Oracle Procurement Cloud Go-live

The last couple of months I was part of a team that implemented Oracle Procurement Cloud at Capgemini. This was an amazing project and an opportunity to be a part of one of the first Procurement Cloud implementations globally. I would like to share my experiences with you where  I have learned a lot through this exciting work with this latest Cloud technology.

Oracle Procurement Cloud implemented at Capgemini

In December 2016, the Oracle Sourcing and Supplier Portal in the Cloud was implemented within Capgemini.

Sourcing Portal Cloud has been implemented in the  Capgemini Latin America region, which helps the procurement team to facilitate end-to-end negotiation processes with suppliers entirely in the Cloud.

The CPO of Capgemini Latin America was happy with the results:

“When we started using Sourcing in Procurement Cloud it was like plug and play. After only a few training sessions the entire team was able to facilitate the complete sourcing process in the cloud. Setup is easy and the solution has already demonstrated to cut costs for our company.”

For new suppliers seeking to do business with Capgemini North America, the successfully implemented Supplier Cloud Portal helps these suppliers to register completely in the Cloud.

Implementing Cloud ERP requires a very different approach compared to conventional on-premise ERP implementations such as eBusiness Suite. Below are a few examples that we wanted to share:

Shorter implementation timelines

One of the benefits of Cloud is that implementation timelines are shorter, which was really demonstrated through this project. Both Sourcing and Supplier Portals were implemented in a three months time frame. The testing phase was completed in two weeks and we moved to production in one day.

Much smaller implementation team

This project went live with our team of  four people; there was no need for huge teams with 50+ consultants to implement Procurement Cloud.

More agile project approach

We didn’t  need to create major process designs or facilitate long lasting workshops to make a good start. By using the standard functional capabilities of Cloud ERP and a more agile approach we were able to quickly have a system up and running. Hosting was done by Oracle, so it is a matter of setting up the system.

Different consultancy skills required – more business, less IT

A smaller team and shorter timeliness mean that we had to fucntion as more all round consultants. Every team member needed to be business focussed, a tester, an implementer and a change consultant. The focus was less on IT and more on business.

In the upcoming weeks we will continue sharing our experiences, based on the following topics:

Contact

If you you need any further information, please contact jeroen.sprangers@capgemini.com or jasper.oskam@capgemini.com

Why implementing Oracle Cloud ERP REALLY is faster

Remember the days when setting up an ERP system was a long and tedious process? I do. Luckily, with Oracle Cloud ERP, it is time to cut the time spend on setup and complex designs in half.

Oracle has been strong in stressing the significant decrease in implementation project timelines and has been emphasizing the ease in which a system can be setup. But of course, seeing is believing.

After I have done the seeing, I can safely say that these statements are not mere hollow outlets of a corporate marketing machine. Below some of the best improvements:

Easy step by step guide for doing setup

Simple solutions are often the best. With the functional setup manager (FSM), all of the necessary -and optional- setup steps needed per business area (procurement, projects, accounts payable, etc.) are shown in an simple overview. Not only makes it sure that you do not skip an important step, it also has all of the required setup gathered into one place. 

No more scavenging through the system to look for that specific setup step that you overlooked somewhere. What a relieve! 

Example of the Functional Setup Manager in Cloud ERP R11

Partial implementation = Partial setup! 

The functional setup manager has another advantage; it makes clear what is required to make a certain process running and what is not. Before it was often unclear what was needed to setup to make a functional process actually work. Via trial and error eventually you would find out, but that is was optimal way of working. To give an example, if you were to use Oracle Cloud Sourcing as a standalone solution in the cloud, there is no need to do any comprehensive finance setup like setting up the accounting structure. Oracle knows that if you only use Oracle Cloud for the negotiation process, there is no need for such setup.

Simplified unit structure

With the flexible, business unit structure on of the most important parts of an ERP system has received a complete overhaul. Of course it still needed to setup the enterprise and legal entities, but the most improvements are made with the concept of business units.

Business units can support not only one, but more business functions and can be setup as shared service center. This means that a specific business unit can serve as a service provider to other business units. Examples are business units that perform requisitioning on behalf of other units or business units that service as a central for invoicing to other units in the company.

This approach can make sure that all business units that are part of the shared service model comply to the same rules and standards. 

             Example of business units

To conclude, next to the fact that Oracle Cloud ERP is now more and more up to par with process flow functionalities of on premise ERP, the way it is structured is much more flexible. This modern approach makes the implementation process much faster.

Implementing Oracle Cloud ERP: Co-existence or complete new implementation?

Since more and more companies are thinking about Oracle Cloud ERP, it is worth looking into two of the ways for implementing this new ERP suite.

Currently, by far the most companies are using ‘Conventional’ ERP such as E-Business Suite (EBS) or PeopleSoft. More often than not, these running applications are complex and require a careful approach when moving to the cloud.

Below I distinguish two types of cloud ERP implementations: the co-existence approach and the complete new implementation approach.

Co-existence approach

A co-existence (hybrid) approach indicates that the existing ERP system will not move to the cloud in one go, but will move in several phases.

An often heard example is finance VS procurement. The CPO wants to be flexible and adapt to the quickly changing market of procurement (which can be accomplished by moving to the cloud) but the CFO is not yet ready to move. In this case, the company can make the decision to procure via the cloud and stay on premise for a while longer with the finance department.

Of course this method requires integration between cloud and on premise. This can be achieved through multiple existing connectors. Oracle knows that most companies will move towards a co-existence solution at first, and has developed ways to achieve this. 

Full new implementation

Next to a co-existence approach the option exists to do a complete new installation. This means that the complete business will move the cloud in one go.

This inevitably has a big impact on the business and requires more preparation than the co-existence solution. Things to think about are fitting the full business process to the solution, testing, migration and change management. Compared with the co-existence, a full new implementation can also bring more risks and requires to have buy in from the complete business. If the implementation causes issues, there is no basis to fall back on as is the case with the co-existence solution.

The benefits of this approach are that there is a onetime effort and investment involved. After the full implementation the project is complete and no phased approach is needed.