requirements of the business. These modules are logically and operationally divided mainly based on the functionality. Material Management, Sales and Distribution, Finance and Controlling are some of these modules. Materials Management module covers the supply chain functionality from requirement generation for the ordering, purchasing, logistic handling, goods receipt, stock handling, physical counts, goods issues and transfers and invoice verification. Sales and distribution module on the other hand will cover the order receipt and goods delivery to the customer.

SAP has its main or the standard product along with its industry specific solutions. There are more than 25 industry specific solutions (List of SAP IS) some of them are SAP for Oil & Gas and SAP for Chemicals. These industry specific solutions are fine tuned to cater the special requirement of a particular industry. SAP AFS (which is my blog’s area of focus) is catering the special requirements of the apparel and footwear industry. In this case requirements of the industry to handle its materials in sizes and colors have been catered apart from the standard SAP functionality for an example.

Brief history of SAP – From R1 to R3

SAP started its journey in 1972. Five of the former IBM employees started the organization called System Applications and Products for data processing to give the businesses a standard solution to process their data real time.

The first SAP product was its financial accounting software and it is called R1. Sometime later the R/2 was developed. R/3 started in 1990’s. Now SAP is moving to the world of web and its applications are becoming very interactive and web based.

SAP Advantages

SAP has tons of experiences with them. Almost all the business best practices are built into the system. When a customer goes for SAP apart from the solid software they get the business best practices.

SAP is a fully integrated system. All the modules of the system combine seamlessly. All the processes are linked and financials automatically takes place in the background.

SAP is a robust and tested system. With its 120,000 installations in 120 countries for 41,000 plus customers with more than 12 million users SAP is tested both in terms of time and volume. It is robust and fast when considering the amount of the data that the system processes.

SAP’s support is another key advantage for its users. Upgrading is also possible without much of an effort.

Above are only some of the advantages and services a customer and user will get when they use SAP. For more information visit the SAP.com

SAP R3 is growing fast. So I will keep updating this section. If you have any comments please leave it here or mail me on azwath@yahoo.com

Resources:
http://www.sap.com/
http://www.sap.com/about/company/history.epx

A few of the Acronyms that you would come across in the configs of a typical SAP AFS IS Environment

PTO – Pick To Order is a fixed configuration of a product which you need to order. No changes can be done in the configuration. This assumes that there are enough stocks available to be simply picked and assigned to order and the relevant shipment fulfilled.

ATO – Assemble to Order products have options from which the user can configure the final product. This is where options are available for the user to choose from to assemble the relevant parts to fulfill the order. When it comes to defining it as a manufacturing concept, we would define this as a Pull Based Manufacturing technique, where the assembly is done only after an order

SKU – Stock keeping unit is identification, usually alphanumeric, of a particular product that allows it to be tracked for inventory purposes. Typically, an SKU is associated with any purchasable item in a store or catalog. An SKU is not the same as a product model number from a manufacturer, although the model number could form all or part of the SKU. The SKU is established by the merchant.

ATP – The Global Available-to Promise (ATP) is used to provide a global reconciliation of supply and demand. The “Global ATP” SAP component uses a rules-based strategy to make sure that customers receive the service they have been promised.

RLT – Replenishment Lead Time is the time taken from the identification of the need for stocks to be replenished and the actual replenishment received.

OCM – Order Change Management identifies existing procurement elements (production orders, planned orders, or purchase orders) that are affected by either an engineering change or a change to a sales order for a configurable product.

More to follow soon…

Hope you found this post informative.

Rgds

S.Suren

ssurenlk@msn.com