By Freya Purnell
SAP partner Soltius New Zealand will implement SAP Business All-in-One for electricity distribution company WEL Networks in Waikato.
WEL selected the SAP best practices solution to replace their financial and asset management systems, with the implementation expected to kick off this month.
The SAP solution will replace the company’s Maximo, JDE and Microsoft Dynamics software.
WEL Networks’ general manager – corporate services, David Smith, said the company chose SAP and Soltius because of their track record.
“Initially we had an open mind about whether we would replace our legacy asset management software with a best-of-breed solution or whether we would do a full systems replacement,” Smith said.
“As a result of the evaluation process, we came to the conclusion that the business would benefit the most from a fully integrated ERP. At that point, SAP Business All-in-One was the obvious choice based on the end-to-end functionality and Soltius’ experience in similar businesses to ours.”
Utility services contractor Connectics – a subsidiary of Canterbury power network owner Orion – also chose SAP A1 at the end of 2010, but has delayed the Soltius-led implementation until this month due to the Christchurch earthquake. Auckland’s water and wastewater services supplier Watercare is also currently implementing SAP in a project on which Soltius is the prime delivery partner.
Soltius director Jim Brodie said these new contracts, along with current Soltius customers Delta Utility Services in Dunedin and Unison Networks in central North Island, show that SAP has become the first choice solution for companies in the utility industry.
“The utility sector is moving fast, with fibre deployment, smart metering and next generation networks placing increasing demands on internal systems and making a single, integrated solution essential for coping with the changing business models,” Brodie said.
