Navigating the SAP WMS landscape, however, can be akin to traversing a labyrinth, particularly given the plethora of products available. By understanding your specific warehouse management requirements, considering factors such as warehouse size & complexity, and aligning your budget with the right WMS, you can transform your warehouse into a well-oiled machine, driving growth and success.

To choose the right WMS for your business, first, let us explore the different solutions available in the SAP warehousing ecosystem.

Available Solutions in the SAP Warehousing Ecosystem

The SAP warehousing landscape has different WMS options to choose from depending on business needs and wants. Let’s delve into the capabilities of each offering to gain a comprehensive understanding of their functionalities.

Stock Room Management:

• Stock Room Management is essentially SAP’s replacement to the initial SAP Warehouse Management (WM) offering, giving customers a non SAP Extended Warehouse Management (EWM) solution.

• It is designed for small to medium-sized businesses and offers basic  warehouse management functionalities.

• It has simple warehouse features, like managing inventory, moving stock, and counting physical inventory. This ensures efficient stock control and visibility.

SAP Warehouse Management (WM):

• SAP WM is the original product offering from the SAP suite of warehousing solutions. It provides businesses with basic warehouse management functions that can be extended with Task and Resource Management (TRM).

• Medium-sized businesses with complex warehouse operations adopt SAP WM for their businesses as it employs enhanced inventory management capabilities.

• Advanced features like bin management can be accessed, enabling optimized warehouse operations and ensuring inventory accuracy.

• Regarding a future-proof solution, SAP EWM (Basic) will replace SAP WM by the year 2025.

SAP Extended Warehouse Management Basic (EWM):

• Offers more advanced functionalities beyond SAP WM.

• It is mainly suited for medium-sized businesses with manually operated processes who seek an extensive range of warehouse management capabilities

• As a part of SAP’s strategic offering, it can be customized to include additional functions when necessary.

• Includes support for integrated yard management, cross-docking, and multi-warehouse setup. It also helps in streamlining complex warehouse operations and improving its efficiency.

SAP Extended Warehouse Management Advanced (EWM):

• It includes all the functionalities that SAP EWM Basic provides on top of other added features such as labor management, slotting management, and integration with automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS).

• Tailored to the needs of large enterprises with highly demanding warehouse management requirements, it is SAPs flagship offering.

• Being a part of SAP Supply Chain, it can seamlessly integrate with Quality Management, Transportation Management, Global Track & Trace, and Production-Planning-Execution. It also provides support for automation, integration, picking & putting away strategies, and more.

• Integrating automation into your warehouse operations can enhance flexibility and enable more efficient management.

Choosing the right SAP WMS for your business

Basic Outlook

*All SAP S/4HANA references are based on either SAP S/4HANA On-premise edition or RISE with SAP S/4HANA Private edition

Comparison of Functionalities

Integration Capabilities

*All SAP S/4HANA references are based on either SAP S/4HANA On-premise edition or RISE with SAP S/4HANA Private edition

Recommendations Depending on Warehouse Size

*All SAP S/4HANA references are based on either SAP S/4HANA On-premise edition or RISE with SAP S/4HANA Private edition

Features of SAP Warehouse management (WM)

*All SAP S/4HANA references are based on either SAP S/4HANA On-premise edition or RISE with SAP S/4HANA Private edition

Conclusion

First, a clear understanding of the size, complexity, and characteristics of what may be unique to your warehouse is very important. This will help you in identifying specific processes such as inventory management, warehouse automation, order fulfillment, etc. that need optimization.

Understanding the above aspects will give you an idea about which WMS is the best for your business. Furthermore, it is essential to assess your budget and timeline since implementing SAP Warehousing solutions can vary in cost and complexity. Establishing a clear timeline for the implementation project can help in ensuring minimal disruption to your ongoing operations and ensure the allocation of the right amount of resources.

The total cost of ownership, mostly, and not limited to, include the software licensing fee, customized hardware requirements, implementation services, and ongoing maintenance of the solution.

By meticulously evaluating your warehouse management needs, understanding your budget and timeline, and consulting with experienced SAP WMS implementation partners, you can confidently select the optimal warehousing solution that empowers your business.

The post Optimize your warehouse’s potential: Which SAP WMS is right for your business? appeared first on Maventic.

This approach follows a process where the core systems focus on key business processes and data integrity, while SAP BTP handles non-core functions.

Benefits of Clean Core with SAP BTP

Agile system:

Reducing the number of customizations to the core systems can help organizations upgrade their ERP systems with ease. It benefits them from having the latest innovations and bug fixes released from SAP, therefore resulting in a higher time-to-market for newer features.

Reduced complexity:

The complexity of managing extensions and add-ons is reduced while maintaining a cleaner core. With SAP BTP, businesses can use pre-built integration scenarios, extensions and other applications available on the platform. This eliminates the need for custom-developed add-ons to the core system

Building a scalable and future-proof architecture:

Businesses can seamlessly adapt to evolving business scenarios without losing stability and system performance, thanks to SAP BTP, which provides a scalable cloud platform with services like API management, Workflow, SAP Cloud Platform Integration and more.

Innovating using SAP BTP:

SAP BTP offers businesses to tap into an ecosystem of innovations such as ready-to-use apps, industry-tailored solutions and partner offerings. These innovations can extend the core system’s functionality without compromising the ERP’s overall performance.

Key steps for developing a SAP BTP Clean Core strategy

Building an SAP BTP strategy for achieving a Clean Core requires carefully aligning customizations, extensions, and innovations outside the core ERP system to reduce complexity, maintain a stable system, and ensure scalability.

1. Understand business requirements and prioritize relevant use cases

• First, begin by identifying key business processes that require extensions or integrations. To ensure stability and ease of maintenance, it is best to leave the core processes untouched.
• You can implement newer innovations to non-core processes, since this is where competitive differentiation and the objectives for achieving your business goals mainly exist. Leverage SAP BTP’s side-by-side extensibility to develop and integrate outside the main ERP system for use cases on a priority basis.

2. Assess and categorize customizations

• Evaluating the current custom code: Analyze the custom code that you have implemented across your ERP system using SAP’ tools (e.g. Custom Code Migration app) to understand which customizations might be a priority, redundant or should be re-written on SAP BTP.
• Categorization of customizations:
  • Core: Essential processes that must remain in the ERP.
  • In-app extensibility: Minor customizations managed within S/4HANA.
  • Side-by-Side extensions: Innovations, integrations, and heavy customizations that can be leveraged through SAP BTP.

3. Utilizing SAP BTP for side-by-side extensions

• Extend with SAP BTP: For increased flexibility and scalability, move custom logic, analytics, and user interfaces to SAP BTP.
• Low-Code/No-Code tools: Use tools like SAP AppGyver and SAP Business Application Studio for enhanced and dynamic app development.
• SAP Integration Suite: You can integrate non-SAP systems with your current SAP systems with the help of SAP BTP without making any changes to your core ERP.

4. Develop an extensibility strategy

• In-App extensibility: Use tools like Key User Extensibility (UI adaptations, custom fields and more) and Developer Extensibility (ABAP RESTful programming model) for customizations that require direct access to your ERP system.
• Side-by-Side extensibility: To develop and run standalone applications that interact with S/4HANA using APIs, leverage SAP BTP. This approach helps provide custom solutions for any business needs while putting less stress on the core.

5. Governance and best practices

• Governance framework: Establish clear guidelines and policies to determine when to employ in-app development versus side-by-side extensions.
• SAP Fiori/UI5 for UX consistency: Ensure that custom applications adhere to SAP’s design principles to maintain consistency across the SAP landscape.
• Automated testing and monitoring: Implement monitoring and testing tools to evaluate the performance, security, and compatibility of side-by-side applications on SAP BTP.

6. Plan for continuous optimization

• SAP tools like Cloud ALM or Solution Manager can help in managing the lifecycle of customizations across development, deployment, and decommissioning.
• Review customizations from time to time to ensure optimization and if they are still relevant to your overall business goals.

Recommended percentage split between core, in-app development, and SAP BTP

• Core (standard ERP processes): 60-70%
  • Standard SAP processes with minimal modifications.
  • These processes should run stable and must receive only the necessary functional updates.
• In-App development (minor extensions and custom fields): 10-20%
  • Low-impact customizations (e.g. adding custom fields or small custom reports).
  • It allows flexibility within S/4HANA in a simple environment
• SAP BTP (Side-by-Side extensions and innovations): 20-30%
  • Major customizations and integrations should be on SAP BTP.
  • Through SAP BTP, apps can easily be developed without compromising system performance and stability

The percentage split might vary depending on the industry and business needs

This approach minimizes core disruptions, ensuring a stable and agile ERP that can readily adapt to future changes and updates, thus helping you meet your business goals and keeping you ready to innovate.

The post A guide to approaching SAP BTP strategy for achieving a Clean Core appeared first on Maventic.

The Clean Core strategy

A Clean Core can be achieved by focusing on the six key elements that make up the core of an ERP software.

• Software stack
• Information (Data)
• Extensibility
• Add-on integrations
• Process involved
• Operations overview

Dissecting the various elements that make up the ERP core

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Our client is a prominent player in the global refinery sector, with an annual production capacity of 10 million tonnes. They specialize in manufacturing Benzene, Toluene, White Spirit, Polyisobutene, and Sulphur, serving markets worldwide with critical petroleum and chemical products.

Business Scenario

Before partnering with Maventic, the refinery aimed to optimize operations by harnessing the power of their data—production metrics, equipment sensor readings, and maintenance records—to drive informed decision-making and operational excellence.

Challenges

Operating with fragmented data systems, the refinery struggled with limited visibility, reactive maintenance, and missed optimization opportunities that were impacting efficiency and profitability.

• Diverse Data Source Integration – Production data, sensor streams, and maintenance logs existed in silos across incompatible systems, making it nearly impossible to gain unified operational insights or identify patterns across the enterprise.
• Inability to Predict Equipment Failures – Reactive maintenance approaches resulted in costly unplanned downtime, emergency repairs, and lost production capacity, with no advance warning of impending equipment degradation.
• Limited Analytical Capabilities – Traditional reporting tools couldn’t handle the complexity and volume of refinery data, preventing the team from uncovering optimization opportunities or performing advanced predictive analytics.
• Environmental Compliance Monitoring Gaps – Manual tracking of emissions and environmental performance created regulatory risks, reporting delays, and limited ability to correlate production decisions with environmental impact.

Solution

Maventic implemented a comprehensive Azure cloud analytics platform, leveraging Azure Data Factory, Azure Databricks, and Power BI to transform disparate data into actionable intelligence.

• Unified Data Integration with Azure Data Factory – Orchestrated automated ETL pipelines that extracted, transformed, and loaded data from production databases, IoT sensors, and maintenance systems into a centralized Azure Data Lake, creating a single source of truth.
• Advanced Analytics with Azure Databricks – Deployed machine learning models on Apache Spark for predictive maintenance, anomaly detection, and production optimization, enabling the refinery to forecast equipment failures 2-4 weeks in advance.
• Predictive Maintenance Intelligence – Analyzed sensor data patterns to predict equipment degradation, enabling proactive maintenance scheduling that shifted operations from reactive firefighting to planned interventions during optimal windows.
• Real-Time Power BI Dashboards – Delivered role-based, interactive dashboards providing operations teams, maintenance staff, and executives with instant access to KPIs, equipment health scores, environmental metrics, and production performance—accessible on any device, anywhere.

Business Impact

• Improved Equipment Breakdown Prediction – Advanced analytics on sensor data enabled the refinery to predict equipment failures weeks in advance, shifting from reactive maintenance to proactive intervention strategies.
• Enhanced Decision-Making – Power BI dashboards provided real-time operational insights to refinery operators and management, facilitating faster, data-driven decisions across production, maintenance, and environmental management.
• Optimised Refinery Operations – Integration of production data, sensor readings, and maintenance logs through Azure Databricks enabled comprehensive analysis that improved operational efficiency and production optimization.
• Increased Environmental Performance Monitoring – Analysis of production and emissions data helped monitor environmental performance and ensure compliance with regulatory standards through automated tracking and reporting.

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