Defining an ERP Readiness Plan to Support Clinical and Commercial Operations
A client brought in the Clarkston Consulting team to to help in defining an ERP readiness plan for their SAP implementation. Read a synopsis of the project below or download the full case study.
Download the Defining an ERP Readiness Plan Case Study Here
This client is a biotechnology company focused on the discovery and development of therapies for patients with neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, ALS, and others. As the client prepares to launch its first commercial product, they are looking to define a strategy that will enable the cross-functional use of SAP for supply chain capabilities and manufacturing of both clinical and commercial products.
The organization engaged Clarkston to create a robust ERP readiness strategy for their SAP implementation that identified the necessary critical activities as well as the timing and sequence of events. Clarkston assessed the client’s current state processes and capabilities, identified gaps in cross-functional capabilities when compared to similar life sciences organizations using SAP, and highlighted key observations, considerations, and decisions to prepare them for commercialization and the use of SAP.
Clarkston engaged with 20+ business leaders to understand existing business processes for Supply Chain, Procurement, Quality/Regulatory, Finance, and Manufacturing. Working sessions focused on current state capabilities, the use of technology, and future state requirements for clinical and commercial products. Following these sessions, Clarkston created a Supply Chain Roadmap and Capability Matrix that defined all cross-functional activities required to support commercial products, provided key observations and considerations when building business processes, and made recommendations for key decisions that would impact their use of SAP.
As part of their ERP readiness strategy, the client anticipated deploying a “Big Bang” approach for their implementation. To ensure the client understood the pros and cons of this type of deployment approach, Clarkston shared two additional SAP deployment approaches and outlined the benefits and risks for each option, along with the estimated business resource requirements. Each deployment option needed to consider business processes and capabilites that must be established (in addition to implementing SAP) to support a commercial launch.
Clarkston also recommended additional ERP readiness considerations, including high-level program activities that will need to be considered for the SAP implementation, such as business readiness, project management, computer systems validation, organizational change management, and training.
Download the Defining an ERP Readiness Plan case study, and learn more about our Supply Chain Consulting and SAP Consulting services by contacting us below.
Contributions from Kate Poknis and Zach McClughen
