SAP ERP solutions take businesses a long way toward standardizing -- bringing together interrelated business processes under a standard architecture that helps the enterprise become more efficient, productive and agile in response to changing business conditions. Within the enterprise, SAP ERP solutions do an excellent job of automating and integrating many aspects of business processes.

What complicates matters is the simple fact that business processes require information to be delivered into and out of SAP ERP systems, which are not as good at universal communication between an organization and its customers and suppliers. Business processes extend beyond the enterprise, but the automation and integration often does not.

Return on SAP ERP investments will not be fully achieved by a business until its invoices, purchase orders, reminders and other documents can be delivered directly from the SAP system, and incoming documents (such as sales orders) enter the SAP ERP system and automatically flow through the enterprise. Because they are such a vital part of business processes, these documents will ultimately determine the investment return on SAP ERP solutions.

As the need to exchange business information with customers and suppliers through multiple media increases, organizations are recognizing that the most practical way to automate information exchange for all business processes and all business partners is through a single, centrally managed information exchange platform that requires no custom programming to implement.

Intelligent document delivery technology, which recognizes and processes document content, makes this possible -- and feasible -- by automating document delivery based on business rules and user preferences through logic residing outside the SAP system. So, SAP applications require no modifications. This solution extends the ERP standardization model to the exchange of information that supports business processes, eliminating the cost and inefficiency of manual document delivery.

Communicating with all customers and suppliers through the most appropriate media translates into better service and stronger business relationships. By increasing the speed and accuracy of business information exchange through document automation, organizations can shorten procurement time for raw materials, fulfill orders for finished goods more rapidly, reduce data entry errors and collect cash earlier when invoices and sales documents are received sooner.

The solution comes in the form of an intelligent document delivery platform that automates and centralizes capture, formatting, conversion, routing and storage of information flowing into, through and out of the enterprise. This platform enables businesses to:

- Capture the necessary information from documents
- Integrate the information into the SAP ERP system
- Distribute documents to the right places in the right ways
- Provide ready access to documents and document content

This describes a comprehensive and practical way to achieve full ROI by automating the delivery of documents directly to and from the SAP ERP system within key business processes: invoicing, sales order processing, purchasing and cash collection.

..more (mySAP ERP)