Direct access to SAP master and transaction data

Whether in airports, thermal power stations or other industrial plants - switchgear from Kraus & Naimer ensures safe on and off. The globally active group with 900 employees, six factories and 18 sales companies is, among other things, the international market leader for cam switches.

Accounting 4.0

For around a year now, invoice processing has been automated and SAP-embedded with the Tangro software. The system ensures greater efficiency and transparency in accounting and thus acts as a process accelerator.

"We are now doing accounting 4.0 with Tangro"

says Johann Schübl, who is responsible for the project at Kraus & Naimer.

The financial accounting department at the company's Vienna headquarters is designed as a shared service center for Austria, Italy and the production plant in Germany. The long distances between the locations alone made manual invoice processing cumbersome and time-consuming.

There were also additional time wasters. For example, every incoming invoice - usually a paper document - had to pass through various stations before it could be posted in SAP: First to the purchasing department to make a handwritten note of the account assignment, then to the accounting department, where relevant content was typed up, then to the responsible purchaser or to the management for approval, and from there back to the accounting department for posting in SAP.

Five to ten days could pass in this way before the invoice was settled. There was no documentation of the approval process, nor was there an overview of the outstanding receipts.

"In a way, we were flying blind"

Johann Schübl remembers.

Implementation

Before deciding on Tangro as the solution for automated invoice processing, Schübl had briefly considered a product with less affinity to SAP - a detour in the selection process that has now given the SAP expert an even better understanding of what is really important for efficient invoice processing: complete embedding in SAP.

"Tangro provides a standard solution for the entire Group that is SAP-embedded and therefore offers direct access to SAP master and transaction data without the detour via data extraction."

Still decisive:

"The system supports all relevant SAP standards out of the box. Whether unplanned delivery costs, cross-company code postings or down payment invoices with input tax posting: with Tangro, these SAP standards are simply there."

And last but not least, the system offers "ultra-fast" implementation. It took just two weeks from signing the contract to going live, and the implementation itself took place in a single day.

"You can really go live extremely quickly with Tangro."

Just as enthusiastic as project manager Johann Schübl is Harald Zeller, authorized signatory and head of finance and accounting at Kraus & Naimer:

"We are very satisfied with Tangro. The software has also proven to be the right choice in terms of price."

Kraus & Naimer receives around 30,000 invoices every year. Thanks to automation, 60 to 70 percent of these documents can now be posted directly without post-processing by the accounting department.

This percentage even applies to companies that do not use SAP MM and therefore have invoices without a purchase order reference. The decisive factor for this enormous increase in efficiency is the ability to store account assignment objects for each supplier, which are then automatically pulled.

Even if no purchase order has been created in SAP, the system recognizes this posting-relevant data immediately. This completely eliminates the time-consuming tasks involved in invoice processing: no more manual note-taking and no more typing of content.

The document can be processed immediately if there are no discrepancies:

"Just press a button and the invoice is posted within seconds"

says Johann Schübl.

Release also for non-SAP users

The Tangro Business Workflow is used for invoices without a purchase order reference, in the event of differences to the purchase order or if approval is required. The accountant simply forwards the document from Tangro to the responsible employee at the touch of a button.

They can then add missing information, comment on facts or approve the document with a click of the mouse. The latter is also possible for non-SAP users from anywhere via smartphone or tablet - an option that has proven particularly useful for employees at management level. And it also helps to speed up processes, as there is no longer any need to wait until the responsible employee is back in the office.

As required by law, the entire verification process is documented and traceable right from the start. As soon as the incoming invoice is scanned, it is listed in the incoming invoice ledger.

"The entire order-to-pay process has become transparent, which is essential when working with shared service centers. Liquidity planning can now be done much more accurately"

says Schübl.

The reorganization of processes in Purchasing itself has also contributed to process optimization. On the one hand, the receipt of electronic invoices by email has been stepped up so that around 60 percent of invoices are now received electronically as PDFs - and the trend is rising.

And on the other hand, all orders are now created in SAP in the sales companies that use SAP MM. This means that a check is already carried out during the ordering process, so that the invoice data is normally correct and the control process is further simplified.

Rollout

Kraus & Naimer has also optimized its hardware: the same scanning hardware and software is used throughout the company, which makes IT support much easier. There is one central scanning PC and scanner per company, which are procured, set up, tested and then sent to the respective branches in Austria.

The rollout is therefore extremely simple:

"Plug in and start - it couldn't be quicker"

says Johann Schübl.

He is therefore confident that the introduction in Holland, which is currently in the pipeline, will also go off without a hitch. Also because the system handling (SAP look and feel) is so simple that a one-hour training course is all that is needed for the accountants to be able to use the system on site.

So it's no wonder that word of the benefits of automated invoice verification has spread throughout the company.

"Demand is huge in all companies"

says Schübl.

"The whole thing has become a no-brainer."

Short interview

SAP-embedded

Three questions for Tangro founder and Managing Director Andreas Schumann.

You describe your solutions for the automated processing of incoming documents as SAP-embedded - what exactly does that mean?

Andreas Schumann: With Tangro, the validation - i.e. the comparison of the recognized document content with the existing ERP data - already takes place in real time and SAP-embedded.

What are the advantages for your users?

Schumann: This enables us to guarantee incoming document processing without media disruptions. During validation, there is direct access to SAP data without any interface effort.

In addition, all the advantages of the SAP landscape are available, such as the SAP authorization concept, the SAP transport system and the SAP development environment. And users work in the familiar SAP environment.

Does this differentiate your software from other solutions for processing incoming documents in SAP?

Schumann: Yes, common solutions for the automated processing of incoming documents are upstream of the SAP system. They therefore require their own server landscape and require data extraction before validation can take place. This is generally also the case when solutions are only mapped in the SAP NetWeaver stack.

Project profile

Company: Kraus & Naimer Production

Company headquarters: Vienna, Austria

Branch: Electronic switchgear

Subject: Automated invoice processing

Document volume: 30,000 invoices/year

230 users

SAP ERP 6 and EHP7