Warehouse Management as an Important Part of the Supply Chain
Deliver the right goods at the right time – every time
Ensuring that the right number of materials are always available wherever and whenever they're needed is critical, whether it's for satisfying customer needs, supporting your own production, or in support of processes throughout a product's lifecycle. On the other hand, you want to avoid excessively increasing safety stock levels, as this can lead to higher storage costs. To find the optimal path between high availability and low total cost of ownership (TCO), a powerful warehouse management solution is required.
The warehouse management features included in SAP S/4HANA Cloud offer such a solution. Warehouse management enhances the scope of SAP S/4HANA Cloud's core business processes, allowing a company to control and record all movements of goods in the warehouse within the context of related business processes. This increases visibility and control over this critical component of the supply chain. Since warehousing operations cannot continue to operate as a functional silo, it is critical to integrate all elements of the material flow to achieve faster order fulfillment and lower operational costs. As such, the warehouse management features built into SAP S/4HANA Cloud fit neatly into a comprehensive platform strategy for supply chain execution. The solution uses Artificial Intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and other technologies to digitalize the end-to-end process and optimize everything from warehousing to delivery.
The supply chain execution strategy at SAP helps you develop an all-in-one technology solution. This solution allows you to notify planners of disruptions quickly and provides analytical tools for faster resolution.
Using the warehouse features of SAP S/4HANA Cloud in the supply chain offers you the following advantages:
- Reduced warehouse costs - Maximizes the use of resources, such as equipment, space, time, and people to realize new savings.
- Improved service and retail process efficiency - Reduces the order cycle times and offers modern, value-added services to customers.
- Increased productivity and accuracy - Helps standardize processes and procedures to reduce error rates and increase inventory accuracy.
- Enhanced flexibility and scalability - Makes processes more malleable.
- Boosted transparency - Gains new visibility into stock, processes, and other warehouse KPIs.
- Optimized warehouse operations - Packing using packaging specifications, handling of full and partial handling units.
- Streamlined supply chain execution - Traces batches from end-to-end over multiple process steps and locations.
The Scope of Warehouse Management in SAP S/4HANA Cloud
Warehouse management in SAP S/4HANA Cloud applies the central features of a standalone SAP Extended Warehouse Management (EWM) application directly in the core business application. This provides small- to medium-sized companies that have warehouse operations with a comprehensive warehouse management solution directly within the cloud-based ERP. This enables full transparency and flexible automation across end-to-end business processes, while reducing overhead from maintaining and hosting separate software systems.
Warehouse Management in SAP S/4HANA Cloud offers:
- Inbound processing, internal processes, and outbound processing
- Handling units in warehouse management and batch management
- Data migration, master data maintenance, and output management
The preceding figure shows the high-level scope of the warehouse management functionality in SAP S/4HANA Cloud. In addition to the solution's functional scope, we deliver a predefined warehouse structure as a template that you can enhance and customize via a self-service configuration UI. Forms supporting common warehouse processes, such as various handling labels, pick lists, and so on, can be used as delivered or customized to suit the needs of an individual business.
In addition, SAP S/4HANA Cloud offers integration capabilities with various external Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) that may already be in place within your warehouse or added as your warehouse operation grows:
Warehouse Management Integrations
| Warehouse Management in SAP S/4HANA Cloud | Integration with SAP Extended Warehouse Management (EWM) | Integration with a Third-Party Warehouse Management System |
|---|---|---|
 |  |  |
| Warehouse management is handled completely within SAP S/4HANA Cloud | Standalone SAP EWM system mapped to the SAP S/4HANA Cloud ERP | Decentralized WM system (third-party or SAP) for self-operated warehouses communicating with SAP S/4HANA Cloud ERP |
| Self-contained | SAP-to-SAP Integration | Intracompany communication (B2B) via SOAP messages can be mapped to EDI formats by the SAP customer |
| For companies with less complex warehouses that need to use storage bins to show where stock is located | For companies that run complex and automated warehouses with high-volume operations | For companies that use third-party WM systems, or for other reasons, run decentralized WM systems of varying complexity. (see scope item Logistics with Third-Party Warehouse Management (1QZ) in SAP Signavio Process Navigator for more information) |