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OPCENTER and S/4HANA integration as key to business innovation

In an increasingly competitive business market, the integration of systems such as SIEMENS OPCENTER and S/4HANA has become an imperative for companies looking to optimize their operations and stay at the forefront of technological innovation.

The combination of SIEMENS OPCENTER, the advanced MES/MOM solution for plant operations, with S/4HANA, SAP’s next-generation ERP, combined with IDOM’s ability to take a holistic approach, enables companies to synchronize their production processes with their business and financial operations, providing a unified, real-time view of the state of the business.

The combination of SIEMENS’ MES/MOM system (OPCENTER) and SAP’s state-of-the-art ERP (S/4HANA) enables seamless synchronization between the shop floor and business management, facilitating faster, data-driven decision making. This integration is especially relevant in the context of Industry 4.0, where connectivity and data intelligence are critical to business success. Companies that embrace this integration are better equipped to respond to market demands, anticipate maintenance needs, and optimize the supply chain, resulting in a significant competitive advantage.

In addition, S/4HANA’s intuitive customization and adaptive capabilities allow it to be tailored to the specific needs of any business, providing a framework that supports continuous innovation and process improvement. The integration of all processes into a single database improves communication and facilitates control and decision-making, which is essential for growing businesses.

However, reality is stubborn and on countless occasions at IDOM, we find ourselves in situations where the ERP system is correctly implemented, the MES system works correctly, but both tools are weakly integrated, often not even synchronized in real time, resulting in inefficiencies and discrepancies between the data provided.

Main challenges of OPCENTER and S/4HANA integration

The integration of OPCENTER and S/4HANA can present several challenges that organizations must address to ensure a successful transition and optimal use of both platforms. The following are some of the most common obstacles and recommended strategies for overcoming them:

• Management buy-in: Obtaining the support of senior management is critical. This challenge involves ensuring approval of the necessary resources and alignment with the organization’s strategic objectives.
• Maintaining effective controls: Integration across platforms requires managing the complexity arising from pre-existing customizations and integrations. It is crucial to maintain data integrity and security, as well as business process continuity during the transition.
• Complex legacy landscapes: We often find that in addition to MES and ERP systems, there is a complex ecosystem of applications that make it difficult to achieve a clean integration and that we must always question whether they are really necessary. Legacy systems can be a significant obstacle due to their complexity and need for customization. Integration must address this complexity without disrupting existing operations.
• Unclear master data: The quality and clarity of master data is critical to successful integration. Consistent key management between systems facilitates integration between systems.
• Complex changes to standard products: The implementation of developments that modify the standard functionality of the systems introduces additional complexity in their maintenance and evolution, while making it difficult to adopt the new versions in which each manufacturer introduces its innovations (SAP and SIEMENS in our case), making our landscape obsolete in a short time.

How do we overcome these challenges?

In order to overcome these challenges, IDOM’s experience has shown that it is advisable to make a clear and precise diagnosis. We avoid “easy” solutions and develop a comprehensive plan that allows us to work in a coordinated manner across all systems. Our strategy may include the following actions:

• Development of a master plan that provides a diagnosis of the current situation and establishes a target situation, phasing over time the different actions and prioritizing the actions with the highest impact, i.e. those that can provide the greatest benefit.
• Establish Clean Core strategies, minimizing custom developments over all those that modify the standard functionality, and carrying out such developments around the systems, avoiding modifying the core of the application.
• Adopt the use of new Artificial Intelligence functionalities to perform integration, analyzing discrepancies and contributing to their early detection.
• Assign to the project a specialized team including all disciplines.
• Take full advantage of automation tools to avoid manual steps
• Since plant tools are a critical environment, establish different levels of testing to ensure a smooth transition to production.

Main benefits

The integration of these two powerful tools offers multiple benefits and facilitates the adoption of Industry 4.0 practices, enabling greater automation and improved data collection for predictive analytics and strategic decision making.

Companies that have successfully implemented the integration of OPCENTER and S/4HANA have reported significant improvements in operational efficiency, cost reduction and increased customer satisfaction, demonstrating the tangible value of this strategy for long-term business growth and sustainability. These take the form of the following:

• Improved operational efficiency: The combination of OPCENTER, which provides advanced management of our manufacturing operations, and S/4HANA, which provides real-time ERP capabilities, results in more complete visibility with a single source of truth for plant operations. This enables faster decision making based on real-time data, reducing downtime and improving productivity.
• Reduced costs: By integrating these systems, companies can automate previously manual processes, reducing human error and time spent on repetitive tasks. In addition, by optimizing the supply chain, we can adjust inventory levels of both components and finished goods by responding more flexibly and efficiently to customer demand.
• Increased client satisfaction: With the ability to respond more quickly to market demands and tailor production to specific customer needs, companies can offer higher quality products and services, fostering a closer relationship with our customers by improving the client experience.
• Advanced analytics and reporting: Integration makes it easier to collect and analyze large volumes of operational data. S/4HANA’s analytical tools, combined with the intelligence of on-premises systems based on OPCENTER (Data Driven Enterprise), provide insights that can drive continuous improvement and help identify new business opportunities.

Ultimately, the integration of OPCENTER and S/4HANA is a powerful lever for long-term growth and sustainability, providing companies with the tools they need to compete in today’s global economy. Improvements in efficiency, cost, and enhanced customer satisfaction are evidence of the value this strategy can bring to organizations that successfully implement it.