Managing Information Technology

Case Study III-6 • BAT Taiwan: Implementing SAP for a Strategic Transition 497

Priority

P1 The entire business is

stopped, a business

process has failed

and/or an entire site is

affected.

All System is unavailable,

billing and delivery cannot

be processed, month-end

processing cannot be

completed.

95% resolved in 1 hour =

Application & APSS (HD, Sec,

Ops) – Resolution

External Engineer (third party, i.e.,

Equant/IBM) – Active

assistance

P2 Issue impacts a module,

prevents a large number

of users from doing their

work, and/or a

workaround is not

available.

Group 90% resolved in 2 business hours

P3 Issue impacts a module

and prevents a large

number of users from

doing their work and a

workaround is available.

Group Financial journals cannot

be posted but it does not

affect third parties, volume

is small for a manual

workaround.

90% resolved in 3 business hours

P4 User is prevented from

doing work due to

critical task failure, no

workaround exists.

Single User cannot print

documentation, user

profile is not complete.

90% resolved in 4 business hours

P5 A user is prevented

from completing a

function, but a

workaround can be

provided, and/or

problem is minor.

Single Automatic check printing

fails but critical payments

can still be processed with

manual checks.

90% resolved in 2 business days

P6 N/A How to extract data for

reporting

90% resolved in 3 business days

* Minimum service level: a resolution (including workarounds) is handed to the user to confirm acceptance before it is implemented in the production environment.

Definition

Users

Affected Examples Minimum Service Level *

Sales and Distribution

module fails, orders

cannot be taken, volume

is too large for a manual

workaround.

Query or request.

EXHIBIT 7 Help Desk Support by APSS

now done in the Taipei office, and invoices are printed at
the five area offices. Within the Taipei office a few work
imbalances still continued to exist because of the lack of
widespread SAP expertise and the loss of some expert
business users. For example, the MM/SD lead still regular-
ly worked a few hours of overtime each evening even after
the new GUI system was in place.
A system upgrade to R/3 version 4.6C is planned for
July 2001, and some improvements to the process configu-
rations could be made at the same time.

SAP is a very powerful application for a small mar-

ket. Initially you go through a stage where you

learn the basics but you don’t yet know all the func-

tionality. When you become proficient with the

system, you begin to look at other needs. APSS

needs to be ready to show the business how to use

the system better—what the more complex pro-

cesses are that they couldn’t absorb before.

— Mr. Ponce, Asia Pacific Regional IT Manager

A formal post-implementation review, sponsored by

Globe House, was to be conducted toward the end of

March 2001. Other BAT managers are expected to be inter-

ested in learning how the implementation was accom-

plished so quickly, at such a low cost, and whether the

business users were happy with the quality of the system.

Within APN, Hong Kong would probably be the next end

market to implement SAP.