Upgrading the SAP environment is helping APL deliver world-class logistics services across Indonesia’s intricate network of islands. Already, the company delivers 97 percent of customer orders on time.
Moving to cloud presents dramatic time savings and flexibility gains, as Dannarjaya Harinta Sri explains: “In Indonesia, hardware acquisitions come with long lead times. Ordering the kind of powerful server required to run SAP HANA would usually take eight weeks, but with Managed SAP Applications we have the resources ready in half the time. Faster allocation of compute resources cut our SAP HANA deployment time by two months compared to an on-premises installation.
“Managed SAP Applications offers excellent system uptime and eliminates the reliability issues of the older on-premises systems. What’s more, moving to the IBM Cloud enables us to shift 59 percent of expenditure from Capex to Opex. We are saving even more than we expected, because APL now spends less on managing SAP and satellite applications in IBM Cloud than we previously spent managing just our SAP landscape.”
APL has also migrated from SAP HANA 1.0 to SAP HANA 2.0 on cloud. This migration is a vital stage on the route to SAP S/4HANA, to which APL will move when its parent company, Zuellig Pharma, decides to do so.
In addition, APL looks forward to building on its strong relationship with IBM to explore new technologies such as artificial intelligence, Internet of Things and Blockchain. For example, APL sees potential to use Blockchain to provide robust traceability of medicines throughout the supply chain, ensuring patient safety.
Dannarjaya Harinta Sri concludes: “Digital transformation is high on our agenda, and SAP is a crucial element of our transformation, because it stores the company’s most important information. Running SAP applications on IBM Services for Managed SAP Applications is transforming APL’s business, enabling even closer engagement with pharma clients and patients, making healthcare more accessible for all.
“APL is one of the first Indonesian companies in the healthcare sector to run critical workloads such as SAP on IBM Cloud. In doing so, we demonstrate our position as an innovator and early adopter, setting the tone for the transformation of healthcare in Indonesia.”