Pladis aims to get closer to consumers with S/4 Hana

First steps

The first steps in bringing Pladis closer to its customers, using what SAP describes as its “intelligent enterprise” technology approach, have been taken in North America, says Madden.

“They were running primarily on manual processes, and mainly on Excel and [Microsoft] Navision for finance, digitally. So that was a good place to do a cloud solution that was agile and scalable, and where it was easier to connect with an ecosystem of partners.

“We used the business model in the SAP Hana Cloud to create a new digital core for the business, which we have also restructured around a brand P&L [profit and loss]. We kicked that off in November 2017, and went live on 1 May 2018,” she says.

London is the headquarters for Pladis, as a relatively new global business. “The key philosophy is to be more consumer- and brand-centric, with a more agile business model. We had been product-centric, so being more relevant to consumers is a big cultural change. The advantage we have over, say, Nestlé and Mars is we are smaller, so we can be more agile,” says Madden.

Choosing SAP

The engagement with SAP S/4Hana Cloud is a pilot for the American business – the US, Canada and the Caribbean. UK-based United Biscuits and Turkey-based ÜIker are long-standing on-premise SAP customers. In China, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia and other territories, there is a plethora of enterprise software, and they are “in the process of integrating and harmonising some of that”, says Madden.

Since its two biggest markets – the UK and Turkey – were already on SAP, the choice “made sense”, she says. “But also, for a company with a complex supply chain, what SAP offers in the cloud is still the leading capability, ahead of Microsoft Dynamics and Oracle.”

“Now we have a platform, we can evolve the business more”

Shifting from a product-centric approach to focus instead on consumers and brands is a sectoral trend for packaged consumer goods. And for Pladis, in particular, she says it can focus more on consumer needs than its bigger competitors.

“Consumers in the UK, Saudi and North America are all different. So, how do we appeal to their different lifestyles? For example, how do we market McVitie’s outside of the UK? In North America, you don’t even talk about ‘biscuits’, you talk about ‘cookies’,” says Madden.

S/4 Hana delivered over the cloud will help to effect this shift to the consumer by offering real-time data and integration with respect to both retailers and distributors, on the one hand, and by providing the capacity to listen to consumers on social media, and use data analytics. Up until now, they had been using agencies and basic tools. “But what you don’t get there is real-time data,” she says.

“We are already seeing huge benefits, seeing the brand P&L, sales by customer, by channel, profitable, being able to optimise demand, to look at our stock situation. All of that is much better orchestrated, and with better collaboration with our customers and distributors,” says Madden.

Future plans

China is the next market Pladis wants to take the cloud-based S/4 Hana system into, as well as ramping up business growth in North America.

It is also looking to use “artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate some of the insight” to be derived from the use of SAP Hana in the cloud, says Madden, “using predictive analytics around demand and occasions, for example”.

“Now we have a platform, we can evolve the business more,” she says.