Cristian di Panfilo
Senior Manager Advisory
PwC Switzerland
Daniel Hernandez Tielas
Senior Manager Advisory
PwC Switzerland
In the rapidly advancing realm of Artificial Intelligence (AI), major players such as Microsoft and Google frequently dominate headlines with new product releases and strategic collaborations. But, what about SAP? Is SAP, as leader in the ERP domain, genuinely at the forefront of leveraging AI to shape the future of the Intelligent Enterprise? Moreover, how is PwC envisioning its AI suite and AI services to assist businesses in harnessing these advancements?
"SAP's vision is to embed GenAI across the SAP portfolio by changing how users interact with users. Software should be able to answer business related questions and offer recommendations across the portfolio."
How SAP is realising the vision
- SAP is enabling GenAI across full solution portfolio not only for streamlining business process but also for increasing efficiency, security and compliance across full development and operations lifecycle.
- SAP is bringing an increasing wave of AI driven solutions to the SAP S/4HANA core in each new release, but clients will only adopt these AI solutions to full extend if they are in RISE with SAP (in private or public S/4HANA cloud).
- In addition to the pre-built AI use cases for SAP S/4HANA (enabled by SAP ISLM), SAP is pushing the boundaries of AI integration possibilities having SAP BTP as cornerstone, with three main components: AI Business Services, Joule SDK, and AI Core and AI Launchpad.
- SAP has officially unveiled in September 2023 its CoPilot assistant 'Joule', which leverages the advanced natural language GenAI capabilities and is seamlessly integrated into SAP's cloud enterprise portfolio. 'Joule' is set to be integrated into various SAP applications, spanning across HR, finance, supply chain, procurement, and customer experience. Additionally, it will be incorporated into the SAP Business Technology Platform.
- SAP also takes the ethical and societal dimensions of AI seriously and has founded an AI ethics council as part of this endeavor and published clear guiding principles and an AI ethics handbook.
SAP strategic partnerships
SAP maintains pivotal alliances with leading entities in the AI technology sector. This includes collaborations with major companies such as Microsoft, Google, AWS, IBM, RoboData, DataBricks and others.
Microsoft
SAP and Microsoft have joined forces to integrate different SAP solutions with Microsoft 365 Copilot and Copilot in Viva Learning. Additionally, Microsoft's Azure OpenAI Service will provide access to advanced language models for natural language analysis and generation.
SAP and Google Cloud have collaborated to introduce sustainable innovative generative AI solutions for enterprises. The collaboration empowers customers with business insights, analysis, and decision-making capabilities by leveraging SAP AI, information from SAP Datasphere and other data sources.
IBM
SAP will leverage IBM Watson's capabilities to enhance its digital assistant in SAP Start, a centralized platform for SAP's cloud solutions. SAP Start enables users to effortlessly search, launch, and interact with applications offered in SAP and SAP S/4HANA cloud.
SAP investments
SAP has made strategic, direct investments in three prominent GenAI firms, namely Aleph Alpha GmbH, Anthropic PBC, and Cohere. This move will bolster SAP's open ecosystem strategy for AI, utilising cutting-edge technology to integrate AI throughout the SAP portfolio. The ecosystem supplements a $1+ billion pledge to invest in AI-driven enterprise tech startups.
Overview of SAP AI's portfolio
SAP AI's portfolio offers a full range of AI capabilities, from pre-trained services for common business tasks, to tools for custom model development and management. These services are integrated into SAP BTP, providing a comprehensive platform for AI-driven solutions.
No matter if you are a business user, developer or operations manager, AI driven solutions are being enabled across the full stack by SAP ISLM and SAP BTP.
Are AI innovations coming only (or first) to SAP S/4HANA cloud?
SAP is shifting its approach to deliver AI innovations. In an SAP recent announcement at SAP Q2 earning call, CEO Christian Klein stated that SAP's newest AI innovations will only be available in specific contexts:
Cloud environment: AI innovations will be available in the cloud, specifically within SAP S/4HANA Cloud. This includes both the public edition and the private edition delivered by GROW with SAP or RISE with SAP. These cloud-based solutions will incorporate the AI capabilities SAP is developing.
Exclusion from hyperscaler hosted environments: Organisations that choose to implement SAP solutions in hyperscaler hosted environments outside of the RISE with SAP framework, will not have access to these AI innovations to same level as in RISE with SAP.
SAP BTP customers can leverage three main AI centric services to keep integrating AI into their SAP and non SAP solutions as explained below.
SAP AI lifecycle managament portfolio at a glance
How is PwC envisioning its AI suite and AI services?
At PwC we leverage the best of the following two worlds to increase the speed, efficiency and quality of our PwC enabled business transformations:
- SAP AI product and platform offerings powered by SAP BTP
- Property PwC GenAI platforms to deploy generative AI at scale like ConvAI (PwC’s Internal Platform for open-sourced low-cost, low-carbon, enterprise-level Generative AI) for enterprise clients and ChatPwC for our workforce
Having this best combination and our industry specific know-how opens up an immense world of use cases for each line of business and each industry. At PwC Switzerland we are currently focused on key cases enabling high value shown below.
PwC AI vision to increase efficiency and quality of your transformation while unlocking the full potential of your business operations
With the help of a Swiss three-year, CHF 50 million investment, we’re rolling out GenAI throughout our firm and helping our clients do the same. GenAI can have far-reaching benefits across your business, with high degrees of repeatability. Its implementation can be more effective not in discrete projects but as an enterprise capability. In the context of SAP, we bring this to life with PwC AI delivery augmentation and AI industry solutions.
PwC AI vision for Delivery Augmentation
Increasing efficiency and quality of business and transformation delivery
- PwC S4HANA Clean Core Advisor
- Preparation of project documentation
- AI on data cleansing, profiling, mapping and migration testing
- DevOps in delivery: Automate code review, issue detection / resolution
- Training preparation and communications
PwC AI Industry Solutions
Streamlining client business and operations
- Search-to-insight AI / Auto comment: CoPilot AI agent to improve user experience and efficiency in Fiori and SAC applications
- Customer Experience (CX) with SAP Commerce and conversational AI
- AI powered financial planning forecast for insurance based on market, environment and core insurance data
- Smart product and supplier recommendation
- Automate service case categorisation and resolutions
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