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A free tool that logistics service providers can use to instantly analyse their SAP systems has been released on the web.
The Key Performance Indicator (KPI) Analyser has been made available by SAP consultancy West Trax on its web site www.westtrax.com to give companies a sense of the return on investment and potential financial benefits they could obtain from their internal SAP systems.
With SAP recently announcing sharp price increases of its maintenance contracts, more and more companies are being encouraged to revisit their SAP lifecycle plans and costs by measuring the actual usage of their SAP system.
The KPI Analyser provides an indication of the potential savings available to SAP clients to offset this increase. Early indications are that the potential savings will more than cover SAP’s price increase.
The analyser measures businesses' SAP system based upon the responses entered to seven simple questions on its web site. These are then combined with comparable SAP systems on the West Trax database, from which the analyser calculates the potential savings for maintenance and project activities.
The algorithm also takes into consideration industry specific details, the SAP release level, and the age of the SAP installation.
The analyser takes no more than 5 minutes to complete. Every entry is completely anonymous, and no prior registration is required.
To date, West Trax studies have consistently shown that about 95% of all SAP systems have significant scope for improvement, a result that should be a wake-up call to all SAP users.
West Trax CFO, Ken Gorf, comments “The next few years are going to be tough for IT investment decisions. However, a potential source of investment for new projects can be created internally by diverting wasteful resources to better use. This resource can be re-directed within months to projects such as optimising the system, improving the end-user experience, upgrading for new functionality, dealing with compliance challenges, and ensuring that the system remains aligned to the needs of the business.”
West Trax has made over 800 analyses of SAP systems in businesses, across 13 sectors in eight different countries, providing a unique benchmark for users to compare their systems against typical and best performance.
In 2007, West Trax published its second report of KPI’s from its benchmark database – copies of the summary report are still available from Ken Gorf. West Trax also welcomes feedback on the new KPI Analyser.
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