Aiming to penetrate the SME market through partnerships with top companies in the industry
On January 1, 2018, SAP Japan will revamp its business organizational structure for small and medium-sized enterprises. Specifically, first, divide the team into one in charge of medium-sized companies with annual sales of 10 billion to 100 billion yen and one in charge of small and medium-sized enterprises with annual sales of 10 billion yen or less, and then divide the teams for medium-sized companies into those in charge of new customers and those in charge of existing ERP customers. Divide.
Business organizational structure for small and medium-sized enterprises after January 2021
Fujii introduced three major initiatives to focus on under this new organizational structure. They are "expansion of new ecosystems", "promotion of digital marketing", and "promotion of cloud ERP as a digital platform".
First of all, it is "expansion of the new ecosystem". For SMEs with sales of 10 billion yen or less, top companies in each industry will be made business partners, and industry partners, SAP, and SI partners will work together to build an ecosystem for each industry.
"SAP's strength is that it can ITize business processes and combine them like Lego blocks to provide new processes, and it is highly likely that leading companies in each industry are using SAP's core system. Therefore, we will consider major companies that are industry leaders as business partners and build a new ecosystem in which we will provide services to small and medium-sized enterprises in each industry through collaboration." (Mr. Fujii)
We will develop a platform business for small and medium-sized enterprises in the industry with the top major companies in the industry as business partners.
Specifically, through this ecosystem, we will build and provide industry-specific “shared-ride (multi-tenant)” cloud ERP. The focus is on sales through the SAP Partner Managed Cloud (PMC), which allows industry partners to resell cloud services.
As an example of such an industry ecosystem, I introduced the cloud integrated backbone system "Landlog ERP" for the construction industry, which is currently being developed and tested. This system is being developed and tested by LANDLOG, which was launched together with Komatsu, NTT Docomo, and OPTiM. It is intended to realize real-time grasp of the situation, construction cost management and purchase management.
The policy is to develop a “shared-ride” cloud ERP for each industry. As an example, he introduced "Landlog ERP" for the construction industry with Komatsu as an industry partner.
On the other hand, for medium-sized companies, he said that he will fully deploy the "Intelligent Enterprise Standard Solution Model (i-ESM)" to efficiently introduce ERP and AI/automation. The aim is to use the intelligent functions (AI/automation functions) built into S/4 HANA in advance to create a platform that realizes the "intelligent enterprise" advocated by SAP.
As a measure for that, since June this year, we have been developing i-ESM for semi-major / medium-sized companies with partners who have expertise in each industry. In addition to ERP (S/4 HANA), this is a menu of intelligent options and partner-specific options to present model cases of introduction costs and periods, and to shorten the introduction project.
Mr. Fujii said that at the time of the announcement in June, there were 3 partners, but now it has expanded to 10 partners, and introduced that the industry template is also steadily expanding. "From next year onwards, this template will be used to spread a faster, more efficient, and highly productive introduction model," says Fujii.
"Intelligent Enterprise Standard Solution Model (i-ESM)" being developed for semi-major/mid-sized companies with partners
Finally, Mr. Fujii pointed out that the positioning, selection, and introduction of core systems are changing significantly, including the impact of the corona crisis. It is now used as a “digital business platform” rather than a simple aggregation system, especially in the non-competitive field, adopting a “Fit to Standard model” that combines standard functions, and selection based on business standard packages design that allows data connection not only with the company but also with business partners, and implementation projects led by the company rather than dependent on vendors.
"Instead of relying on vendors for digitization, we can see a mindset of taking the initiative and promoting digital transformation under the company's own initiative. In addition, managers themselves lead the movement. As a result, we have begun to focus on developing digital human resources within our company. Conversely, partners who adopt the conventional approach will be weeded out in the future.” (Fujii Mr)
