CERATIZIT & Soley Drive Sustainable Product Management with SAP Technology

Overview

CERATIZIT Group, a leading provider in hard material solutions, partnered with Munich-based Soley GmbH to optimize their complex product portfolio sustainably and profitably. Through cutting-edge AI and SAP supply chain management (SCM) technologies, they have transformed product portfolio management, demonstrating a landmark approach in combining economic and ecological goals.

The Challenge: Managing Scale and Sustainability

CERATIZIT’s Cutting Tool Solutions division manages over 65,000 products, struggling with limited transparency around product performance and sustainability metrics. Manual reporting diverted valuable employee time from strategic decision-making, and insufficient insights into suppliers and materials hindered phasing out high-emission products.

AI-Powered Solution by Soley and SAP

Soley’s Product Mining Platform, integrated into SAP’s ecosystem through SAP S/4HANA, SAP Business Warehouse, and SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP), uses AI-driven modules to analyze and optimize the product portfolio:

• AI Advisor: Recommends actionable steps such as product phaseouts to reduce carbon footprints without hurting margins.
• AI Assistant: Provides a natural-language interface simplifying user interaction without deep technical know-how.
• AI Detective: Identifies hidden dependencies and pinpoints opportunities to enhance both profitability and sustainability.

This solution leverages SAP Datasphere, SAP Analytics Cloud, and SAP Databricks for advanced data consolidation, analytics, and graph-based dependency analysis.

Business and Sustainability Impact

CERATIZIT achieved significant improvements within nine months:

• Sustainability Gains:

  • 87% implementation of AI-recommended measures.
  • Over 30% reduction in end-of-life products with negative carbon footprints.
  • 100% transparency in sustainability data across product hierarchies.

• Financial and Operational Benefits:

  • 10% increase in Earnings Before Interest and Taxes (EBIT) through optimized working capital.
  • 75% improvement in delivery reliability and supply chain resilience.
  • 40% reduction in inventory.
  • Return on investment realized in under 12 months.

Klaus Lupfer of CERATIZIT emphasized the company’s commitment to sustainability aligned with economic performance, highlighting product carbon footprint data’s crucial role.

Strategic SAP Leadership and Vision

Dominik Metzger, President and Chief Product Officer of SAP Supply Chain Management, advocates leveraging AI, generative AI, real-time data, and predictive analytics to build an autonomous, resilient, and sustainable supply chain. This partnership model epitomizes SAP’s mission to empower customers to preempt disruptions and proactively promote sustainability.

Conclusion: A Blueprint for Sustainable Digital Transformation

The joint initiative by CERATIZIT, Soley, and SAP showcases how intelligent AI-enabled technology integration can harmonize profitability with robust environmental stewardship. This successful model encourages other manufacturers and supply chain experts to rethink portfolio management as a strategic tool for sustainable growth.

Learn More

• Explore Soley Product Mining Platform on the SAP Store.
• Stay updated on SAP supply chain management innovations through SAP’s newsletter.

Tags: AI, Carbon Footprint, SAP S/4HANA, SAP BTP, Sustainability, Supply Chain Management, Product Management, SAP Innovation Awards

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