Business planning and consolidation with SAP

Efficient planning processes with SAP Business Planning and Consolidation and SAP Analytics Cloud

In the age of digitalization, the question is no longer whether a planning solution is needed, but rather which solution best suits the company. SAP offers two different tools: SAP Business Planning and Consolidation (SAP BPC) and SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC). Since both tools are easy to use and the technical requirements are low, users from the business departments can create their plans independently.

SAP Business Planning and Consolidation (SAP BPC) can be used for any kind of planning tasks in your company. BPC is based on the SAP Business Warehouse (SAP BW) and supplements its scope of services with additional functions. To ensure consistent planning and consolidation, SAP BPC identifies a comprehensive picture of your company’s economic situation. By integrating various reporting interfaces and the preconfigured, industry-specific functions, the planning and reporting solution speeds up monetary planning and budgeting in your company.

BPC as an on-prem, cloud or hybrid solution

SAP BPC includes planning, financial consolidation, forecasting and budgeting elements. Use BPC to create reliable forecasts, comply with accounting standards and speed up budget and closing cycles.

By doing so, you’ll have full access to both SAP and third-party data, in connection with SAP S/4HANA even in real time. BPC is offered in two different versions – SAP BPC Standard for end users, and SAP BPC Embedded for IT.
BPC can be deployed on-prem, as a cloud solution, or in conjunction with SAP Analytics Cloud as a hybrid deployment.

With SAP Analysis for Office, SAP Business Planning & Consolidation enables users to intuitively plan in the Excel world they’re already familiar with and in their browser with SAP Lumira Designer. 

• Save both time and resources compared to conventional processes
• Simple for the business departments to use
• Microsoft Excel integration
• Advanced visualizations thanks to SAP Analytics Cloud
• “What if” scenarios
• Create individual data models
• Consolidation process is automated
• Planning and actual data is analyzed in real time using the SAP S/4HANA integration
• Use additional reporting tools through SAP BW
• Additional key figures and report content is included in corporate reporting
• Automated report distribution
• Mobile access to company key figures

All of this makes planning a complex process that can be efficiently mapped by an enterprise performance management (EPM) solution.

Unlike SAP BPC, SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) does not have an integrated consolidation function. But, due to the use of machine learning and AI, SAC is more flexible and easier to use, and can thus be used in specialist divisions. By using the SAP HANA database, you are shown analyses of mass data on dashboards in a matter of seconds due to the in-memory technology. It’s ideal if you need ad-hoc planning and don’t have a suitable solution in place yet. Since SAC is a SaaS solution, no additional hardware is required. Additionally, installation and maintenance costs are eliminated, and the implementation time is also significantly shorter.

You can use SAC and BPC in parallel (as a hybrid model) for your business planning and consolidation operations, which offers the most advantages.

Would you like to know whether BPC or SAC meets your requirements better, and what added value you can achieve by using an SAP-based planning or consolidation solution?

Then take advantage of the consulting services offered by ORBIS! We support you in both selecting and implementing the appropriate solution. Our BI consultants have the necessary technical and business expertise to provide you with superb support for your project.

ORBIS offers you holistic support when it comes to modernizing your reporting operations. From classic on-prem data warehouse projects to current cloud solutions, like SAP Analytics Cloud, ORBIS is your partner for success.