RPA has been a key enabler in driving productivity and efficiency in many businesses even before the COVID-19 pandemic caused disruptions to major industries. Developed to automate time-consuming tasks that require significant manpower, RPA provides an opportunity for the workforce to focus on more complex problems that require human judgment. With recent enhancements to SAP Intelligent RPA solution, the German software giant strengthens its commitment to helping companies empower employees of all skill levels to speed up automation — allowing them to scale delivery while lowering costs.

New features in the solution enable citizen developers to create bots based on insights gathered through the new SAP Process Insights offering, which will be available in the third quarter of 2021 as part of the SAP Business Process Intelligence Portfolio. Furthermore, SAP is enhancing the citizen developer experience with these latest updates, allowing customers to grow the number of people who can assist their organisations in achieving higher productivity, agility, and resilience.

In a SAPPHIRE NOW 2021 session titled Zuellig Pharma: Transforming Healthcare with Best-in-Class Technology, Daniel Laverick, Head of SAP and IT Solutions at Zuellig Pharma, expounded on how digital assistance and intelligent automation across its operations drove operational efficiency for the organisation. He shared:

“Even before the pandemic, we saw the importance of driving efficiencies so that we could grow, operate and support larger scale and more complex healthcare supply chains. With this in mind, we embarked on a digital transformation journey with SAP and were able to quickly activate our technologies to address the spike in customer orders from countries like Thailand when the pandemic hit.”

Successful Implementation of SAP iRPA Across the Enterprise

As one of the largest healthcare service providers in Asia, Zuellig Pharma chose to implement SAP Intelligent RPA and SAP Conversational AI services to limit the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the company, it was able to fulfill customer orders significantly faster by utilising SAP’s solutions. Laverick further explained:

“This agility and speed of our sales order processing accounted for an increase of approximately 100,000 sales orders processed daily which helped us to continue our mission of making healthcare more accessible.”

Through its successful implementation of SAP iRPA, Zuellig Pharma was able to achieve the following value-driven results:

• Digitalisation and automation of error-prone and time-consuming manual tasks of receiving orders.
• Continuous order processing without lag and disruption.
• Enablement of employees to execute more value-added activities across its operations.
• Utilisation of a dependable, preapproved, and repeatable ordering process to support compliance with industry regulations.
• Increased trust in the company’s products and assisted in the fight against the distribution of counterfeit drugs in the region.
• Clearing out a backlog of over 10,000 IT-related cases that needed auditing — a task that would have taken three full-time staff to complete.

Zuellig Pharma Recognised for Innovation Using SAP Technology

In the recently concluded SAP Best Run Awards 2021 for Southeast Asia (SEA), Zuellig Pharma won the Most Promising Next Generation Leaders – The Trailblazer (Individual) Award for its use of SAP Intelligent RPA across the enterprise. Deploying more than 60 automations across various business units and countries, the inaugural event recognises Zuellig Pharma’s successful adoption of SAP technology to enhance its most critical processes.

Last March, the pharmaceutical giant also unveiled eZVax, an end-to-end vaccine management solution that provides governments and health authorities with a holistic view of their vaccine rollouts, from manufacturing to distribution and administration.

Moreover, the solution features Zuellig Pharma’s eZTracker platform, which leverages SAP Blockchain Technology, to address concerns on the distribution of counterfeit drugs around the region. Through the application, consumers’ mobile devices become a verification tool that can trace barcodes on medication to its manufacturer and country of origin instantly.

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The judging panel includes Cathy Ward, APJ Head, Customer Engagement and Experience, SAP Asia Pacific and Japan, as well as other respected business leaders from around the region. Participants were evaluated based on how SAP technologies have been used to achieve improved business outcomes.

In an online event, Verena Siow, President and Managing Director at SAP Southeast Asia, kicked off the SAP Best Run Awards 2021 for SEA with an illuminating look at the power of business transformation. She said:

“The SAP Best Run Awards is a significant milestone not just for our customers and partners, but also to SAP as well. Following a year of uncertainties, it has been an absolute honour for us to recognise and celebrate the grit, resiliency and creativity of Southeast Asian organisations as they pivoted swiftly to respond, adapt and accelerate their growth in a challenging business environment.”

Winners of the SAP Best Run Awards for SEA have the opportunity to increase their organisation’s visibility and marketing mileage. These companies have used SAP products to reinvent their businesses, drive innovation, and thrive in today’s disrupted economy. 

Becoming a Best-Run Business with SAP

Changi Airport Group, Globe Telecom, Inc., TrickleStar (M) Sdn Bhd, Zuellig Pharma, and PXL Marketing Sdn Bhd topped the categories they competed in and were the winners of the SAP Best Run Awards 2021 for SEA.

Best Innovation Award – The Disruptor

Changi Airport Group, the manager of Singapore Changi Airport, bagged the Best Innovation Award – The Disruptor. The major revamp of the company’s iShopChangi platform with SAP Commerce as the Commerce Engine was deployed within 10 months from the start of the project, delivering more capabilities than the initial system. 

Despite introducing the platform in mid-2020, Changi Airport Group was able to pivot and scale beyond pre-pandemic levels. The company has expanded its merchant base and acquired over 70,000 customers using SAP Commerce Cloud as its engine.

Most Transformational Award – The Game Changer

Bringing home The Game Changer – Most Transformational Award is telecommunications company Globe Telecom, Inc. (Philippines). The firm successfully created new methods to stay flexible, scalable, sustainable, and maintain business continuity using SAP HANA DB and SAP S/4HANA, resulting in up to 14,200 hours of savings and a 99.99 percent uptime.

Most Promising Startup or Entrepreneurship Award – The Rising Star

TrickleStar (M) Sdn Bhd, a Malaysian company that offers smart energy solutions aimed at increasing household and commercial energy efficiency, won The Rising Star – Most Promising Startup or Entrepreneurship Award. SAP enhanced TrickleStar’s ability to accelerate digital transformation, deliver value to customers, and save more than 65 percent on costs, personnel, and accounting with minimal increase in staffing.

SAP Business One was chosen by TrickleStar due to its extensive capability, ease of use, and flexibility to integrate with external supplier systems. The company’s requirement to reduce support staff was met by the capacity to run SAP Business One on the cloud.

Emerging Enterprise Award (Small and Midsize Enterprises or SMEs) – The Small but Mighty

Malaysian disposable food packaging supplier PXL Marketing Sdn Bhd took home The Small but Mighty – Emerging Enterprise Award for Small and Midsize Enterprises (SMEs). The company used SAP’s solutions to enable digital transformation and revolutionise its approach to change management, streamline user experiences, and increase efficiency, resulting in a 40{aa282f308afcc222aaa21b0478c79e01a8fedd01972e2180867097bd93930f22} boost in inventory management and a 30{aa282f308afcc222aaa21b0478c79e01a8fedd01972e2180867097bd93930f22} improvement in supply chain productivity.

Most Promising Next Generation Leaders – The Trailblazer (Individual)

Zuellig Pharma, one of the largest healthcare services providers in Asia, bagged the Most Promising Next Generation Leaders – The Trailblazer (Individual) Award. SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation (RPA) was used by Zuellig Pharma to install and scale robots across the company. 

The adoption of SAP Intelligent RPA has helped the enterprise to pioneer the deployment of digital bots that meet the expected standards in terms of innovation. Additionally, this has further enabled Zuellig Pharma to continue daily operations during the COVID-19 pandemic while serving customers with an enhanced experience.

Best Customer Experience Management – The X Factor

Adding to the list of Zuellig Pharma’s achievements is earning the Best Customer Experience Management – The X Factor Award. The company’s eZPay platform uses the SAP Cloud for Payment portal for customers to identify invoices for payment and view Statement of Account documents. With SAP’s solution, Zuellig Pharma was able to fully utilise its cloud capabilities, eliminate all manual processes, and design a seamless customer experience in real-time, all while saving up to 80{aa282f308afcc222aaa21b0478c79e01a8fedd01972e2180867097bd93930f22} on collection expenses.

Moreover, winners of the SAP Best Run Awards 2021 for SEA walk away with a total of US$30,000 charitable donations made by SAP to the ASEAN Foundation on behalf of them. This is in addition to professionally shot productions for their business promotions, as well as a personalised award trophy and an award certificate to commemorate their achievements.

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Zuellig Pharma, Asia’s leading healthcare services provider, has recently developed the eZTracker smartphone app, an SAP-powered blockchain platform. Through the app, consumers’ mobile devices become an instant verification tool, tracing barcode on medication to its manufacturer and the country of origin within seconds. Hence, ensuring the authenticity of the drug and the legitimacy of its distribution.

Zuellig Pharma leverages the blockchain technology as a solution to the growing concern on counterfeit drugs distributed around the region. The company acknowledges the fact that keeping track of counterfeit drugs is tedious because it entails the gathering of data from different parties across its supply chain.

Zuellig’s eZTracker App Explained

Zuellig Pharma has already announced its innovative move to combat the distribution of counterfeit drugs through blockchain projects during Fight the Fakes Week in December 2018. The company stated:

 “If a product is fake, alerts will be automatically triggered to the manufacturer and to Zuellig Pharma, together with an instant identification of where the fake product entered the supply chain,” 

Recently this August, Daniel Laverick, Zuellig Pharma’s Head of SAP and IT solutions, elaborated on eZTracker at an SAP regional event in Bangkok. He explained that the SAP blockchain platform captures data from the drug manufacturer upon receiving a drug at its warehouse onto a blockchain.

Laverick added that pertinent information about a drug like drug types and batch numbers are saved on the blockchain from the time it is moved within Zuellig Pharma to being shipped to consumers, hospitals and drug stores. Information about when and where a consumer uses eZTracker to scan the drug’s barcode is also written to the blockchain once it reaches the consumer.

Consumers will be alerted and advised on the actions they can take, such as informing the authorities or to seek treatment if they have already consumed the drug when the drug is deemed a counterfeit.

With regards to parallel imports, Laverick cautioned that although the drug is genuine and has passed through Zuellig Pharma’s supply chain, it might not have been shipped in conditions that guarantee its efficacy. 

The Blockchain Journey Begins

eZTracker is just the beginning of Zuellig Pharma’s blockchain journey. According to Laverick, the supply chain can also benefit from the same technology wherein sensor data about environmental conditions in which drugs are transported can be captured, as well as to facilitate payments and transactions. He stated:

“We have to come to a point where we can get to an open platform that we can collaborate on and put all the data in so that consumers would only need to use one app.” 

With regards to cracking down on counterfeit drugs, Laverick said that the pharmaceutical giant was also looking at providing data that it has captured on its blockchain platform to the authorities. 

According to World Health Organization (WHO), an estimated 1 in 10 medical products in low- and middle-income countries is substandard or falsified. These drugs may cause harm to patients and fail to treat the diseases for which they were intended. Zuellig Pharma’s blockchain journey, starting with eZTracker, is one logical and high-minded move to help the industry strengthen its stand on medicine traceability.

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