The figure shows the basic set-up of a Retail organization with the headquarters (US Retailer Inc.), and their distribution centers and stores. Additionally, there are the (external) business partners: suppliers for merchandise procurement, and customers (wholesale, re-sellers,..), and consumers on the sales side.
The parties involved in this unit are the store, the distribution center, and the external supplier. The intention is to regularly fill up the stocks in the stores with merchandise ordered from the DC, or from the external supplier. Replenishment planning is used to automatically determine the relevant order quantities for the stores.
The solution processes shown in the figure above, Process Overview: Store Replenishment, represent the overall retail store replenishment process with the intent of regularly filling up the stocks in a store via shipments from the distribution center (DC). The process starts with the Store Connectivity - Outbound (3I2) solution process, which covers the download of e.g. master data and prices to the point-of-sale (POS) system of the store. Using this data, e.g. sales- and financial transactions can be posted at POS, which are then uploaded to the central SAP Retail system. This is described in the Store Connectivity - Inbound (3HV) solution process. With the updated inventory figures in the central system, the store replenishment function is able to calculate the actual demand, which leads to the creation of purchase requisitions. This is covered in the Replenishment Planning for Stores (3I7) solution process. This overall process focuses on the logistics from the DC as the supplying site. Which means, the next processes, which will added at a later stage, are the Store Ordering from Distribution Center (5FX), and the Outbound Logistics for Distribution Centers (5FV) solution processes. Note: Purchase requisitions with an external source of supply (see dotted line in the figure above), are further processed as described in solution processes Procurement for Retail (5FM), Inbound Logistics for Distribution Centers (5FU), and Invoice Verification for Retail (5FN). These were already covered in a previous unit, Performing Requirements Planning.
Each solution process represents a lesson in this unit, and can be completed individually.
This lesson covers the solution process Store Connectivity - Outbound (3I2).
In the retail industry, specific terms differ from the standard terms used in other lines of business. The following terms are used synonymously in this document:
| Standard Terms in Lines of Business | SAP S/4HANA Cloud for Retail, Fashion, and Vertical Business |
|---|---|
| Material, Product | Article |
| Material group, Product group | Merchandise category |
| Plant, Location | Site |
The central management of the store sales processes requires an accurate synchronization of data from the SAP Retail system to the POS systems. This applies in particular to article data whose descriptions, GTINs, and prices usually have to be compared on a daily or even hourly basis.
The POS Outbound scenario shows the basic settings, which an Administrator has to set-up, and how to monitor the article data replication within the SAP Retail system. The data replication happens via SAP's Data Replication Framework (DRF) which offers Product Merchandise Data services to replicate merchandise master data including article master data, sales and purchase prices, bill of materials and so on. The services are based on a SOAP protocol where messages, sent between systems, are monitored using the Application Interface Framework (AIF).
The communication arrangement is the main element to manage the data replication: You maintain both the target system and a schedule to trigger the data replication run. In the Replication Mode you can select between technical use cases. The initial replication sends the complete merchandise data. This is usually done for the first/initial data replication for a store. The change replication only sends the merchandise data that was changed since the last replication run of the store. This is usually used during regular store operations. By defining a suitable set of communication arrangements you can set-up the required frequency and the scope of data that is sent to stores or store groups.
The store's POS server is supplied with data for the first time by means of an initialization message (initial data transfer). After this initial transfer, it is possible to only transfer changes, that is, delta information such as new/changed articles or changed prices, instead of creating a full data download every time.
Besides the automatic scheduling of the replication run, it is also possible to trigger and monitor data replication manually - the typical daily work for an Administrator to learn, and to test the set-up of the data replication.
Summary
The key process flows covered in the tutorials for this process are to:
- configure and monitor the outbound communication scenario in the SAP Retail system
- select the merchandise data which should be transferred
- administrate and monitor the technical replication
