Highlights from the SAP S/4HANA & SAP S/4HANA Cloud, private edition 2022 release

This week, SAP gave a first sneak preview of the S/4HANA 2022 edition. We have listed all the highlights and will zoom in on the specific functionalities that are important for our focus industries: Retail, Wholesale and Production.

Supply Chain Management in SAP S/4HANA

Improved packaging/carriers and loading planning functionality

A smart new feature for Supply Chain Management has been added to the new version. This function allows you to fill packaging using unified package building, a generic layer for packaging. Until now, the automatic packaging option in Logistics General (LO), Transportation Management (TM) and Extended Warehouse Management (EWM) used different packaging functionalities based on different packaging rules. With Unified Package Building, you can use your favourite packaging functionality in any of the three components, e.g. use packaging construction not only in TM, but also in LO and EWM.

• Take advantage of new consistency checks for packaging construction restrictions and minimise the number of pallets, while taking into account restrictions such as packaging attributes, product stacking rules, customer-specific requirements and height limits.
• Maximise the use of containers/carriers by taking into account various restrictions such as dimensions, vehicle attributes, stacking rules, loading sequence, flexible split-deck.
• Create a load plan manually and increase flexibility by creating multiple load plan PDF files in batch.

Analyse your stock within a specific time frame

‘Analyse stock in date range’ is a new analysis app that allows you to analyse and track goods movements in a single app. In particular, you can:

• Analyse and track the movements of goods of one or more materials within a specific date range
• Obtain a comprehensive analysis of all goods movements that took place within the defined date range
• Availability of all stock-identifying fields as dimensions and additional KPIs (such as absolute and relative booking differences) to deepen the analysis through aggregations and disaggregation.

Production in SAP 4/HANA 2022

Time-phased delivery days and minimum stock levels

This function allows you to use a new safety stock method: time-phased delivery days. This offers the possibility to use dynamic, time-dependent stock levels to cover material requirements, taking into account a minimum safety buffer level and a desired safety buffer level. Purchasing or production is automatically activated to make stock levels continuously available for material coverage.

Comparing bills of materials

We have made a number of improvements to the bill of materials. One of the highlights here is the new bill of materials (BOM) comparison app, which allows you to compare the following:

• The same bill of materials with different alternatives and validity dates.
• Bills of materials from different factories to understand how the production process differs in each factory.
• Different types of bills of materials (sales order BOM and material BOM) to understand how the ‘as engineered’ product structure differs from ‘as sold’.
• Bills of materials with different BOM applications.
• Version BOMs and date-effective BOMs.

The app also allows you to analyse the comparisons and gives you a detailed comparison result.

• Procurement and Sourcing in SAP S/4HANA

  Sourcing Project: Comparison of supplier quotations, cost specification and commodities

  Identifying and contracting with selected suppliers for your direct materials and services is crucial in managing the large portion of costs for both private companies and public organisations. SAP has introduced a new series of possibilities for ‘Product Sourcing’. One of the highlights is the new Manage Sourcing Projects app.

  • Easily create and manage multiple cost analysis templates for the combination of company code, purchasing organisation, material group, etc.
  • Collect more detailed costs linked to each item listed in the supplier quotation
  • Easily compare detailed cost elements of each item with different supplier quotations

Other new features in SAP S/4HANA 2022

Project claim

SAP has launched a new Project Claim Overview app. This allows you to view the details of the claims linked to a project and WBS element.

Sourcing project

Comparison of supplier quotes, cost distribution and raw materials. Identifying and contracting with selected suppliers for your direct materials and services is essential for managing a large part of the costs for both private companies and public organisations. SAP has introduced a new range of possibilities for ‘Product Sourcing’. One of the highlights is the new Manage Sourcing Projects app:

Carbon Footprint data for the material in purchase requisitions

With Product Carbon Footprint you can monitor the carbon footprint of the products requested in purchase requisitions.

Advanced intercompany sales

It is common business practice for an international company to sell a local sales office to a customer and for an affiliated production company in another country to deliver the goods directly to the customer. The new advanced intercompany sales maintain the integrity of the financial value chain in international logistics across borders.

Seamless transfer between customer returns and internal repairs

This release makes it easier to start the internal repair process, which is seamlessly connected to the returns process.

Interface improvements

There are many improvements for end users in Asset Management (fixed assets). One of the highlights is the ‘Perform Maintenance Job’ function for maintenance engineers. The screenshots show only a part of the functions: registration of the duration and the measurement values directly at the maintenance point with the app on a mobile phone.

Fiori apps for warranty claims

In this release, SAP has introduced new Fiori apps for warranty claims, such as ‘Manage Master Warranty’, ‘Manage Supplier Claim’ and ‘Manage Customer Claim’, in addition to these classic applications.

Maintenance order

This scenario is particularly useful for industries where maintenance engineers maintain complex assets that are owned by their organisation (maintenance management) and where these same technicians also provide maintenance services to external parties and have to invoice these services.

Manage credit risks more efficiently

The ‘Manage Credit Accounts’ app offers a 360° overview of all your credit accounts. In the new ‘Manage Credit Management Rules’ app, the credit manager can define rules for different usage situations, taking various criteria into account.

HR Management

Blocking personnel numbers and data retrieval for data protection and privacy.

SAP Fiori – Self-service

SAP Human Capital Management for SAP S/4HANA offers you a modernised set of Human Capital Management functions that will be expanded with new functions in the future. Note: SAP Human Capital Management for SAP S/4HANA is exclusively available to customers who have purchased a separate licence.