“The new enterprise-wide solution combines innovation and transformation and provides a solid global foundation for controlling enterprises and processes with data-driven business models in the cloud,” says Taras Podberezhnyj, Senior Vice President and CIO of Kemira, a global leader. Sustainable chemical solutions for water-intensive industries.
The company, headquartered in Helsinki, Finland, is not shy about achieving ambitious goals, including plans to achieve revenues of more than half a billion euros from biosimilar products by 2030. As it looks to the future, the company has adopted a strategic perspective on digital technology. Transformation, which will not only enable business continuity, but will create a platform for innovation.
As of June 1, 100% of Kemira is available on SAP S/4HANA, a shift that also included updating the platform to Azure Cloud. Chimera didn’t stop there. SAP has introduced Datasphere for reporting on where a company is on its journey to adopt a next-generation core enterprise data warehouse solution. On the front end, Kemira implemented SAP Analytics Cloud for reporting, analytics, and financial planning. In addition, more than 360 interfaces have been converted to the SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP), leveraging the SAP Integration Suite. Overall, the digital program consists of five initiatives, including SAP S/4HANA transformation, financial accounting redesign, enterprise data warehouse implementation, digital data excellence initiative, and internal interface migration.
Kemira appropriately named the program LEAP, representing the investment it was making in its company’s future and the ambitious timeline and scope of the effort. Innovation played a central role, considering how a company could empower the business with new technology and ultimately push the business to operate more efficiently. It was no small feat to launch a hugely successful big bang, including a move to Azure, within 15 months. Kemira has worked with cbs Corporate Business Solutions on this journey and has been a strategic partner of the company for over a decade.
About CBS Enterprise Business Solutions
Excellence in consulting to global market leaders – that’s what CBS stands for. She advises the world’s coolest companies: famous clients, highly innovative clients and hidden champions in the international manufacturing, chemicals, life sciences and automotive industries. CBS is creating the next generation of enterprise solutions. The company combines comprehensive business process solutions, innovative technologies, strategy consulting, architecture and process design with unique transformation services into a market-leading total offering. cbs is part of the materna group and employs 1,200 people in 22 locations, including austria, spain, finland, the usa, japan, singapore and malaysia. Through its global organization and strong partner network, CBS delivers successful client projects around the world. For more information, visit https://www.cbs-consulting.com/us/about-cbs/.
The approach taken in the program was to perform a selective data transfer from Kemira’s SAP ERP Central Component (SAP ECC) system to SAP S/4HANA. To kick off the project, the team conducted a comprehensive pre-study to determine which processes would be migrated to SAP S/4HANA as-is, what new processes would be enabled, and what new capabilities would be delivered. This approach helped balance project focus and scope, a key element for achieving rapid value. For example, by leveraging some processes as they were, the team was able to focus on new capabilities such as SAP S/4HANA margin analysis, which drove tangible business results. This work has come to fruition very smoothly, covering 400 factories in 37 countries to ensure business continuity, and has been enabled by strong collaboration between the many talented people at Kemira and CBS.
“Given the extreme complexity of organizational change, data orchestration and optimization, ONE Finance transformation, interface migration, and innovations in the cloud, we were able to manage the program extremely well. We successfully completed the migration to a completely new platform in just 15 months. The rapid value approach was It is the key to success. CBS had the right methods and tools to ensure the success of the ambitious project. “Our in-house experts know the world of Kemira and the company’s operations inside out, so it was the perfect combination,” explains Podbereznyj.
For Kemira, cloud readiness is about being future-oriented. You made a deliberate decision to implement a quick turnaround to stay ahead of the competition. The team rightly sees this work as a pioneer of the next generation of SAP business architecture, which also builds on Kemira’s early success with SAP solutions, including SAP’s integrated business planning for supply chain. Data has been at the heart of this program and will continue to guide the company as a foundation for innovation and insights. Cloud readiness is about delivering value-based business transformation. This means supporting new digital business models, enabling new levels of flexibility, and increasing market competitiveness.
“Kemira has jumped into the cloud and digitized the entire world of operations. The company is now ideally positioned for the future. With the platform in place, the company can benefit from all subsequent SAP developments and stay at the forefront of technology. This gives it a clear and innovative lead over other companies that may not reach To this stage of development before another five years.
The relationship with cbs Corporate Business Solutions is built on this holistic approach, which translates strategy into business transformation. Teams realize that this doesn’t happen overnight, and even with successful execution behind them, transformation requires a constant mindset of innovation. For Kemira and CBS, this journey continues as the company looks to leverage new technology and deliver on its commitment to its customers. For Chimera, it’s about delivering “chemistry with purpose.” Investing in SAP and new business technology is about enabling this vision and driving profitable growth through connected business models, data-driven decision making, and integrated business processes.
Matt Reiman is Global Vice President of the Chemicals Industry Business Unit at SAP.