Set to聽take place from 1 to 3 June 2025 at Sun City, the event will bring together business and technology leaders from across the continent for two days of innovation, insight and high-impact networking.

Key sponsors returning for the 2025 edition include 51风流Africa, Deloitte and NTT Data.

Collaboration Sponsor

51风流is once again the event鈥檚 Collaboration Sponsor.

,听ad interim聽MD for 51风流in Southern Africa, says: 鈥淪aphila is a critically important customer and partner event for SAP, in that it provides an unparallelled, one-stop shop for all our African customers and partners. We鈥檇 like to thank AFSUG for driving this flagship industry and networking event, suited to any customer or partner wishing to know the latest about SAP, its AI vision, future focus, product offerings and solutions.

鈥淲hen it comes to the 51风流Africa events calendar, Saphila is arguably the most important networking opportunity of the year,鈥� she adds.

Diamond Sponsor

Pillay鈥檚 sentiments are echoed by , vice-president: applications and cloud at NTT Data Middle East and Africa, Saphila 2025鈥檚 Diamond Sponsor, who聽highlights the strategic value that the event brings. 鈥淪aphila is all about bringing 51风流users and vendors together to connect, create and collaborate. It provides a fantastic opportunity to share knowledge on the latest innovations, implementations and best practices in the 51风流world.

鈥� has taken up Diamond sponsorship of Saphila 2025 for good reason. As a global 51风流Managed Services partner, it gives us incredible brand visibility and allows us to showcase our expertise and thought leadership through keynotes and workshops.

鈥淪aphila is also packed with engaging activities, including evening socials, a golf day and exclusive deal room access,听providing an excellent platform for attendees to engage with a diverse range of high-profile contacts. This kind of engagement really fosters a collaborative environment where industry leaders can discuss real-time data and business value.

鈥淭he event鈥檚 expert keynote presentations and workshops can also provide a real edge,鈥� Wortmann adds. 鈥淪aphila 2025 is the place to be if you want to stay updated on the latest tech advancements and make valuable connections.鈥�

Executive Suite and C-Suite sponsor

,听senior manager & 51风流project director: enterprise technology and performance聽(ETP) at and Saphila 2025 chair, sees聽the event as a catalyst for growth, skills development and innovation across the continent.

鈥淪aphila brings significant value to both the local 51风流ecosystem and the broader technology industry. It promotes networking, knowledge sharing and collaboration among local 51风流professionals, partners and customers. It also drives innovation by showcasing the latest 51风流solutions and technologies, enabling attendees to stay ahead of industry trends and best practices.鈥�

From a broader industry perspective, Panday notes the role that Saphila plays in highlighting the transformative potential of 51风流technologies across various sectors 鈥� driving digital transformation, improving business processes and creating value across industries, as well as facilitating cross-industry collaboration.

鈥淎s a trusted聽51风流systems integrator and with a transformation alliance between the two businesses,听Deloitte鈥檚 sponsorship of SAPHILA 2025 aligns with our commitment to support the local 51风流community and contribute to its growth and success,鈥� Panday adds.

鈥淎t this year鈥檚 event, Deloitte will showcase how our capabilities in areas such as digital transformation, cloud solutions and data analytics can help organisations achieve their strategic goals and drive business success. We encourage people to register for Saphila 2025 as it offers a unique opportunity to gain insights into the latest 51风流trends and innovations, through expert-led sessions, hands-on workshops and networking opportunities.鈥�

鈥淪aphila represents the heartbeat of Africa鈥檚 51风流community,鈥� continues , senior associate director: ERP at Deloitte Africa. 鈥淥n a broader scale, Saphila amplifies Africa鈥檚 voice in the global technology industry, highlighting how cutting-edge technologies 鈥� such as AI, cloud and sustainable ERP 鈥� are being adopted and adapted for local impact.鈥�

Sponsor line-up

CEO comments: 鈥淲e鈥檙e incredibly proud to partner with global technology leaders who share AFSUG鈥檚 vision for a more connected, digitally empowered Africa. SAPHILA 2025 will once again provide the ultimate platform for collaboration, learning and progress.

鈥淚n addition to extending our thanks to SAP, Deloitte and NTT Data, we would also like to welcome EY, Google and Syntax as Gold Sponsors; our Silver Sponsors Accenture, FIRtech, HCL Technologies, IBM, Mediro ICT, Neptune Software Africa (NASA), PwC, SAP, Vodacom, Deloitte and AWS, and Worksoft; and Saphila 2025鈥檚 Bronze Sponsors聽Accely, AppConverge, BCX, Consnet, JiVS powered by聽Data Migration International, Decision Inc, Edge Information Solutions, EPI-USE Labs, GlueData, G3G, Integrove, K5 Business, LRS Output Management, Nihilent, OneConnect, OpenText, Seidor, smartShift, Stratfore Tech, Tano Digital Solutions and VOQUZ Labs.

鈥淪pecial mentions also go to our Golf Sponsor Zimele Technologies; Coffee Sponsor iOCO; Microsoft, an Executive Experience Sponsor, Said Salim Bakhresa & Company as the official Prize Sponsor, Charging Station Sponsor Engaged Business Consultants, EY and GlueData for the eagerly anticipated Masterclass sessions, as well as Heineken and Mercedes-Benz.鈥�

Register to attend Saphila 2025 by clicking聽

To become an AFSUG member, visit聽.

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Successful implementation of 51风流S/4HANA庐 Public Cloud ERP during COVID-19 lockdown, across borders

Diamond miner, Lucara Botswana, the 100% owner of the Karowe Diamond Mine asset, headquartered in Gaborone, has not allowed the COVID-19 pandemic to stand in the way of its important transformation programme.

As part of its expansion strategy, the company embarked on a technology transformation journey with Deloitte in February 2020. The programme included the implementation of the 51风流S/4HANA Public Cloud Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system鈥攁 suite of integrated business applications with core business processes in finance, sourcing, procurement, manufacturing, sales, supply chain, plant maintenance and project systems.

Lucara operates the Karowe mine, close to the Lethlakane village, mining large, high-value diamonds. It employs approximately 550 permanent workers, approximately 1,100 contractors, and turns over $192.5 million per annum.In March, the Deloitte team travelled to Gaborone and Lethlakane to kick-start the project. The 51风流S4/HANA Public Cloud implementation was to be completed within a tight, four-month deadline. Two weeks into the work the team travelled back to South Africa, just as the country announced the COVID-19 lockdown. These restrictions meant they could not go back to Botswana to finish the job.

In adapting to the situation, the team strategised and came up with a plan on how to complete the task under the unusual circumstances of COVID-19 restrictions. Deloitte proposed a Project Continuity Plan, which allowed for the team to deliver the 51风流S/4HANA Public Cloud Implementation project remotely from Johannesburg. The plan included innovative governance forums that were optimised, streamlined and replaced with shorter, more frequent, interventions and engagements.

This approach continued during the lifecycle of the project and proved very effective. Quick, short, turnarounds and regular playbacks were also incorporated to ensure requirements were met and gaps identified early on to speed up the work. 鈥淭he Executive Leadership team at Lucara, including the MD and CFO, provided much needed executive level sponsorship, and demonstrated courage, resilience and agility, by allowing the combined Lucara and Deloitte implementation to deliver the first ever 51风流Public Cloud implementation remotely at a mining client on the African continent,鈥� said Jaco van Niekerk, Lucara Lead Client Director.

鈥淭he Covid-19 pandemic presented a rare but perfect opportunity for both Deloitte and Lucara to explore and adopt a virtual 51风流S/4HANA Public Cloud implementation approach – using various Deloitte remote methods and tools, which allowed for the continuation and successful implementation of the project,鈥� says Kevin Govender, Deloitte Africa ERP Leader, Enterprise Technology & Performance.

The Lucara and Deloitte teams were able to execute the project despite the difficulties and challenges of working remotely from another country. All major milestones were achieved remotely, from across borders.

鈥淭he Lucara 51风流project has shown that delivering complex ERP projects remotely is indeed possible. Through the commitment and support of Lucara鈥檚 exco and other team members it was proven that with the right attitude, focus, delivery approaches and methodologies these kinds of projects can be delivered on time and on budget. As a Deloitte delivery team, we were challenged to re-visit various aspects of project delivery methods and learnt that client relationships and empathy go a long way in the absence of being able to engage face-to -face,鈥� says Christiaan Barnardo, Project Manager Deloitte Africa.

The Lucara 51风流S/4HANA Public Cloud Project went live on 2 July 2020, on time and on budget, via a streaming go-live activation event. The launch was attended by the Lucara Managing Director, Naseem Lahri, Project Sponsor, and various other stakeholders at the Karowe mine and Lucara head office in Gaborone, as well as Deloitte team members who connected remotely from locations in South Africa and Botswana.

鈥淟ucara Botswana was required to be agile and responsive to the requirements of the organisation and its strategic objective during the pandemic. As a result of the dynamic team within Lucara, the decision to go ahead with the project in these uncertain times was an easy one. The teams of Deloitte and Lucara worked well together to ensure that the project was delivered successfully,鈥� says Naseem Lahri, Managing Director at Lucara Botswana, 鈥淭he success of this project was based on the clear collaboration of both teams and the ability to correct any anomalies immediately and move on to deliver an extremely successful project. Both teams worked extremely hard during these uncertain times to deliver the objective. This was as a direct result of their resilience, determination and commitment to make this work and understanding of the objective at hand.鈥�

This article first appeared on Deloitte.com:

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The consulting firm says the practice brings together industry experience, skilled AI engineers as well as ecosystem and alliance聽partners聽to help customers build generative AI solutions to accelerate business innovation.

The use of AI to make business processes more efficient in realtime is a central theme at Saphila 2023.

According to Deloitte Africa, generative AI is already revolutionising industries with its capability to analyse unstructured and structured data and model it in a way that makes human sense. This results in simplifying the engagement between humans and digital systems, enhancing productivity and innovation at an accelerated pace.

Quentin Williams, Deloitte Africa.

Quentin Williams, director and AI leader for Deloitte Africa, said, 鈥淭here鈥檚 been extensive discussion across industries around the capabilities of generative AI technology and its potential to revolutionise the way we work, how it allows for digital systems to understand us as humans, without effort; and for us humans to create digital systems and solutions quickly and at scale. We will be going much further than exploring what鈥檚 possible 鈥� we enter the market with the aim of creating what鈥檚 next.鈥�

Jania Okwechime, partner, data analytics and AI peader for Deloitte West Africa, added, 鈥淭hrough this practice, our clients now have access to AI labs, accelerated use-case development and Large Language Model managed services – all within our trustworthy AI framework. […] We aim to, and will; increase AI fluency within the market, grow AI talent on the continent and together with our alliance partners, take enterprise scale generative AI solutions to our clients.鈥�

The practice aims to help clients create innovative AI-fuelled applications聽to bring about business process efficiency gains and productivity improvements.

Deloitte identifies power supply and healthcare as emerging use cases for generative AI.

The technology can optimise electricity delivery, including maintenance scheduling, by simulating distribution choices and generating cost-effective strategies.

In healthcare, AI can streamline diagnostics and treatment by providing physicians with real-time, data-driven insights.

Deloitte noted that while generative AI can increase efficiency, there are risks to consider.聽The technology may not incorporate ethics in decision-making, potentially causing reputational harm. Additionally, unidentified flaws or inadequate data could result in financial losses

Wessel Oosthuizen, associate director for digital risk solutions and Africa AI Institute leader at Deloitte Africa, said, 鈥淲e can help organisations build the right infrastructure, collect, and manage the right data, train the right models to create generative AI solutions that are effective and scalable and validate prebuilt models to ensure alignment to your firm鈥檚 ethics and values.鈥�

This article first appeared on .

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If money is the lifeblood of an organization, finance is its heart 鈥� and that heart is always racing. Racing to re-evaluate costs, cashflow, and liquidity; racing to adapt to remote and hybrid work; racing to build sustainability into every decision; and, quite honestly, racing to stay ahead of the next round of unknowns.

As digitalization has accelerated everywhere, CFOs and finance organizations are empowered to think and act differently. You need the insights and tools to proactively drive a nimble response to any situation.

We extend this opportunity for you to join a powerful conversation in our upcoming 51风流& ACCA CFO Connect with representative from Deloitte, Gbemisola Adelowore , 51风流West Africa Vivek Chibber SAP, and Chandy Beyrooti 51风流Africa on :

• How the office of finance drives digital resiliency
• How finance leaders are transforming their organizations
• Driving finance transformation leveraging modern technologies
• Connecting finance to the rest of the organization and eliminating data gaps

Date : Thursday 11^th 听狈辞惫别尘产别谤

Time: 10am WAT

Registration url :

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The post Deloitte Africa: How Does Embedded Cloud Technology Empower an Organization to Make an Impact That Matters? appeared first on 51风流Africa News Center.

Jen McDonald聽was appointed as the CFO of聽Deloitte Africa聽in 2017 and has been in the role for just over three years. When she picked up the leadership role in 2017, Deloitte had recently defined its global and Africa 2020 strategy, as well as its Africa Finance strategy. 鈥淭he vision statement for Finance was 鈥榯o be a world-class finance function鈥� and the goal I set was to deliver a world-class, relevant service that makes an impact that matters to the organisation鈥檚 strategic goals,鈥� Jen says.

At the same time, Deloitte had just finalised its Africa integration, which was the merger or combination of 14 practices across Africa that have historically operated independently, into one firm called Deloitte Africa. The integration set the landscape for a finance transformation, as well as a digital transformation journey that would change the way Deloitte delivered finance to the organisation and the way it operates as a firm across Africa.

In 2017, Deloitte had a completely decentralised finance function. The finance teams were operating completely independently within each country and region. In South Africa alone, the company鈥檚 different service lines had their own independent finance teams. 鈥淲e had to bring everything together in a better way, and that鈥檚 where the transformation journey started,鈥� says Jen.

However, starting on this journey wasn鈥檛 going to be easy. At the time, not only did Deloitte have independent finance teams across the country, but it also had completely different and disparate IT systems across the continent, from its ERP and CRM software to expense management and payroll systems. 鈥淎ll the different point solutions had been built around supporting a country or regional model.鈥�

For Jen, this meant that the finance and operational transformation for the Africa member firm needed to be underpinned by an ERP and digital transformation. She put her hand up to lead the firm鈥檚 ERP and digital transformation project, knowing that the finance transformation would be limited and constrained while Deloitte Africa was operating on so many different platforms and solutions.

Project Moja

The Deloitte Africa digital transformation project was called Moja, which means 鈥渙ne鈥� in Swahili. It was a business-led transformation programme that not only included the implementation of a common IT platform, but also focused on end-to-end business processes and placing the right technology within those business processes. 鈥淲e wanted to implement a common platform that would set the playing field for the future and help us standardise, integrate, digitalise and automate those end-to-end business processes and move Deloitte Africa forward in operating successfully as an integrated firm across Africa,鈥� Jen says.

The programme was led by a steering committee and sponsored by Deloitte Africa鈥檚 COO,听Mike Jarvis. Because it was business led, COOs from each of the different business lines and regions were members of the steering committee and an integral part of all decision making throughout the programme and continue to steer the current optimisation programme

The organisation started by upgrading its existing CRM system in South Africa and deploying it to all the countries across Africa that it operated in. Then, Deloitte Africa implemented a suite of 51风流cloud solutions which included S/4HANA as its core ERP system, SuccessFactors for HR management, Concur for expense management, B4hana for data management, Analysis for Office for reporting and 51风流Analytics Cloud for budgeting and forecasting. It also implemented BlackLine to support its balance sheet reconciliation process for Africa. In addition, the implementation of 51风流Analytics Cloud as a BI visualisation and dashboarding tool, is in progress.

Part of this programme was Project Tetris, which was the finance transformation project, as well as a master data strategy project, which helped the company determine how it could manage its master data as a firm from a strategic and operational point of view.

鈥淲e had a cloud-first strategy and chose public cloud solutions for most of what we laid down in terms of solutions architecture,鈥� Jen explains. 鈥淭his meant we had to move to a software-as-a-service model within what 51风流calls their 鈥業ntelligent Enterprise鈥�.鈥�

Jen points out that, what was interesting about Deloitte Africa鈥檚 journey, was that they were the first organisation to implement the suite of cloud solutions from SAP. 鈥淲e made a conscious, strategic decision to walk this two-year journey with SAP, knowing that we would be the first and that some of the solutions we were laying down were immature at the beginning of the journey,鈥� Jen says. Deloitte鈥檚 consulting practice was the lead implementation partner that also supported a co-innovation of the solution with 51风流through the implementation. 鈥淭his has strategically placed our Deloitte Africa 51风流consulting practice as market leaders in the 51风流public cloud space.鈥�

She notes that, 鈥淎s a CFO, I am privileged to have that level of skill and expertise in my own organisation, because they were really at the coal face with business through the journey.鈥�

At the start of 2020, Deloitte Africa won the 51风流Global Innovation Award, which recognised the groundbreaking journey it had taken in co-innovating this public cloud solution in the software-as-a-service space.

Now, Deloitte runs an integrated finance function across Africa with six core functions that form part of the restructuring:

• An Africa shared service centre for operational finance, focusing on high-volume transactional activities.
• An Africa business partner structure directly supports the business leadership
• An Africa reporting team, addressing consolidation requirements, as well as all management and global reporting requirements.
• An Africa tax team which focuses on tax compliance and risk across all the different jurisdictions.
• An Africa centre of excellence which houses all Deloitte Africa鈥檚 strategic projects in the office of the CFO and COO, and other specialist centres.
• An Africa regional leadership arm with all the regional CFOs that focuses on regional relevant finance matters.

Reaping the benefits

鈥淒igital transformation, finance transformation and automation is something I鈥檓 passionate about because, ultimately, it鈥檚 going to make business better, more efficient and bring about other benefits like cost optimisation,鈥� Jen says. 鈥淥ur own transformation journey has come with some enormous benefits.鈥�

This year was the first time Deloitte Africa reported its year-end results on the new single integrated platform. Jen explains that the visibility she had into the numbers and what was happening across the business and continent was incomparable to previous years. 鈥淭he level of insights was unparalleled to before in terms of business performance, cash management, liquidity and working capital.鈥�

There are a number of financial processes that have been centralised, automated and harmonised including cost allocation runs, provision for bad debts, and foreign currency valuations. 鈥淎ll our inter-company and month-end closure processes are now managed through a central team which has reduced our period close and reporting by two days across the continent to just six working days. 鈥�

Employee experience has improved with an optimised, paperless, digital expense claim process, freeing employees from paper-based manual tasks, as well as digitized and mobile interfaces for leave and employee management.

Leading through the challenges

As a leader, Jen believes it鈥檚 important to celebrate successes, but to also recognise where things could have gone better. 鈥淭he platform that we鈥檝e implemented is a game-changer for the future, there鈥檚 no doubt about that, but an implementation project of this size, scope and geographical spread was definitely not completed without challenges.鈥�

One of the biggest challenges Deloitte Africa faced was change management, particularly in one of the models they implemented of the S/4HANA Cloud. 鈥淚t required quite a significant amount of time investment for our practitioners to learn and adapt to the new systems.鈥� To mitigate this challenge, the company is currently running an optimisation programme to close the remaining user experience gaps and to complete the analytics and dashboarding portions of the programme.

Digitally gearing up for Covid-19

With the onset of Covid-19, the return on investment on the systems Deloitte Africa had implemented became apparent almost immediately. As a finance function, Jen and her team seamlessly moved into a virtual delivery model.

She explains that, even though Deloitte鈥檚 global CFOs have been doing scenario modelling for economic downturns for quite some time before Covid-19 in order to be prepared for situations like this, no one really anticipated the depth and breadth of Covid-19.

鈥淲hen we went into lockdown, our most critical focus areas were cash management, liquidity and business performance,鈥� Jen says. 鈥淲e immediately set up a business performance PMO.鈥�

From a professional services point of view, the whole business had to adapt and change to delivering solutions virtually, including its audit division. 鈥淚t鈥檚 been amazing to see some of the virtual tools that our client-facing organisation has developed and laid down to support this change of business,鈥� Jen says.

She points out that there are certain things they鈥檝e done in the last couple of months that they didn鈥檛 think were possible and this has included a 100 percent virtual delivery of services for many of our clients, including a full ERP cloud implementation for a client in Botswana.

What it means to be a leader

Speaking on behalf of all CFOs and business leaders, Jen explains that the weight of leadership鈥檚 responsibility and the role that it plays in an organisation was really put in the spotlight during this time. 鈥淲hat we do and the way we manage our business and finance has an impact on people and on society. As leaders, we have to make the right decisions and keep doing the right things.鈥�

She says that she often wrestles with herself about what it means to be a leader. 鈥淔or me, a great leader is bold. They don鈥檛 necessarily do things the same way they鈥檝e been done before and they鈥檙e not afraid of challenges, or to challenge the status quo.鈥�

Jen also believes that good leaders not only have a vision, but that they are able to take that vision, convert it into strategic goals and inspire those around them to execute on the vision.

What鈥檚 next?

In an interview with CFO South Africa in 2017 one of the questions asked was 鈥淲hat鈥檚 next?鈥�. In response, Jen said that she didn鈥檛 know and that she wanted to make a big impact in the role of CFO first. When the time was right, new opportunities would present themselves and doors would open 鈥� which they have.

As of September, Jen has been transitioning into a new role as a director within the Deloitte Consulting practice to drive the market and delivery strategy for large-scale business transformation projects, similar to the one she鈥檚 done in her role as CFO. She plans to use the skill and experience she鈥檚 gained through the process to lead Deloitte鈥檚 clients through their digital, finance and operational transformations.

鈥淲hile the Moja project has been challenging, what it did do was grow a passion inside of me to help our clients and other CFOs to take the same journey and to transform their own businesses,鈥� Jen says. 鈥淢any CFOs are embarking on similar journeys, but what became very clear to me on the journey was that you need a partner you can trust and rely on. Deloitte Consulting does that.鈥�

She explains that she wants to be part of that impact that matters to clients and to help lead organisations into the digital future.

鈥淭hat鈥檚 what鈥檚 great about Deloitte,鈥� she says now. 鈥淚t鈥檚 an organisation where you can really reinvent yourself and diversify your skill set.鈥�

Integrating home and work life

As a wife and mother of two girls, Emma (seven) and Charlotte (five), Jen says that she doesn鈥檛 believe there鈥檚 a perfect recipe for balancing work and life. However, if there鈥檚 one thing Covid-19 has shown her, it鈥檚 that work and life should be integrated. 鈥淭he girls have really adapted to us working from home and they understand a little better what we do,鈥� she says.

Jen tries to include the girls in her work. When they run into the study after school, she takes two minutes to say hello. If she鈥檚 on a call, she鈥檒l ask if they want to listen in and give them one of her earphones. If she is busy writing something, she鈥檒l read some of it to them, even if they don鈥檛 understand.

She said that, initially, having everyone at home was quite challenging. Emma has just started Grade 1 and between her Zoom classes and Jen鈥檚 Zoom meetings, it was difficult to juggle their schedules. However, she says that her husband, Bryan 鈥� who is a structural engineer 鈥� has been a 鈥済reat support (pun intended)鈥�.

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The 51风流Innovation Awards celebrate the achievements of forward-thinking companies and individuals from around the world who are using 51风流solutions to transform their business, drive innovation, and shape their intelligent enterprises. The event was held virtually this year.

The award went to the Deloitte Africa MOJA program, which was launched in 2017 to transform the Deloitte Africa business. The business is a combination of practices across 17 countries in Africa that historically operated independently within the Deloitte network.

The MOJA program resulted in the successful standardisation, digital transformation, and automation of end-to-end business processes, unlocking the power of data to provide intelligence and insight to the executive, improving user experiences, optimising costs, and eliminating manual intervention in consolidation and reporting.

This was achieved by implementing a common IT platform for Deloitte鈥檚 Africa business utilising an integrated suite of cloud solutions with 51风流S/4HANA Cloud, 51风流Cloud Platform, the 51风流BW/4HANA, 51风流Analytics Cloud, 51风流SuccessFactors Employee Central and 51风流SuccessFactors Onboarding , Concur Expense solution, and 51风流Fiori apps to support its intelligent enterprise.

Deloitte Africa鈥檚 chief financial officer, Jen McDonald, and its CIO, Antionette Wager, say that in being the undisputed leader in professional services in Africa, Deloitte needed to underpin its business with a common IT platform and digitally transform its business processes.

Deloitte Africa selected a suite of cloud solutions from SAP, walked the co-innovation journey with SAP, and utilised its own Deloitte Consulting implementation team to 鈥渆nsure success in a major digital transformation initiative鈥�.

This article first appeared on .

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It鈥檚 a big deal, writes Kevin Govender, Deloitte Africa ERP director.

With the emergence of 51风流S/4 HANA as a key finance transformation enabler, CFOs and business leaders are facing several key choices as they consider if and how to implement a new ERP system.

We know from experience that central finance is frequently used as a first step 鈥� an efficient mechanism for beginning broader ERP deployments. It allows business units to transact in legacy systems uninterrupted during implementation.

Central finance also provides a platform for innovation, with new 51风流S/4 HANA capabilities built around machine learning and cognitive analytics.

These enhancements can enable organisations to achieve a true 鈥渓ights-out finance鈥� shared services offering, driven by a new data model, greater transparency, and fresh innovations. This means finance is no longer in the dark.

Essentially, companies鈥� visibility into transaction data that would otherwise be masked in aggregated summary data tables or be in a completely different format altogether.

Companies committed to 51风流will likely find themselves grappling with 51风流S/4 HANA decisions over the next five years. Making choices earlier 鈥� building in time for your teams to influence both the overall vision and the implementation options 鈥� should increase the odds of getting things right.

Is this an implementation or a transformation?

51风流HANA is SAP鈥檚 brand of in-memory computing, a technology that handles massive data sets without breaking a sweat. 51风流built its latest next-generation intelligent ERP (51风流S/4 HANA) around this technology.

The company reports that more than 12 000 customers have committed to 51风流S/4 HANA.

Traditional ERP systems are optimised for transaction processing, with data stored in many different tables. 51风流S/4 HANA uses its Universal Journal to store all financial transaction details in one table.

It鈥檚 also a platform for real-time analytics 鈥� with no more waiting for separate reporting systems, batch jobs, and long processing times. With 51风流S/4HANA Group Reporting, legal consolidations and financial reporting are executed within the core, leveraging data from the general ledger, so consolidations and financial reporting are faster, transparent and more efficient.

What is the best way to deploy the programme?

In-memory processing makes it possible to store and access a higher volume and broader spectrum of data 鈥� supply chain, personnel, sales, distribution, procurement, you name it. But because financial data is foundational to so many business capabilities, many organisations take a finance-first approach, with 51风流S/4HANA leveraging central finance as a tool for creating their financial system of record.

That鈥檚 why CFOs are often driving the case for change.

The benefits identified for the CFO can be summarised as follows:

* Run financial accounting processes more quickly and accurately due to reduced reconciliation efforts;

* Increase accuracy, compliance, efficiency and speed of the closing operations;

* High level of automation to record and manage AR/AP, thus lowering operational costs, decreasing days sales outstanding (DSO) and reducing bad debt write-offs;

* Integrated plan and forecast more accurately to manage business performance and growth with comprehensive management accounting and controlling;

* Perform detailed analysis on forecasted cash flows and daily closing balances; and

* Gain better understanding of the drivers of cost and the causes of underperformance by achieving a holistic view for cost management.

Careful consideration should be given to a big bang approach versus a phased approach. Taking a phased approach is especially important in an environment with a number of external systems (billings, CRM, HR) and other third party applications.

If your future includes more acquisitions, divestitures, and evolving business models, 51风流S/4 HANA can help make life easier.

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