Describing Business Integration

Objectives

After completing this lesson, you will be able to:
  • Understand the integration concept.
  • Depict product marketability integration in product master.
  • Illustrate product marketability integration in sales and delivery.

Product Marketability Integration Overview

Learn about "Requests from Logistics" and integrated marketability checks.

This image outlines the process flow involving Master Data Specialists, Product Stewardship Specialists, and Internal Sales Representatives for managing product compliance and marketability, detailing manual and automated processing steps across different stages.

Product Marketability - Integration Concept

Regarding marketability for products, there are two functionalities integrated with logistics:

  • Request from logistics - initiated by editing product master data, for example, setting the compliance relevance of a new material to Yes or in case specific data in the material master of an existing product is edited. A request from logistics is also created when, during processing of marketability checks on a sales document, for example in case there is no market assessment for the business process Sell In for the country/region of the ship-to party. It is also possible to manually initiate a request from the Compliance Information for Products app.
  • Marketability checks on sales and delivery documents - these checks are also processed automatically if the document is changed, a delivery is created from a sales order or in case there was a request from logistics created from a sales order and this request is processed and closed. Product Marketability checks are integrated in the following documents:
    • Sales quotation
    • Sales order, Sales without Charge
    • Sales contract
    • Outbound delivery

Product Marketability Requests from Logistics

Understand how "Requests from Logistics" can be initiated and how requests are processed.

A request from Logistics for Product Marketability can have the following origins:

Master Data - any product with the Compliance Relevant indicator set to Yes is subject for assignment to a Compliance View. Details from the material-/ product master are related to the Compliance View and initiate the creation of a Request From Logistics:

  • Distribution Chain - adding a distribution chain initiates the related country to be assigned to the compliance view for the business process Sell in.
  • Plant view - adding a plant to the material of an unpackaged product view initiates the related country to be assigned to the compliance view for the business process Produce in.
  • Change of the Procurement Type in a Plant View.

Manual Request - created by a user in the app Compliance Information for Products, that is, when it is planned to sell or produce a product in a new country, the Product Stewardship Specialist - Product Compliance can clarify marketability upfront.

Business Transactions - e.g. in Sales or Delivery documents initiate a Request from Logistics

  • If the destination country, derived from the ship-to-party, is not yet assigned to the compliance view of the material/product.
  • If the business process Sell in for the destination country, derived from the ship-to-party, has a compliance status Allowed with restrictions - then a specific approval is required for the individual business transaction.
This image illustrates the workflow and key responsibilities of data management, product compliance, and marketability assessment processes involving various roles, including Master Data Specialist and Product Stewardship Specialist.
This image shows the SAP Product Master Data management screen where the compliance status of a product called Resin Remover Lemon - 1L Bottle is being edited by the role Master Data Specialist - Product Master.

If the compliance relevance is set to "Yes", the system creates a request from logistics for the product stewardship specialist, so that the product stewardship specialist is aware that this product needs attention.

This image explains that a compliance request in logistics within an SAP system is triggered not only when the Compliance Relevant field is set to Yes, but also when a Distribution Chain is added, a Plant View is added to an unpackaged product, or a Procurement Type in a Plant View is changed.
This image displays a screenshot of the SAP Process Requests from Logistics app, showing various filter options for processing unprocessed logistic requests.

In this app, the product stewardship specialist can see all requests from logistics. Those can be requests from the product master (material master), but also from other documents like sales orders and delivery notes.

This image displays an SAP interface showing a compliance request for a product named Resin Remover Lemon - 1L Bottle, highlighting the process to create a packaged product within the system.

Here, no compliance view is assigned to this new packaged product. The product stewardship specialist selects "Create Packaged Product" and then assigns the already available compliance view of the unpackaged product.

If this would be a request for an unpackaged product, product stewardship specialist selects either "Create Unpackaged Product" if no compliance view exists or "Assign Unpackaged Product", if the view is available.

This image shows an SAP Compliance Request from Logistics screen for a product Resin Remover Lemon - 1L Bottle, detailing various compliance purposes, assessments, and an option to add new entries.

If this new packaged product needs to be transported into another country/region, the product stewardship specialist could add another transport purpose and then continues with "Ready for Assessment".

This image shows an SAP interface where a compliance request for a product called Resin Remover Lemon - 1L Bottle is ready for assessment, with details about the packaged product, assigned packaged product, added countries, and added compliance purposes.

The product stewardship specialist can either continue with "Assess Now" if no marketability assessments immediately need to be done.

If continuing with "Save", the product stewardship specialist can add market assessments at a later point in time.

The image shows the initial screen of the Manage Basic Compliance Data - Unpackaged Products app with an example product highlighted. Longside is the tile representing the Manage Basic Compliance Data - Unpackaged Products app and below the three major steps to be processed: maintain compliance view, assign product master for unpackaged or packaged products, and assign compliance purpose.

The Manage Basic Compliance Data app is the "center" to maintain the compliance view for an unpackaged product, allocating the following:

  • Unpackaged and related packaged products.
  • Logistics roles.
  • Application, markets (countries/regions), and purposes.
  • Material-based and derived substance-based compositions.

These objects are subjects of the product compliance assessment.

Triggered by the assigned compliance purpose(s), the product stewardship specialist - product compliance will assess the marketability requirements to finally derive the market assessment per business process.

This image shows a SAP interface displaying a list of logistics process requests that are currently in assessment, detailing product information, business processes, solution areas, request reasons, origins, and due dates.

In the app Process Requests from Logistics, we find our example product and several requests being In Assessment by the Product Stewardship Specialist – Product Compliance.

There are requests for the business process Sell In originating from:

  • Business transactions, here sales orders and an outbound delivery.
  • Material Master, which was initiated by a new distribution chain added for France.

Product Marketability: Integration in Sales and Delivery

Understand the check logic of integrated marketability checks and customizing for integration.

Product Marketability Checks are processed on each item against the product's market assessment status with a resulting Product Marketability Status on the item line. The header status for the sales or delivery document is derived from the item statuses. Status consolidation from items to header is different for sales documents and delivery documents.

  • On the sales document header, there is the Partially Blocked option - items with a status Blocked cannot be taken over to the subsequent delivery document, whereas items being not relevant or allowed can be delivered.
  • On delivery document header, there can be only the Allowed or Blocked status. The Blocked status may occur:
    • When the product's compliance status for the country and business process is Allowed with Restriction and the delivery has not been approved.
    • Due to changes on the product's market assessment status between creation of the document and further processing, for example status is changed from Allowed to Allowed with Restriction or Not Allowed.

Marketability Check In Sales - Item Status

CaseCase DescriptionItem StatusFollow-Up / Remark
1

Product is not relevant for compliance, meaning the Compliance Relevant indicator in the product master is set to No.

OK - Not Relevant

Check is not processed for this item.

2

Product is relevant for compliance, no compliance view exists.

Blocked – Decision Pending

A warning message is raised and a logistics request is created for the ship-to country/region.

3

Product is relevant for compliance, logistics role Sold is not assigned to the compliance view.

Blocked – Decision Pending

A warning message is raised and a logistics request is created for the ship-to country/region.

4

Product is relevant for compliance, market coverage for business process Sell In in the ship-to country/region does not exist, meaning the country/region is not assigned to the compliance view.

Blocked – Decision Pending

A warning message is raised and a logistics request is created for the ship-to country/region.

Option Exceptional Approval is available.

5

Product is relevant for compliance, market assessment status for the ship-to country/region and business process Sell In is not set yet.

Blocked – Decision Pending

A warning message is raised.

A notification is created for the user with the role "Product Stewardship Specialist - Product Compliance".

6

Product is relevant for compliance, market assessment status for the ship-to country/region and business process Sell In is set to Allowed with Restrictions.

Blocked – Decision Pending

A warning message is raised and a logistics request is created for the ship-to country/region.

Option Exceptional Approval*) is available.

7

Product is relevant for compliance, market assessment status for the ship-to country/region and business process Sell In is set to Not Allowed.

Blocked – Not Marketable

A warning message is raised.

8

Product is relevant for compliance, market assessment status for the ship-to country/region and business process Sell In is set to Allowed.

Ok - Approved

---

*) in case the product is relevant for customer compliance check, customer assessment can be initiated

The above table shows the overview of item status values, which can result from processing marketability checks for an item of a sales document along with the case description per status value. Follow-up steps or remarks are given for item statuses.

Marketability Check in Sales – Item Status

Item StatusExplanation for Item StatusConsequence for Item Confirmation

OK – Not Relevant

Product is not compliance relevant

Confirm

OK – Approved

Product is compliance relevant – can be sold in ship-to country/region

Confirm

OK – Approved as Exemption

Product is compliance relevant – can be sold in ship-to country/region with exceptional approval

Confirm

Blocked – Not Approved as Exemption

Product is compliance relevant – cannot be sold in ship-to country/region

Do not confirm

Blocked – Not Marketable

Product is compliance relevant – cannot be sold in ship-to country/region

Do not confirm

Blocked – Decision Pending

Product is compliance relevant – marketability assessment not released

Do not confirm

Marketability Check in Sales – Header Status

Header StatusConsolidated Item StatusConsequence for Order Confirmation

OK – not relevant

Only 1

Send confirmation

Approved

(1, 2, 3)

Send confirmation

Partially Blocked – Not Approved

(1, 2, 3)

and (4)

Send confirmation, but with text for blocked items

Blocked – Not Approved

Only 4

Do not send confirmation

Partially Blocked – Not Marketable

(1, 2, 3, 4) and (5, 6)

Send confirmation, but with text for blocked items

Blocked – Not Marketable

(4, 5, 6)

Do not send confirmation

The above tables show the overview of consolidation of item status values to the header status of a sales document. For each resulting header status value the consequence for order confirmation is given.

This image details SAP's process for marketability checks of a product, emphasizing the necessity of assigning the Sold logistic role and showing the different statuses (Required, Allowed with Restriction, Not Allowed, Allowed) that can trigger decision pending or not marketable outcomes, or allowed as the resulting marketability item status.
The first image shows the Specify Excluded Document Types for Integration in the customizing hierarchy for product compliance. The second image is a screenshot of the initial screen for the Specify Excluded Document Types for Integration customizing activity. The option Product Marketability Integration into Value Chain is highlighted.

For the selected business feature "Product Marketability Integration into Value Chain", you can exclude document types from processing marketability checks.

This is currently available for:

  • Sales document types
  • Delivery document types
The screenshot shows available document types to be excluded for selected business feature Product Marketability. In particular Sales Document Types are selected and list of excluded sales document types is shown.

For the selected "Product Marketability Integration into Value Chain" (PMA) business feature, you can exclude sales document types.

Supported sales document categories:

  • B = Sales Quotation
  • C = Sales Order
  • E = Scheduling Agreement
  • F = Scheduling Agreement with Service Agent
  • G = Sales Contract
  • I = Sales Order without Charge

SAP uses a negative logic, this means that newly created sales order types are by default included in the check functionality but can be excluded intentionally.

The screenshot shows available document types to be excluded for selected business feature Product Marketability. In particular Delivery Document Types are selected and list of excluded delivery document types is shown.

For the selected "Product Marketability Integration into Value Chain" (PMA) business feature, you can exclude delivery document types, which are document category J = delivery.

SAP uses a negative logic, this means that newly created delivery types are by default included in the check functionality but can be excluded intentionally.

Marketability Checks on Sales and Delivery Documents; Analyze Issues

Follow processing of marketability checks in sales order and outbound delivery; Analyze Issues.

This image illustrates a sales process where an internal sales representative encounters an issue with product availability during order creation.

When entering a product, which is indicated Compliance Relevant, to a sales document (Sales Order, Quotation, Order without Charge, Scheduling Agreement), the system automatically checks product marketability.

If no released Market Assessments exists for an item in a sales document, a launch pad notification is sent to the Product Stewardship Specialist to inform them. From the launch pad notification the Product Stewardship Specialist can directly navigate to the product which needs their attention.

Parallel to the creation of the launch pad notification, in the background, a request from logistic is automatically created in status "In Assessment" so that the sales document can be rechecked as soon as the Product Stewardship Specialist has finished the assessment. If the recheck was successful, the request from logistic is automatically closed.

This image depicts an SAP Sales Order screen showing basic order data, including sold-to party and ship-to party information, with an address in Paris, France.

The country of the ship-to party is the destination country, taken for processing marketability checks.

In the example, the country is France.

Marketability Status is determined from the results, edited in the app Assess Products for Markets.

This image shows an SAP Sales Order screen indicating an overall blocking status with a warning message stating that approval to sell item 10 is in progress.

As soon as you finish adding an item line, beside other checks, product compliance checks are processed for the product.

On header level, the blocking status is set and you receive a message in case of issues.

You navigate to the item details to investigate.

This image shows a sales order item screen in SAP where the product marketability status is blocked pending a decision, resulting in the delivery block status being set to Blocked.

You find the Product Marketability Status set to Blocked – Decision Pending. This means, the Market Assessment for the country France and the business process Sell In is requested, but not yet available.

According to status aggregation, this leads to Incompletion Status set to Incomplete and Delivery Block Status set to Blocked.

These statuses prevent the not yet finally assessed product from being delivered, which potentially could be a compliance violation.

This image depicts a sales order screen from an SAP application indicating that the overall status of the order is open, but it is blocked due to product non-marketability, and provides various statuses and details related to the order processing, blocking status, completion status, and product compliance.

Status from item level are aggregated on header level.

According to the aggregation rules, product marketability status on header level is set to Blocked – Not Marketable, since there is only the item status Blocked – Decision Pending.

The screenshot shows the Sales Order Fulfillment Issues app: Filters are shown as compact filters with the Product Marketability Status added as filter criteria using the Adapt Filters action. For product marketability status, Blocked statuses are selected as criteria to identify sales orders with issues related to product marketability.

In the app Sales Order Fulfillment, you can adapt filters to include Product Marketability Status as selection criteria to identify sales orders with issues related to product marketability.

Log in to track your progress & complete quizzes

Learning

SAP FacebookSAP YoutubeSAP LinkedIn