Enteg helps Watson Pharma optimize their business processes through an effective SAP implementation

Introduction

Watson Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NYSE-WPI) is a global specialty pharmaceutical company with a broad product line, operations in established as well as emerging markets and revenues pegged at USD 3 billion. On the threshold of consolidating and enhancing its position in the market, Watson was looking at improving its cost structure, and targeting products in generics, brands and bio-pharmaceuticals that will deliver long-term growth. Here is an account of how they managed to successfully achieve their business goals.

Business challenge

Watson Pharmaceuticals was not new to SAP. They had implemented SAP Business Intelligence (BI) in 2007, the module integration was minimal. They were unable to leverage the features SAP BI had to offer, and therefore it was underutilized.

To consolidate their position in the market, improve their product offerings and cost structure, they had to re-jig their SAP implementation and ensure that they fully leverage the various features this solution had to offer. Watson Pharma was keen to re-implement SAP BI for all the modules.

Watson Pharma preferred to partner with Enteg for their BI implementation satisfied with their expertise and customer commitment levels. Enteg is a SAP Partner and a core SAP implementation expert, understanding SAP better than anyone else. It also helped that Enteg specialized in adversary services which bought in a wealth of experience into this engagement.

Implementation Process:
The solution scope involved implementing all the modules, i.e. SD, MM (Purchase and Inventory), PP, CO and QM modules. The implementation process was successfully conducted in five phases.

• Initial Planning and Preparation: This phase involved initial planning and preparation for the SAP project, defining project goals and objectives, crystallizing the scope of implementation, defining the project schedule and implementation sequence, and finally project organization and resource allotment.
• Business Blueprint: This phase helped understand how the company intends to run SAP to support its businesses. Original project goals and objectives were defined further and overall project schedule was revised. Enteg developed a comprehensive blueprint, which is a detailed documentation of the requirements gathered through intensive workshops, by the end of this phase.
• Realization: Enteg implemented 21 reports (of 27) of the business process requirements based on the Business Blueprint. The system configuration methodology was provided in two work packages: baseline (major scope); and final configuration (remaining scope). The other key areas of this phase included :
• Conducting integration tests and drawing up end user documentation.
• Training and Documentation Plan (Realization Phase)
• User Roles and Authorizations Implementation
• Development and Customization
• Functional and Performance Test Planning
• Final Configuration and Confirmation
• UAT and Final Integration Test
• Quality Management Realization(Sign-Off)
• Pre-launch: The pre-final phase involved testing, end-user training, system management and cut-over activities before the project was to go live. Enteg also worked towards resolving all critical open issues during this phase, and by the end of it, the business was ready to run in the live SAP system.
• Launch: The business moved from a project-oriented, pre-production environment to live production operation. The most important activities included setting-up production support by creating and scheduling process chains.