PIRAMAL HEALTHCARE
ESTABLISHING SUPPLY CHAIN
QUICK FACTS
Industry
Life sciences – pharmaceutical
companies
Revenue
US$720 million
Headquarters
Mumbai, India
Web Site
www.nicholaspiramal.com
SAP® Solutions and Services
SAP® Advanced Planning & Optimization
component
Implementation Partner
Bristlecone
Piramal Healthcare Limited is one
of India’s largest pharmaceutical
companies. With a distribution net-
work in multiple geographies and
12 manufacturing facilities in India,
the United Kingdom, and North
America, Piramal needs the right
IT to support complex supply chain
processes and continued growth –
while keeping costs down. The solu-
tion: the SAP® Advanced Planning &
Optimization component.
SAP Business Transformation Study
Consumer Products
EXCELLENCE
Key Challenges Why SAP Was Selected
• Eliminate multiple legacy systems • Robust, best-in-class, integrated IT
• Eliminate manual planning processes and meeting core business as well as
dependency on spreadsheets – to accel- industry-specific needs
erate planning cycles and response times • Tight integration between planning,
• Improve data accuracy and completeness execution, and performance monitoring
• Accommodate an increasingly complex processes
supply chain • Simplification of the IT landscape
• Streamline processes for contract • SAP’s market leadership and commitment
research and manufacturing services to the pharmaceutical industry
• Improve ability to meet increasing
customer expectations and demands
Implementation Best Practices Low Total Cost of Ownership
• Detailed tracking of implementation prog- • Simplification of existing IT landscape,
ress using key performance indicators enabling the IT team to work more
• Alignment of business objectives with IT efficiently
• Use of ASAP methodology during busi- • On-time, within-budget project
ness blueprint, testing, integration, and • Elimination of high-maintenance legacy
operational phases applications, improving productivity of IT
• Strict sign-off policy for introducing personnel
enhancements • Tightly managed, well-defined project
• Involvement of cross-functional teams to scope
define data integrity and master data
management strategy
Financial and Strategic Benefits Operational Benefits
• Greater visibility of order and fulfillment Key Performance Indicator Impact
data
Available-to-promise process Manual to
• Elimination of redundant data
• Greater ability to react to changes in automated
demand Raw material inventory -15% to -20%
• Streamlined supply chain processes
• Common platform for collaborative Finished goods inventory -15%
forecasting Planning process From macro (groups
equipment) to micro
level (single piece of
equipment)
“Piramal Healthcare has successfully managed to integrate business processes www.sap.com /contactsap
around planning and has taken system visibility and customer service to
a new level.”
Jayant Dwivedy, President, Global Supply Chain, Piramal Healthcare Limited

Starting the Supply Chain Journey Transforming the Business tive and quantitative measurements. It
also designed a KPI diagnostic tree so
Piramal Healthcare Limited, one of During phase one, the project team mem- that Piramal could analyze and conduct
India’s largest pharmaceutical compa- bers – comprising business users, IT root cause analysis to eliminate ineffi-
nies, embarked on an ambitious mission staff, and Bristlecone consultants – ciencies and ensure continuous
to streamline its supply chain. The com- worked closely together to set up key improvement.
pany’s domestic formulations business performance indicators (KPIs) that would
was witnessing strong competition due allow the company to monitor progress. Siddhartha Pahwa, President of Supply
to issues around product differentiation This resulted in a greater degree of own- Chain and Trade Management for
and lower brand loyalty. Piramal was ership across the organization. The team Domestic Formulations at Piramal, con-
also challenged by a period of rapid implemented SAP APO using the ASAP firms, “With SAP APO, we’ve integrat-
growth and an increasingly complex methodology and reengineered Piramal’s ed planning processes, enabling us to
supply chain. It needed tools to help it business processes – such as annual bud- reduce lead times. We also expect to
handle geographical expansion and geting and sales and operations planning see further improvements in customer
product diversification, new product – to meet company requirements. One service, cost optimization, and the
launches, and ongoing cost pressures. task that proved particularly challenging cash-to-cash cycle.”
was linking the complex processes involv-
The core goals of this strategic initiative ing active pharmaceutical ingredients with Looking Ahead
were: effective and accurate supply and formulations.
demand management, proactive supply The pharmaceutical company is already
chain planning for both the short and However, quick decision making at the experiencing benefits from its imple-
long term, reduction of working capital, senior management level, along with mentation. In addition to measurable
improved customer service levels, and strong collaboration between Piramal and KPIs such as customer service levels,
more effective utilization of resources. Bristlecone, helped ensure a swift, suc- raw material and finished goods inven-
cessful implementation. Other success tory, and order fulfillment, the organiza-
Choosing the Right Partner factors included a strict sign-off policy for tion enjoys enhanced visibility of its
introducing enhancements and the supply chain end to end – which
Piramal underwent a rigorous selection involvement of cross-functional teams to enables it to react more quickly to
process, and after a thorough analysis it ensure data integrity. The company also demand. However, the journey to trans-
selected the SAP® Advanced Planning & made the decision to implement standard form the supply chain is a continuous
Optimization (SAP APO) component. SAP APO functionality to reduce customi- process for Piramal. Now that it has
Tight integration between planning, exe- zation costs. core SAP business software running in
cution, and performance monitoring pro- the Indian, UK, and Canadian sites,
cesses was a key reason for choosing Tracking Success Piramal plans to follow up its successful
SAP APO, as well as the application’s implementation of SAP APO at the
robust, best practices–based functional- Another important aspect of Piramal’s Indian sites with a full global rollout.
ity and ability to support growth. Piramal transformation was to establish a perfor-
decided to first implement functionality mance management system for the com-
for supply network planning, production pany supply chain using the SAP
planning and detailed scheduling, and NetWeaver® Business Warehouse com-
the global available-to-promise process. ponent. The team developed a very
It chose “Bristlecone as its implementa- strong framework of KPIs that included a
tion partner. mix of lead and lag indicators and qualita-

50 096 096 (09/08)

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