Managing the spend is the key. However, Managing the spend “intelligently” will make the difference!
Effective spend management is the cornerstone of financial prudence for any organization. The concept of intelligent spend management takes procurement practices to the next level by incorporating intelligent features and capabilities throughout the procurement lifecycle.
This article will give a brief overview on how SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP) is redefining the future of intelligent spend management.
Intelligent spend management transcends traditional procurement practices by infusing intelligent features and capabilities into every stage of the procurement process. It goes beyond simply buying goods and services; it’s about optimizing how organizations utilize and allocate their resources.
This involves efficiently handling the:
- Direct procurement (Ariba and S/4 HANA).
- Indirect procurement (Ariba).
- Managing External Workforce (Fieldglass).
- Handling travel expenses (Concur)
Incorporating all these spend functions under the umbrella of intelligent spend management provides enterprises with unparalleled control over their spending. By bringing these categories together, businesses can gain better visibility, control, and insights into their spending patterns.
SAP Business Technology Platform: The Foundation of Intelligence
SAP BTP is an open, integrated, and business-centric platform that combines various crucial elements as mentioned below:
What sets SAP BTP apart is that it unifies these elements into a single, cohesive platform, integrating solutions like SAP Cloud Platform, SAP HANA, and SAP Ariba. This amalgamation provides businesses with a single source of truth for all their data and a unified experience for users, developers, and administrators.
In simple terms, SAP BTP serves as the centralized hub for intelligent spend management. It’s akin to having all your favorite OTT platforms under one roof, like bundling Prime, Netflix, and others through a single service provider (Airtel or Jio). This unified approach offers a streamlined and cohesive experience, just as SAP BTP does for spend management.
Intelligent Spend/Procurement with SAP BTP
SAP Business Technology Platform for Intelligent Spend
SAP BTP offers solutions that empower intelligent spend management. This platform drives the evolution towards a unified system encompassing data, applications, and business processes, effectively reducing infrastructure costs and operational complexity. Enhanced spend and process visibility opens the door to valuable insights into procurement processes. With the assistance of embedded artificial intelligence, you can make informed decisions and leverage predictive analytics. Real-time insights into procurement processes ensure timely approvals and releases to suppliers.
As global companies and manufacturing industries have adopted digital tools to manage their procurement, they’ve increasingly shifted from on-premise legacy systems to the cloud. This transition involves migrating a multitude of applications, materials, suppliers, and partners across numerous countries. While these actions have been successfully executed, the challenge remains in consolidating and streamlining the data generated by these applications.
This is where SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP) plays a crucial role. BTP offers an integrated suite of solutions, including robust database and data management, analytics, application development, and integration. By leveraging these capabilities, manual processes are significantly reduced, and purchasing decisions are made based on a transparent view of spending activities across the globe.
BTP simplifies operations and streamlines the integration of a company’s IT landscape for an advanced turnaround of operations.
In essence, SAP BTP provides the process visibility needed for intelligent spend management, transforming the way companies approach procurement and enabling more informed decisions on a global scale.”
The key aspects of spend management include:
Enterprise Procurement Visibility:
- Prebuilt data models
- Self-service data modelling
- Data discovery
- Data integrations
- AI assisted planning & insights.
Automation:
- Process insights and services visibility
- Workflow automation
- App templates, bots and AI document
Collaboration & Execution:
- Persona based content consolidation facilitating execution of procurement tasks.
SAP BTP Solution Extension Types:
SAP BTP Solution Extension Types for Procurement
SAP BTP Extension Types for Procurement Use Cases
- In the SAP Analytics Cloud, you can access AI-driven insights that provide actionable recommendations. For example, it can alert you to changes in your spending with a particular supplier or increases in invoice exceptions.
- The Application Development aspect encompasses both extension and creation. For instance, you can extend the invoice module to improve the handling of invoices from long-tail suppliers. These suppliers often send invoices directly to the accounts payable department with PDF attachments. With SAP BTP, you can digitize, validate against purchase orders, and streamline this process.
- Integration is a significant part of the solution, as it goes beyond spend analysis and extends into your sourcing pipeline.
In conclusion, SAP’s Intelligent Spend Management, coupled with the capabilities of the SAP Business Technology Platform, aims to improve spend management, streamline procurement, and enhance business processes through automation and data-driven insights.