EMERY OLEOCHEMICALS
COMPLETE ERP SOLUTION LEVERAGES
“Because SAP Best Practices for
Chemicals provides 75% of the
functionality we need, we knew
it would shorten our implementation
time and lower our costs.”
Ralf Petersohn, Head of IT,
Emery Oleochemicals Group
SAP Customer Success Story
Chemicals
SAP CHEMICAL INDUSTRY EXPERTISE
QUICK FACTS
Company
• Name: Emery Oleochemicals
• Headquarters: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
• Industry: Chemicals
• Products and services: Oleochemical
products
• Revenue: €775 million
• Employees: 1,100
• Web site: www.emeryoleo.com
• Implementation partner: Accenture
Challenges and Opportunities
• Establish an independent company,
business processes, and systems
• Ensure deployment of best practice
processes for the chemical industry
• Increase productivity and efficiency
Objectives
• Implement a complete enterprise resource
planning (ERP) system in 9 months
• Automate business processes according
to industry best practices
• Integrate with other SAP® and 3rd-party
solutions
• Outsource noncore functions as well as
hardware and software maintenance
SAP Solutions and Services
• SAP Best Practices for Chemicals
package
• SAP Business All-in-One for Chemicals
solution
• SAP ERP application
Implementation Highlights
• Leveraged 75% of SAP prebuilt
processes
• Cost-efficiently completed implementation
on time
• Successfully outsourced business func-
tions as well as hardware and software
maintenance
Why SAP
• Mature package of industry-standard best
practices for the chemical industry
• Comprehensive solution appropriate to
requirements and size of company
• Strong integration capabilities
• Prior experience with SAP interfaces and
process automation
Benefits
• On-time and within-budget implementation
• Simplified inventory control and reporting
compared to former SAP solution
• More data transparency for greater insight
into inventory movement
• IT focus on business processes and
operational efficiency
Third-Party Integration
Multiple systems including:
• Atrion for environmental health and safety
compliance
• Foreign trade
• Optical archive for incoming invoices
Emery Oleochemicals Group faced one of the most difficult IT chal- At the same time, Emery Oleochemicals
recognized that the implementation
lenges of any business. Following its parent company’s decision to offered the opportunity to identify areas
sell the chemicals producer, Emery Oleochemicals needed to build for improvement by defining new busi-
ness processes, optimizing existing
its own fully functional enterprise resource planning (ERP) system ones, setting up distributed business
and IT infrastructure. It succeeded – on time and within budget – units to manage functions that had
been centralized, and outsourcing non-
with the help of the SAP® Business All-in-One for Chemicals solution, core competencies. However, this type
the preconfiguration provided by the SAP Best Practices for Chemicals of analysis typically requires develop-
ment of a blueprint, a lengthy process
package, and the expertise of Accenture, an SAP partner. “With which was not feasible given the tight
SAP and Accenture, we have been able to rapidly establish Emery time frame, budget constraints, and
small IT staff. Emery Oleochemicals
Oleochemicals as a stand-alone company equipped with tools that needed a solution that would immedi-
provide full data transparency and control over our processes so ately deliver most of the standardized
processes used by chemical producers,
that we can manage them strictly to our needs,” says Ralf Peter- while providing the flexibility to create
sohn, head of IT for Emery Oleochemicals Group. and modify those processes to meet
the company’s specialized requirements.

Headquartered in Kuala Lumpur, A Complete ERP Solution Quick Implementation with

Malaysia, Emery Oleochemicals
operates globally with 1,100 employees
at its production sites and service cen-
ters spread across Europe, Asia, and
the Americas. The company produces
a wide range of oleochemical products
derived from renewable raw materials
such as tallow as well as palm, coconut,
and vegetable oils. These oils are used
in a broad range of applications, includ-
ing soaps and detergents, cosmetics,
pharmaceuticals, textiles, preserving
agents, and plastic additives. The com-
pany is one of the leaders in fatty acid
and glycerin production, oilfield tech-
nology based on biodegradable re-
sources, and ecologically sound stabi-
lizers for the processing of plastics.
from Scratch
To establish itself as an independent
company, Emery Oleochemicals needed
to develop an IT organization, imple-
ment a new ERP solution, and automate
multiple complex business processes,
starting with Emery Oleochemicals
Europe. Up until that time, employees
had used the SAP applications and
processes of its parent company, which
maintained a substantial IT operation
and centralized many of its functions.
“The goal was a single, cost-efficient
system that could serve our global oper-
ations. We wanted a lean, standardized
solution that could be quickly imple-
mented and let us concentrate on our
business processes rather than IT sup-
port,” says Hans Peter Eckardt, CFO at
Emery Oleochemicals Europe.
SAP Best Practices for Chemicals
The company determined that SAP
Business All-in-One for Chemicals,
based on SAP Best Practices for
Chemicals, would best meet its exten-
sive requirements while facilitating
a rapid, cost-efficient deployment.
Built on the SAP ERP application, the
solution provides preconfigured soft-
ware that supports industry-standard
business processes in the chemical
industry. Especially well-suited for mid-
size and smaller chemical companies,
these preconfigured business processes
eliminated the need for a costly and
time-consuming blueprint and helped
Emery Oleochemicals to meet its target
date. “Because SAP Best Practices for
Chemicals provides 75% of the func-
 “SAP has helped us to streamline our operations. We have appreciated the
fact that the predefined business processes allowed us not only to quickly
implement industry-standard practices, but also to question and redefine
our processes where we identified opportunities for improvement.”

Andreas Meinz, Vice President, Emery Oleochemicals Europe

tionality we need, we knew it would
shorten our implementation time and
lower our costs,” Petersohn comments.
The ability to easily integrate the soft-
ware was another deciding factor, as
Emery Oleochemicals would continue
to exchange data with its former parent,
“With SAP and Accenture, we have
been able to rapidly establish Emery
Oleochemicals as a stand-alone
company equipped with tools that
provide full data transparency and
control over our processes so that
we can manage them strictly to our
needs.”
Ralf Petersohn, Head of IT, Emery
Oleochemicals Group
partners, suppliers, and service provid-
ers. In addition, because the parent
company used SAP applications, the
employees of Emery Oleochemicals
were already familiar with the interfaces
and automated processes, which would
reduce training and ramp-up time when
moving to the new solution.
Emery Oleochemicals combined its se-
lection of SAP software with service
hosting and application management
provided by Accenture, its implementa-
tion partner. This enabled the company
to meet its goal of outsourcing hardware
and software maintenance. Petersohn
explains why the company chose
Accenture: “Accenture presented a
very good and structured concept as
well as excellent reference customers.
We felt they not only understood the
needs of midsize companies but also
offered the global reach that we would
need given our worldwide operations.”
Accenture coordinates the SAP mainte-
nance activities for Emery Oleochemi-
cals at its support and data centers in
Germany.
Leveraging SAP Expertise to
Streamline Business Processes
During the implementation, Emery
Oleochemicals changed business pro-
cesses to comply with the leading-edge
practices as preconfigured in SAP Best
Practices for Chemicals, using approxi-
mately 75% of the practices. At the
same time, Accenture worked closely
with the business process owners with-
in the company to identify site-specific
processes and interfaces that needed
to be developed and integrated.
Based on its smaller size, compared
to its former parent company, Emery
Oleochemicals chose to shrink the
number of interfaces, redesign its master
data management, and reduce the
complexity of its controlling and finance
processes. As a result, new-materials
numbering has simplified inventory con-
trol and reporting, the higher level of
data transparency provides greater
insight into inventory movement, and
sales reporting is easier using divisions
instead of profit centers as the basis
for the reports. In addition, reducing
the number of controlling elements sim-
plified reporting to suit the company’s
needs.
A key integration with the digital truck-
weighing station automates the vital
road tanker process. This solution auto-
matically captures the weights of incom-
ing and outgoing transports. Connection
with the former owner’s SAP laboratory
system eases end-to-end order pro-
cessing and allows testing data and re-
sults to be automatically transferred
into the Emery Oleochemicals system
via “IDocs” – the standard SAP format
for electronic data interchange (EDI)
between systems. And EDI established
with a logistics provider means quick
transmission of delivery changes.
“SAP has helped us to streamline our
operations. We have appreciated the
fact that the predefined business pro-
cesses allowed us not only to quickly
implement industry-standard practices
but also to question and redefine our
processes where we identified oppor-
tunities for improvement,” says Andreas
Meinz, vice president at Emery Oleo-
chemicals Europe.
Emery Oleochemicals has also been
able to maximize its use of outsourcing
because of the high level of standard-
ization built into SAP Best Practices
for Chemicals. The company has out-
sourced noncore functions, such as
foreign trade, and eliminated technical
maintenance with application support
managed by Accenture. As a result, the
 www.sap.com /contactsap

IT team can stay focused on streamlin- When Petersohn looks back on the
ing business functions. “Our objective whirlwind pace of the project, he notes
is spending time looking at how we can how instrumental SAP has been in
best improve process efficiency and helping achieve the fast results: “It’s
management rather than worrying remarkable that a small team could set
about system issues,” Meinz explains. up a complete and fully functional ERP
system from scratch combined with an
Global Implementation Started optimization of the company’s processes
within nine months,” says Petersohn.
Today 340 Emery Oleochemicals em- “This demonstrates the value of the
ployees use the company’s single, fast, industry-standard processes built into
and lean ERP solution. The solution SAP Best Practices for Chemicals.”
was rolled out successfully to the Unit-
ed States in 2008. Now the group is
planning to extend the use of its SAP
software to its operations in Malaysia.
“We look forward to scaling the results
we have achieved with SAP Best Prac-
tices for Chemicals throughout the rest
of our group,” says Petersohn. Once the
rollout is complete, Emery Oleochemi-
cals will continue to concentrate on le-
veraging the industry-standard practic-
es to optimize processes and increase
efficiency and flexibility. It is also con-
sidering additional SAP software for
customer relationship management.

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