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Two years earlier, the Kemira chemicals group had already established a new business model in Europe with the help of the Heidelberg-based management consultant cbs Corporate Business Solutions.

With the comprehensive transformation project, Kemira wanted to implement a central operating model for all countries and units. This involved fundamentally changing the organizational structure, standardizing business processes, and consolidating the Kemira Group's existing SAP system landscape and adapting it to the concepts of the new operating model.

OneKem, the standardized global SAP template solution, had been transformed to the new organizational structure. Over the course of a year, eleven countries and 17 companies were incorporated into the new SAP world and the structure of the new business model.

The further rollout of the template solution to Latin America had already been decided, and cbs had been commissioned to implement it, when Kemira once again announced a change in strategy. The Fit for Growth restructuring program was launched to simplify the corporate structure, increase profitability and boost growth - especially in the Asian and South American markets.

With the follow-up project, Kemira is strengthening its regional, globally active business units. These were to be given more local ownership of their business operations in order to interact better and faster with their customers in local markets.

However, the new roles and responsibilities not only had to be communicated at corporate and management level, but also implemented operationally and, in particular, mapped accordingly in the SAP software. The change in organizational structures led to changes in structural assignments and reporting.

Growth markets

Kemira's growth strategy focuses on Asia and South America, two important growth markets in the pulp and paper segment. In order to regionalize business responsibility, Kemira relocated the paper segment management to Hong Kong. This is because China and Indonesia are considered the key countries for the paper industry.

On the other side of the globe are Brazil and Uruguay, Kemira's main markets for bleaching chemicals in the pulp industry. At its Latin American sites, Kemira is focusing on process optimization through the introduction of standardized, lean, and proven best-practice processes.

The OneKem SAP process template was intended to professionalize process and system operation, increase productivity and raise quality levels. For implementation, cbs planned two interdependent projects with Kemira: The framework project was the SAP rollout of the OneKem template to Latin America, which was to bring the globally standardized Group processes and structures to the region within twelve months.

At the same time, organizational change had to be implemented. Reporting, balance sheet structures and sales controlling, which were geared to the central management of global segments, had to be broken up and aligned to a cross-segment regional management perspective. The OneKem template had to be adapted to the new, regionalized management and earnings structure.

Four months were estimated for the technical changeover in the SAP system and the switch from global reporting of the individual business areas to regionalized reporting, which would allow the profit centers to be evaluated locally, for example by country.

A transformation that was implemented on a productive global SAP platform during ongoing business operations. A major challenge was the parallel implementation of both projects in terms of organization and time. The global profit centers were converted during the ongoing SAP template rollout.

The SAP rollout at Kemira's Latin American sites in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Uruguay was no simpler. The new, decentralized business model was to be implemented by cbs in 35 plants in five countries - with simultaneous go-live.

To do this, the cbs consultants had to map the legal requirements of all states in the globally valid OneKem turnkey template. The data was transferred and prepared from five different legacy systems. Last but not least, the large project team, the collaboration across different locations and time zones, and the bridging of language barriers placed high demands on everyone involved.

The focus was on replacing the local ERP system and integrating it into the central SAP system landscape. This is where the strengths of the OneKem SAP template became apparent, which ensures global processes as well as taking country-specific, complex legal requirements into account.

These include, for example, the Nota Fiscal Eletrônica in Brazil, the Magnetic Media DIAN in Colombia and the Withholding Tax Certificate in Argentina.

Minimally invasive transformation

For the changeover of reporting responsibility from global segments to regional units, Kemira brought a doubly experienced partner on board in the form of cbs. The specialized experts from the Heidelberg-based consulting company not only carried out the technical implementation in the SAP system, but also developed a project approach in advance that was suitable for the globally active chemical group. After all, a total of 43 companies worldwide were to be converted.

Thanks to competent technical and process consulting, the first step was to optimize the financial reporting processes. Subsequently, the reporting in the SAP system was converted to the new structures with all operational process dependencies. Among other things, the dashboards for management had to be extensively adapted.

The particular challenge here was that the opening balance sheet had to be available on the conversion date on the basis of the new structure, while retaining the previous structure for the previous years (double management reporting structure).

To implement this requirement, cbs used its proven transformation tool cbs ET Enterprise Transformer to convert the profit center structures within the balance carryforward. The balance sheet data can thus be reported for the previous years in the old structures, and for the current and subsequent years in the new structures.

Also on the reporting date, it was necessary to convert all master and transaction data to the new profit center structure. Thanks to the proven cbs standard software ET Enterprise Transformer, the consultants were able to implement a minimally invasive approach; existing processes in logistics and accounting were able to continue smoothly after the conversion.

Within just one year, cbs successfully implemented the high requirements of the Kemira projects. Thanks to the minimally invasive approach, the transformation of all business units worldwide into the new, regionalized business model was achieved with virtually no disruption to ongoing operations.

With the template-based SAP rollout to Latin America, the cbs consultants were able to respond flexibly to the new business model. This made it possible to go live simultaneously at 35 plants in five South American countries - and straight away with the new regional structure.

The range of solutions offered by cbs gives corporations like Kemira more flexibility when it comes to strategic changes. Strategic changes can also be implemented on a global level in a timely manner and almost during ongoing process and IT system operation. The company-wide SAP system landscape can be restructured quickly and efficiently with little downtime.

Despite immense country-specific requirements, the global SAP template was retained and also used in Latin America. Standardized processes were established and optimized through the introduction of global best practice processes.

This gave management more transparency and control competence. The users of the SAP software benefit from the automated system changeover, which required only a few manual rebooking tasks after going live.

From now on, global support will replace local system operation and take over application support centrally. With cbs Corporate Business Solutions, Kemira once again placed its trust in its long-standing partner, which has already successfully implemented various projects for the chemicals group.

An article in the April issue of E-3 Magazine dealt with the integration of new sites into a uniform SAP system. As a general contractor and holistic restructuring consultant, cbs offers exceptional expertise in the environment of global SAP solutions.

The focus is on complex, mission-critical SAP implementation projects - for global restructuring programs as well as for business and technology-focused optimization projects.