Checking the SAP parameter settings
The Professional Edition of the SAPdiagnostic plug-in from Abels & Kemmner, which is available now, makes it possible to access detailed characteristic values and system settings of SAP-systems and to check individual material settings.
If you are concerned with optimizing your planning and scheduling processes in the company, if you want to reduce inventories, improve delivery readiness, if you want to make planning and scheduling processes more reliable, you have to deal with two typical issues on a regular basis:
- What is the current inventory situation in my value chain?
- What about the current parameter settings in the SAP system?
In order to evaluate the inventory situation, sales, inventory values, inventory ranges, safety stock and excess stock must be determined. Some of these values can be determined with diligence. However, estimating overstocking requires some statistical knowledge. For example, the “floor records” that can be evaluated in the SAP system are not excess stock. Furthermore, it is not enough to know the total amount of excess stock or safety stock across all items.
In order to gain a meaningful picture of the inventory situation in the company, it is necessary to classify all materials according to their importance for sales (ABC characteristics) and their regularity of demand (XYZ characteristics). Only the distribution of sales, stocks, stock ranges, safety stocks and excess stocks in an ABC-XYZ portfolio provides a clear picture of the stock situation and shows initial starting points for improving the logistics situation. As far as the parameter and master data settings in the SAP system are concerned, many users try to get a “feel” for the rough settings of their SAP system by picking out supposedly representative materials and laboriously scrolling through important settings in the various master data views. This not only takes a long time, but also does not lead to any meaningful results.
For this reason, inventory optimizers ideally need an additional diagnostic tool that functions more or less like a machine diagnostic tool: It is docked to SAP systems, the relevant operating data is read out and then analyzed and visualized in a meaningful way. If such a tool were available, it would be possible to answer the above questions without much effort and waste of time and thus assess the inventory situation and important system settings on a global basis. Abels & Kemmner has developed such a unique tool in the form of the SAP diagnostic connector. It is available in a light version, which was launched in March, and in a professional edition, which is available immediately.
The light version is suitable for a rough overview without material-specific detailed evaluations. It is therefore a diagnostic tool that can be used for initial analyses and is useful for evaluating potential for reducing inventories. The Excel-based diagnostic tool takes between 30 minutes and 2 hours to automatically synchronize data with SAP and perform the subsequent automatic calculations, depending on the volume of data. Meaningful pivot tables and charts are then available, which accurately show the optimization potential and thus also liquidity reserves in the inventories. Recognizing potential is therefore the main function of this variant. Additional in-depth analyses are required to identify the strategic levers for exploiting this potential. The SAP Diagnostic Plug Professional is now available for these analyses. It enables a far more differentiated, material-specific evaluation.
Our tools
SAP diagnostic plug Professional
… makes it possible to delve deeper into characteristic values and system settings and to check individual material settings.
In addition to the functionality of the Light version, the Professional version enables:
- define the ABC and XYZ parameter limits yourself,
- to carry out stock evaluation at storage location level,
- to carry out an evaluation according to stock types and
- Drill down to the individual SAP material numbers and their parameter settings in all Excel pivot tables and charts.
Protection fee 990 € for 1 year (protection fee of the light version will be credited)
SAP diagnostic plug Light
… calculates the ABC and XYZ characteristics for all materials at plant level and visualizes the distribution of the ABC and XYZ characteristics in an ABC/XYZ portfolio using Microsoft Excel.
- Number of articles
- Sales at the valuation price
- Plant inventory values
- Storage envelopes
- Excess inventory values
- Safety stock values
- set dispenser characteristics and
- set batch size procedure.
nominal fee 79 €
Any SAP-data evaluations
The Professional diagnostic plug is also supplied with a special A&K SAP interface. This includes an ABAP that enables any SAP data to be read – within the scope of the user’s SAP authorization, of course. This interface is able to read practically all data types and carry out specific queries by linking several SAP tables. The pivot functionality of Microsoft Excel thus enables any number of evaluations.
Extensive data analysis can take some time. The Professional diagnostic plug therefore enables automatic updating of the evaluations in batch mode.
Managers and administrators in the areas of planning, scheduling, logistics, materials management, purchasing and controlling can use the SAP Diagnostic Plug-in Professional to carry out convenient, flexible and regularly updatable evaluations. This allows the status of the SAP system to be continuously and therefore sustainably diagnosed.
The SAP Diagnostic Plug Light is supplied by A&K at a nominal charge of 79€. The SAP Diagnostic Plug Professional costs €990 for one year of use. When upgrading from the Light version to the Professional version, the nominal fee of €79 will be deducted.
Further information:
ak-online.de/Diagnosis
