Uniqema unifies SAP across Europe

Speciality chemicals firm Uniqema is well on the way to replacing 83 legacy systems across its European operations with a single SAP ERP system in a project costing around £12m. Uniqema was formed by the merger of five ICI businesses and has had to align its IT infrastructure and re-work its business processes. The project, code named Helix, began in 2001, has complete its first phase, managing sales order processing, customer relationship management (CRM) and accounts, and is now set to move on to supply chain management. Simon Alban, Uniqema’s director of European transformation, says: “The creation of Helix has had an immediate effect in making order placing and invoice handling easier. As the Helix project progresses, the benefits it brings will become more apparent.” The project has been managed by a team of 40 IT specialists from Uniqema and consultancy Atos Origin. First stage of the implementation involved installing the Helix platform, which saw the replacement of two existing SAP systems with an upgraded SAP system, and associated data migration and business process re-engineering and training. Phase Two involved rolling out SAP across Europe, and aligning sales order processing, raw material procurement and financial support. CRM implementation was accomplished concurrently. Phase Three will cover supply chain management, planning processes and its quality management systems.