An additional field for supplier information, a connection to an external data source or a customer acceptance check. Over the years, more and more customisations have been added to many SAP environments. Every change has a purpose, but together they can make the system more complex. Upgrades require more preparation, and integrating new functionality becomes more difficult.
With SAP Clean Core, the focus shifts towards extensions that respect the standard functionality of the ERP system. SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP) plays an important role in this approach. But a more manageable system is only the beginning. How do you ensure that the customer and supplier data your processes rely on also remains reliable?
What is SAP BTP?
SAP Business Technology Platform is a cloud platform for integration, application development, automation, data and AI, among other things. It allows you to connect SAP with other systems and add functionality alongside your ERP core. For example, you can use an application to retrieve external business information and make it available within your existing SAP processes.
This approach is known as side-by-side extensibility: the extension runs alongside the ERP system and exchanges data through available interfaces. This makes the extension and the SAP core less dependent on each other. You can develop and manage new functionality with fewer changes to the core system.
What does SAP Clean Core mean for your organisation?
SAP Clean Core is about maintaining an ERP environment that remains manageable and easy to upgrade. You make use of standard functionality and supported extension options where additional logic is needed. This can be within S/4HANA or through an application on BTP, depending on the process.
The main difference is therefore how you extend the system. Customisations that deeply affect standard SAP code can require additional checks and remediation work during updates. By designing extensions carefully and, where appropriate, placing them alongside the core, you reduce this dependency. This creates more room to improve your processes without every new development becoming a major technical project.
A modern SAP environment requires reliable data
Clean Core makes your SAP environment more manageable. But duplicate customer records, missing registration numbers and outdated supplier data do not disappear automatically. Whether you are moving to S/4HANA, digitising your invoicing or implementing AI, the quality of your master data partly determines how well your processes work.
- The move to S/4HANA. By checking and cleaning your data before migration, you can prevent existing errors from being carried over to your new environment.
- Electronic invoicing. Accurate company names, addresses and identification numbers help ensure invoices are processed correctly and prevent rejections or delays.
- AI and automation. Automated processes require up-to-date information and need to identify the correct company to deliver reliable results.
An outdated legal status, for example, can lead to an incorrect assessment of a supplier. Duplicate customer records can fragment information about orders, payments and risks. The more you automate, the further such errors can propagate. By getting your master data in order and keeping it up to date, you create a stronger foundation for the next step in your SAP landscape.
Interesting read: SAP deadline 2030: prepare your data for S/4HANA
Enrich your own Business Partner data with D&B data
Your own customer and supplier data contains valuable information about your business relationships, such as internal customer numbers, orders and payment terms. By combining this data with up-to-date business information from Dun & Bradstreet, you gain a more complete view of the organisations you do business with.
dataxess for SAP from Altares Dun & Bradstreet connects your SAP environment to the Dun & Bradstreet Data Cloud. The solution is built on SAP BTP and aligns with Clean Core principles. You can check and enrich existing Business Partner records with information such as official company names, addresses and registration numbers. This external information complements your own data within the SAP processes your team already works with.
You can also create new customers and suppliers as enriched Business Partners in just a few clicks. For example, you can search for a company by company name, D-U-N-S® Number or VAT number. When source data changes later, you can compare the new information with your SAP data and synchronise it after review. This reduces manual data entry and helps you maintain control over the accuracy of your data.
Interesting read: Altares Dun & Bradstreet launches dataxess for SAP for reliable Business Partner data
A clean core is only the beginning
SAP BTP provides room to extend your SAP landscape. Clean Core helps keep those extensions manageable. The value for your organisation comes when you combine this architecture with reliable data: less remediation work, better-informed decisions and a stronger foundation for automation.
Want to improve your Business Partner data without adding customisations to the SAP core? Our experts would be happy to show you how dataxess for SAP makes reliable business data available within your SAP processes.
