SAP does focus on user feedback in both the technical areas and the functional areas. User groups are also well organized by region across the globe, with of course ASUG (Americas’ SAP Users’ Group), being the largest.
History of SAP
SAP began in 1972 by nearly five former IBM employees in Mannheim, Germany. The original name for SAP, Systeme, Anwendungen, Produkte, is indeed German for “Systems, Applications, and Products.” The original idea as far as SAP is concerned is to provide customers with the required ability to interact with a common corporate database for a fully comprehensive range of applications in real time.
SAP modules and developing products
The SAP ERP system, or SAP ECC, is considered to be a collective term for SAP’s functional and technical modules that do enable enterprises to manage their business processes through a given unified system. ECC is the on-premises version of SAP, and it is usually implemented in medium and large-sized companies. For smaller companies, SAP does offer its Business One ERP platform.
SAP ERP has several different main modules, which are separated into functional modules and technical modules, each of which has sub-modules.
SAP’s Functional Modules are:
- Human Capital Management (HCM)
- Production Planning (PP)
- Sales and Distribution (SD)
- Materials Management (MM)
- Project System (PS)
- Quality Management (QM)
- Plant Maintenance (PM)
- Financial Accounting (FI)
- Controlling (CO)
SAP also has no doubt cross-application components, which can also be implemented with any of the main set of modules.
Some of the cross-application components are:
- Document Management System
- Classification
- Product Lifecycle Management
SAP Technical Modules include:
- Basis
- SAP NetWeaver
- ABAP
- SAP NetWeaver
- IS (Information Systems) Management
- XI (Exchange Infrastructure)
- Business Intelligence (BI)
- Business Warehouse (BW)
- SAP HANA
Furthermore, SAP also consists of industry-specific applications that do support business processes that are unique to a particular industry. Some of these applications are:
- SAP for Utilities
- SAP for Insurance
- SAP for Oil and Gas
- SAP Healthcare
SAP Business Suite happens to be a bundle of business applications that do provide integration of business and processes, as well as industry-focused functionality. It not only has SAP ERP as its foundation, plus modules for customer relationship management, supply chain management, product lifecycle management, and supplier relationship management. SAP customers also can choose to run Business Suite on SAP HANA, its in-memory platform is for processing large volumes of data in real time.
S/4HANA is no doubt the vendor’s in-memory version of the Business Suite ERP platform, and it is also run on HANA. S/4HANA is meant to reduce complexity, according to SAP, and to replace SAP ECC, eventually.
The SAP is indeed very viable and its applications and trends do indicate that it is an essential component of the business. Business establishment gains much in terms of profits by making use of its applications and therefore need to keep track of its latest trends.
