Zespri Rolls Out SAP Technology To Support Its People, Processes And Growers

SAP NEWSBYTE — 14 November 2022 – SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) today announced that Zespri, the world’s biggest marketer of kiwifruit, has gone live with SAP S/4HANA Cloud, private edition. The move will support Zespri’s ability to deliver the highest quality fruit to market and sustain strong returns to growers.

The go-live of this new technology, which took place on 1 November 2022, is the first phase in Zespri’s ambitious, multi-year Horizon transformation programme. The aim of the programme is to standardise and automate Zespri’s processes, increase its operational efficiency, and provide a platform for growth and innovation.

As a result of the implementation, Zespri hopes to deliver kiwifruit to customers more effectively. Ultimately a more robust, transparent and reliable process will support its entire product delivery system, from the receipt of a sales order, to payments for product, through to distribution. Zespri’s quality management solutions will include proof that the product has been grown and handled in accordance with regulatory, customer specifications and consumer expectations.

With a focus on creating global consistency, almost 1,000 full-time employees and contractors across offices in 17 countries will benefit from the implementation, with Zespri also undertaking its biggest-ever training programme.

As well as the move to SAP S/4HANA Cloud, private edition, SAP Integrated Business Planning (IBP) has been implemented to provide a more efficient end to end demand and supply planning capability.

Zespri will also take advantage of SAP Business Technology Platform capabilities, including SAP Analytics Cloud, SAP Integration Suite, the SAP Extension Suite, and SAP-endorsed partner solutions from OpenText, Tricentis, and Celonis.

The SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) platform combines business intelligence, analytics and planning, using best-of-breed data visualisations and dashboarding for analytics and insights. Fiori applications will generate real-time operational reporting right at the point of transaction capture. This will enable Zespri to turn data into intelligence that will help it gain business advantage, make better decisions, improve business performance and mitigate risk. Improved reporting will support informed, strategic and timely decision-making.

SAP’s Cloud Success Services worked with Deloitte in collaboration with Accenture, to use the SAP Delivery Framework to establish a premium engagements service focused on mitigating the technology risk for the programme, supporting the partner with the initial design, technology safeguarding and go-live support.

Commenting on the successful go-live of this first phase, Dave Scullin, Zespri’s Chief Digital Officer, said: “We’ve known for a long time that our legacy systems were no longer scalable and fit for purpose. We underinvested in them for many years, to a point where they would hold us back, reduce our efficiency and effectiveness, and create real risk for the business. We had to change.

“We’ve selected the latest generation SAP applications as our core enterprise platform, but to view this simply as a digital project would be wrong. The Horizon Programme aims for transformational change, supporting a truly integrated end-to-end business.”

Paul Marriott, President, SAP Asia Pacific Japan, said: “Zespri is one of our most forward-looking customers and its ambitious and proactive way of embracing its business transformation means it is experiencing the benefits of RISE with SAP across its entire business. We’ve been working with Zespri for many years, and I look forward to the next phase of our journey, as Zespri continues to grow, deliver, and delight customers, while also sustaining returns to the industry and growers.”

With the foundations now firmly in place and phase one complete, Zespri is looking forward to further developments, focusing on grower enablement and solutions for extended supply chain and quality management, integrated business planning and sales.

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