SAP BPC (Business Planning and Consolidation) vs. SAP S/4HANA Cloud

SAP BPC (Business Planning and Consolidation) overall is a good package and has helped improve our reporting a lot whilst also making it more efficient due to the reliability of data input / output. There are limitations like graphs being so limited in functionality and reports failing when too much data being processed however i would recommend to others.

Incentivized

SAP S/4HANA provides Real-Time financial insights and performs automation for routine tasks. It reduced dependency on spreadsheets, resulting in fewer data losses, errors, and manual tasks. SAP S/4HANA may be less suitable for companies with highly specialized or higher financial requirements that require extensive customization, as the cloud version has certain limitations.

Incentivized

• SAP BPC is real time data. You can send information into the system and see it reflected in your reports immediately. Other systems may require a manual push into a reporting system.
• SAP BPC is a shared reporting tool, so multiple users can be working in a model/environment at the same time, real time. This is especially helpful if your workbooks incorporated multiple processes requiring multiple users to get into the same model.
• SAP BPC is a powerful tool designed to help all facets of the company, from cash flow to capital expenditures to headcount management to financial planning to consolidation.

Incentivized

• SAP S/4HANA Cloud uses the SAP HANA in-memory database, allowing companies to process massive amounts of data in real-time.
• The system integrates AI, machine learning (ML), and robotic process automation (RPA) to automate manual tasks.
• S/4HANA Cloud unifies core business processes like finance, procurement, supply chain, and human resources under one system.

Incentivized

• SAP should focus on delivering one single product for planning, consolidation and budgeting needs rather than providing a large list of options to choose from.
• The product is not very user-friendly compared to other cloud competitors. There is a heavy dependency on IT teams.
• SAP BPC should come up a pure cloud option.

Incentivized

• I would like to have an offline functionality as well which is not available at the moment.
• I would like to see in-built templates that can be used according to organization needs and have to be industry specific.
• Navigation of this platform is quite difficult to learn and requires training. So, new users will find learning a steep curve.

Incentivized

The cost of SAP as an ERP is quite high and the switching costs associated with ERP systems are even higher. That being said moving from one ERP to another only happens once in a great while for large organizations. Those switching costs include retraining, IT hardware requirements, outside consultants and more

Unlike other SAP traditional products, SAP BPC was meant to be simple and familiar to financial users

Incentivized

Day to day data insight is more accurate for manufacturing industry to procure as per forecasted from supplier. Supply and fulfillment cycle becomes more easier. I would say more about performance as we are using this new server so we can see clear difference between SAP S/4HANA Cloud and ECC. Also it has customized business extensions for rapid development.

Incentivized

We need a big support team with various skillset like BPC, ABAP, BW, HANA, FICO etc

Incentivized

The technical support received by the ITT design teams and OS implementation team has been very useful in ensuring that the SAP ERP is well-tailored to our company's specific needs and operations. This coupled with the training materials, business process maps, and concept demos (sand-box demos) makes adoption easy on end-users.

SAP BPC training content and trainers are very good. The training is structured and provides a very good understanding of the product features and functionalities. I attended 6 separate training sessions of week-long or more. I had very good experience in all the sessions. The training is organized very well.

Incentivized

More effective

Incentivized

SAP Training contents are very good, informative and exhaustive.

Incentivized

The implementation was carried out in two phases spread over a period of 4 years with 2 upgrades in between. We also had multiple upgrades to HANA.

Incentivized

SAP requires
a lot of internal and external resources to complete its successful
implementation. The cloud version requires a deeper understanding of the
different capabilities of the local systems (hardware) and the connection
towards your local IT team. We found several problems on our systems that we
couldn't foresee before the implementation and roll out.

Incentivized

With Hyperion we struggled as it didn’t have integrated planning and consolidation, whereas BPC does have it. BPC is easier for reporting as it is Excel-based. Also BPC has prepackaged business process flows that helped a lot. Hyperion on the other hand has a faster response time for user queries or report generation.

Incentivized

The platform utilizes advanced predictive analytics to anticipate operational bottlenecks and put them out of commission before the problems become larger. We can proactively develop effective strategies that help keep service quality in the face of unexpected changes in the market, or external disruptions, by continuously analyzing historical performance data as well as elements of the current market

Incentivized

• When originally implemented (as the predecessor product Outlooksoft) BPC took ASU from trying to budget and forecast for a 2B enterprise out of spreadsheets and into a far more consolidated tool. It has saved us considerable time over the years and paid for itself several times over.
• BPC also allows us to present our budget in multiple different views to support management, board and departmental reporting.

Incentivized

• SAP is as stable as an ERP can get, so there an mandays lost on recovering from problems, etc.
• As as big and stable system, there are quite a few master data tables that need to be maintained on a constant base, so this does cost some extra time, but one gets to have fine tuned processes in return. So this is well invested time.
• SAP is an expensive system in general, but it is as they say. You get what you pay for and SAP is just the best ERP you can get, so...

Incentivized