As one of Europe’s leading providers of innovative, environmentally friendly textile processing technology, Sympatex Holding GmbH delivers textile expertise, advanced manufacturing techniques and stylistic inspiration to nearly 98 per cent of all classic menswear suppliers. The company relies heavily on its existing SAP ECC 6.0 release for financial accounting, planning, logistics material management, sales, distribution and other business processes.
Sympatex chief information officer, Hasso Ercelebi, has no complaints about SAP ECC 6.0.
“Our SAP system runs well. It is well-engineered and we are happy with what we have,” Ercelebi says.
However, ongoing support costs associated with SAP had Ercelebi looking for support alternatives by 2009.
“Our biggest expense in IT aside from personnel costs was SAP support. The textile industry in Germany is a very competitive business, and we always have to look at our costs, to see whether what we’re paying makes sense or not.”
Noting that Sympatex had purchased more SAP licenses than it was actually using, Ercelebi tried negotiating with SAP.
“Our first thought was to give up some of our licenses, because we didn’t need them anymore,” he says.
“This was not an option with SAP. Because there was no flexibility, we simply had to pay the full amount for support.”
The company’s biggest expense in IT after personnel costs had been SAP support. Since making the change, its savings have been greater than 50 per cent with additional savings from Rimini Street’s support for customisations, avoidance of forced upgrades, and streamlining of support processes.
“What’s equally significant is the fact that I was able to decrease the IT budget while receiving better service and issue resolution,” Ercelebi says. “We have not lost any effectiveness in terms of resolution of issues.”
As part of its support services with Rimini Street, the company is also receiving comprehensive tax, legal and regulatory updates.
In late 2013, the German government published new tax legislation to take effect in 2014 that significantly affected all companies running SAP’s Travel Management module. It involved changes to the ERP system and new business processes that each company had to implement. Although the net effect of the legislation was to radically simplify and unify existing tax laws around travel costs, it was a very significant and complex change to an area that hadn’t been changed for years.
Sympatex’s Primary Support Engineer (PSE) coordinated an intensive effort to resolve an urgent time-sensitive issue for the textile manufacturer.
Rimini Street responded by delivering code changes and SAP table updates, as well as documentation detailing the adjustments needed to its internal processes for tracking overnight stays, commuting allowances, additional meals and expenses abroad.
“I was very impressed with Rimini Street’s thoroughness in dealing with the regulatory changes,” Ercelebi says. “I appreciated that Rimini Street went into such depth, and were willing to openly dialogue with us about how to correctly interpret some of the legislation’s vague language.”
- Saved more than 50 per cent on annual support fees compared to vendor support
- Decreased IT budget without losing effectiveness of support issue resolutions
- Received comprehensive tax updates in response to complex changes to German regulations governing travel expenses
Rimini Street customers save multiples of SAP vendor fees
A research report by Rimini Street, published in September
2014, called ‘Assessing the Business Case for Independent SAP Software
Report’, helps customers understand the overall business case for moving
to independent support by providing supporting evidence of 27 in-depth
client return on investment (ROI) studies that show the total
maintenance savings by switching from vendor support to Rimini Street
and the impact and value to their organisations as a whole.
Nucleus Research verified the methodology, data, results,
and interpretation of the study for accuracy and credibility, and found
that the client data and estimates were reasonable and representative of
the savings Rimini Street customers can make.
Rebecca Wettemann, vice president of Nucleus Research, said
there is a compelling business case for switching from SAP software
support to independent support.
“Customers seeking to do more with fewer resources are
looking at their overall IT operations budget to identify
underperforming investments. They’re finding that moving to independent
support frees up vendor tax dollars to invest in technology that drives
growth and greater innovation, enabling them to deliver what the
business needs now,” Wetteman says. “In short, we believe many
organisations will have little difficulty formulating a solid,
persuasive business case for switching from vendor support to
independent support of their enterprise software, as validated by the
findings of this study.”
While SAP customers switching to independent support with
Rimini Street save 50 per cent on annual maintenance fees, there are
also savings on upgrades, customisation support, and maintenance
efficiencies.
“Nucleus also found that some clients, depending on the
extent of their customisations and upgrade philosophy, saved as much as
three times their annual vendor maintenance fees,” the report says. “On
the low end, other clients reported saving approximately the equivalent
of their annual vendor maintenance fees.”
This case study is sponsored by Rimini Street and was first published in the Inside SAP Yearbook 2015 (published November 2014).
