The Challenge
A global supplier of purity materials for the life sciences and advanced technology markets, continually evaluates business operations to drive cost savings initiatives across the organization. The company’s SAP production systems were stable, and they had no plans to upgrade to a newer application version in the near future. Given the stable nature of the installed systems, the Company saw little to no return from the continuous rise in the cost of vendor-provided maintenance support. They sought to:
- Reduce IT spend on SAP support
- Increase the level of customer service
- Ensure their portfolio of SAP software was well maintained and would meet future needs
- Receive support that was proactive and responsive, provided by industry experts that would gain knowledge and understanding of their environments
- Ensure support is delivered by a company that is focused on the company’s needs and satisfaction and is easy to do business with while being financially stable
The Approach
The company began investigating third-party support options and quickly realized key distinctions between what the vendor support model had to offer in comparison to that of the personalized support offered by Spinnaker Support. They sought to reduce their SAP software maintenance fees while significantly improving their level of support through personalized service with ready access to experienced support personnel. The company desired a partner with the SAP competency, global infrastructure, proven support methods, and strict business practices to mitigate any potentials risks of the desired change, one who would deliver the value they deserved for every dollar spent.
One of the main reasons the company chose Spinnaker Support was our willingness to align support fees with actual licenses used, not licensed software that was never implemented. This unique approach allows a much larger reduction in annual maintenance fees. The company was also impressed with Spinnaker Support’s Technology Center of Excellence, which is available for support on virtualizations, interoperability, security, and future upgrades or cloud migration plans – all a part of Spinnaker’s standard support agreement.
The Solution
The company’s strategic requirements made the decision to move to third-party support with Spinnaker Support an easy course for their future. Spinnaker Support is the leading third-party provider of global SAP and Oracle Application Maintenance and Support for over 900 organizations worldwide. The comprehensive and unmatched software support model delivers a broad range of value-added services in a highly responsive manner while providing service of the highest quality through an expert Global SAP support team.
The following solution was implemented by Spinnaker Support to allow them to achieve their desired state:
- Assigned a team of named SAP senior software engineers leveraging proven methods and global infrastructure to deliver exceptional maintenance services for their portfolio of products
- Established an agreement with flexible commercial terms which allowed the company and Spinnaker Support to scale maintenance services and fees based upon actual software usage
- Implemented proactive support processes that consist of monthly calls with dedicated support team, advisory services from Spinnaker Support’s Technology Center of Excellence, and support for integrations and customizations
Spinnaker Support delivers unmatched software Maintenance Services to the global SAP user community. Organizations around the world have realized tremendous service benefits and cost savings from Spinnaker Support’s services.
The Results
The company signed a multi-year agreement with Spinnaker Support in February of 2015, and over a three-year timeline will have an estimated cost savings in support fees in excess of 65%. The company continues to progress through a strategic transformation and has reallocated support funds for strategic IT initiatives. The savings afforded by Spinnaker Support are helping them redirect costs for research and development, as they continue to expand their market reach. Instead of being forced into costly upgrades, they have stabilized on SAP ECC6 and now have a partner that can plan and execute an upgrade or cloud migration when their business warrants that change.