CIO Bulletin

Secure Your Company’s Future with Transparency: apsolut

apsolut is a leading consultancy for Intelligent Spend Management, Business Network, Procurement, Supply Chain, External Workforce Management and Business Transformation. Apsolut’s expertise ranges from technical implementation and process consulting to IT project management and the implementation of holistic transformations. apsolut is a SAP Gold Partner, multi-awarded SAP Ariba MEE Partner of the Year, development innovation partner of SAP and solution partner of United VARs, the global alliance of top-rated SAP solution providers.

Q. Why should you transform your business with apsolut?

The move to SAP S/4HANA confronts you as a decision-maker with a major challenge – the transformation of your current ERP landscape into the ERP world of the Next Gen. To stick to the term transformation: Even in times before the transition to SAP S/4HANA, there were major release upgrade projects in which apsolut’s customers from a wide variety of industries relied on apsolut's expertise. Many companies have invested in their IT infrastructure in recent years. The path to the Next Gen ERP world mentioned above can now be unsettling. What is the best way to deal with the topics addressed by SAP such as Cloud, SAP Cloud Platform, IoT, SAP Leonardo, AI, etc.?

apsolut's business experts will lead you into the SAP S/4HANA ERP world. No matter whether you want to build on an existing system or develop it from scratch. With us, you can face the requirements around the digitalization of your company calmly.

As a basis for your transformation roadmap, apsolut will work with you in four stages:

The first stage on your way to SAP S/4HANA is the analysis of your SAP ERP using the SAP Readiness Check and the Business Scenario Recommendation (BSR) Report. apsolut will support you in the preparation and implementation of these essential steps.
In the second stage, apsolut offer you a general overview of SAP S/4HANA via an initial workshop.
In the SAP S/4HANA Transformation Workshop Package (3a), apsolut develops a roadmap for a transformation scenario tailored to your needs.
Would you like to prepare intensively for the fourth stage (implementation)? As part of the SAP S/4HANA preliminary study (3b), apsolut will provide you with a concrete plan for your transformation to SAP S/4HANA.
As soon as all preparations have been completed, apsolut will join forces with you in the fourth stage: your SAP S/4HANA implementation.

The pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the blockage of the Suez Canal have prominently demonstrated how supply chain disruptions can put constraints on business. The cloud is a tool that allows purchasing departments to play a strategically important role in their organizations and to provide resilience to shocks. When used wisely, it can save time and money in purchasing processes. This can be seen in the example of Mahle, which has implemented the SAP Ariba platform to optimize its purchasing.

Low-tech purchasing

According to data from McKinsey, only 17 per cent of Polish companies have a defined supplier relationship management process. In addition, most buyers are not actively seeking new suppliers. On the other hand, the pandemic, the war in Ukraine and inflation have changed the role of purchasing departments. Once primarily responsible for cutting costs, they are taking on an ever more strategic role within their organizations, tasked with providing increased resilience to shocks. As the McKinsey data show, up to 80 per cent of companies report that they are making investments in digitizing their purchasing processes, but few entities in Poland approach this transformation strategically. Instead, most focus on digitizing individual processes. Furthermore, only 55 per cent of purchases in the surveyed organizations are made using the digital platforms they have implemented. This means that Polish businesses are insufficiently exploiting the potential for digitalization in their purchasing. In contrast, the ‘A digital journey into the clouds: managers on the cloud in Poland and the CEE region’ report indicates that only 44% of companies in Poland use cloud tools to optimize their purchasing processes. This is 2 percentage points lower than the average for the CEE countries reported in the survey commissioned by SAP.

In purchasing, Mahle bets on the cloud

Mahle is an example of a company that stands out in this area. As a leading global development partner for the automotive industry, Mahle offers unique solutions in the fields of engines, filtration, electrics, mechatronics and cooling systems. The company generates more than €12 billion in turnover annually and employs around 80,000 people worldwide. Mahle car parts are produced at 160 plants, including its facilities in Krotoszyn and Ostrów Wielkopolski. The company's research and development and shared services centres are also in Poland. “As a result of its dynamic expansion, Mahle now has an extensive purchasing environment and a complex infrastructure of SAP systems. Continuing in this vein, the company has decided to implement the MORE projects, which aims to standardize processes and migrate to the S/4HANA system and the cloud. Mahle aims to standardize and harmonise its business processes and to globalize its purchasing units”, says Dominika Bednarz, NPM IT Lead Ariba at Mahle. As she points out, SAP Ariba and Central Procurement have enabled the company to implement a single, centralised purchasing process that meets the needs of its highly complex organisational structure and an intricate IT infrastructure. By using cloud-based tools, Mahle’s purchasing specialists can track the entire purchasing process using a single, standardised interface.

“Thanks to the ease of implementation of the SAP Ariba systems, we were able to retire our old systems very quickly and benefit from the savings generated by the reduction in license costs for on-premise solutions. In addition, our suppliers are able to collaborate with us efficiently and effectively using the SAP Ariba Network cloud platform”, reports Dominika Bednarz.

Dozens of Mahle’s key suppliers took part in the pilot implementation of the SAP Ariba Network platform, while more than 6,000 of the company’s business partners will ultimately use the system. Mahle has as many as 20,000 active SAP Ariba users. The effective implementation of the new system in Poland and Slovakia enabled the rapid implementation of the required functionalities on a global scale.

Further expansion in the cloud

“The success of the SAP Ariba implementation at Mahle lies in its simplicity. Very quickly, we were able to get the knowledge we needed from our implementation partner, apsolut, and implement all the necessary solutions in more than 10 locations worldwide”, Bednarz points out. Mahle has ambitious growth plans not only for the implementation of SAP Ariba solutions in more countries but also for the expansion of the range of cloud-based solutions for streamlining purchasing processes offered by SAP and apsolut. According to a company representative, Mahle intends to further optimize both its IT infrastructure and its costs by migrating legacy systems to the cloud.

“The pandemic, the problems in the Suez Canal, the war in Ukraine – the last few years have shown that with volatile supply chains, we can no longer rely on just a few proven business partners. The key to building a resilient business in challenging times is to have a community that gives us flexibility and enables us to respond quickly when an existing supplier or transport channel comes up short. This is exactly the kind of cloud business community SAP is developing – connecting suppliers, buyers and logistics providers from all areas of the economy within the SAP Business Network. By optimizing purchasing processes and helping companies find new suppliers, apsolut is working together to build value for the global economy”, says Dorota Zaremba, Vice President of SAP Poland.

Meet the leader behind the success of apsolut

Thomas Herbst Founded apsolut together with Tim Kollmeier in 2005, focusing on IT applications in the field of eProcurement based on SAP Supplier Relationship Management. For over 15 years, apsolut has been active in the field of procurement and has become a household name in the consulting world. The company's main objective is to advise customers and improve them according to their business processes and requirements and to increase operational efficiency and productivity and reduce costs. Following its success in the procurement space and as part of its expansion strategy, apsolut has spread its wings to SAP Ariba, SAP Fieldglass, SAP S/4HANA Central Procurement, SAP S/4HANA Enterprise Management, integration solutions, SAP Fiori and additional solution add-ons. As the epitome of delivery quality and dedicated customer service, apsolut has developed a strong customer base.

Thomas holds a degree in industrial engineering from Esslingen University of Applied Sciences. He started his career as a consultant at HewlettPackard, where he worked on optimizing SAP-based procurement processes for several customers. His systematic way of learning and his leadership skills took him to the next career level and he took over responsibility for the entire SAP consulting area at Heiler Software AG. Thomas is the personification of honesty and commitment. He is a visionary and inspiring leader. His tireless efforts have made him the majority owner of apsolut subsidiaries in Germany, India, Spain, the UK, China, Austria and Switzerland. His motto "grow and let grow" has paved the way for many aspiring leaders. His fairness towards colleagues has made him a role model for people. His company ideology has made apsolut one of the best companies in the market.