With SAP’s platform strategy with includes leveraging the huge SAP partner ecosystem to not only sell and service SAP customers but also build crucial industry specific functional capabilities for our customers, it is also very important for SAP resellers to collaborate with solution partners.
In this blog post, we explore the collaboration between the SAP partners Flexso in Belgium and GISA in Germany. Flexso has developed a number of industry cloud solutions for higher education which GISA is leveraging for their business.
Interview with Marco Fahsel, Business Line Manager, Higher Education and Research D/AU, GISA GmbH
Q: Can you introduce your company briefly?
Answer: Last year we celebrated our 30th anniversary. As an IT specialist, cloud service provider and consulting firm, we offer comprehensive IT solutions: from strategy and consulting to development and implementation through to the outsourcing of complete business processes and IT infrastructures. We employ more than 870 people and have been an SAP Gold Partner and SAP Reseller for many years. GISA operates throughout Germany as one of the leading industry experts for the energy industry and the public sector and provides medium-sized industrial companies. Since 2017, our new focus sector has been on universities and research institutions in the DACH region with a specific and comprehensive solution portfolio. We are generating the greatest growth in this sector.
Q: How and why did you end up collaborating with Flexso and leverage their solutions?
A: GISA pursues a clear course for universities and research institutions. We want to be the trusted partner for our customers in the DACH region. This means that we anticipate many of the challenges that an institution faces in this area, proactively translate them into solutions and then offer them. As our focus for this sector is on administrative processes, i.e. the areas of procurement, finance, budget management, planning, personnel management, student administration and third-party funding management, and we have already developed two ready-made SAP S/4 master models for this, it made sense to also include the entire research process as a solution in our portfolio. And there is only one company in the world that has thought through and implemented this holistically. It is Flexso with its Research Package solution. But that's just one side of the coin: with our colleagues at Flexso, we have found partners who see eye to eye with us and share the same passion for our customers. So the chemistry and the solution are a perfect match. GISA pursues a clear course for universities and research institutions. We want to be the trusted partner for our customers in the DACH region. This means that we anticipate many of the challenges that an institution faces in this area, proactively translate them into solutions and then offer them. As our focus for this sector is on administrative processes, i.e. the areas of procurement, finance, budget management, planning, personnel management, student administration and third-party funding management, and we have already developed two ready-made SAP S/4 master models for this, it made sense to also include the entire research process as a solution in our portfolio. And there is only one company in the world that has thought through and implemented this holistically. It is Flexso with its Research Package solution. But that's just one side of the coin: with our colleagues at Flexso, we have found partners who see eye to eye with us and share the same passion for our customers. So the chemistry and the solution are a perfect match.
Q: What are the biggest benefits you as partner have experienced from your collaboration with Flexso?
A: We have invested a lot of time, nerves and expertise in our GISA S/4 solutions. We have overcome barriers to market entry, and not always directly. I myself have been looking for a solution that covers the end-2-end process in the research process for over 10 years. With the Flexso solution, we have a market-ready and market-tested product on SAP BTP. In the first step, we worked with some of GISA's existing customers to determine the market fit and established that this was 100% given. We generated leads directly. Following our university information day last year, at which Maastricht University also gave a presentation on the Flexso implementation project, we are now holding intensive discussions with almost a dozen potential customers. This shows that the decision-making phase, which normally takes almost 2 years, is shorter. So we are talking about an accelerated sales process. On the one hand, this is due to the modular nature of the product, as the solution can be introduced with a small approach, its high market maturity and the very inductive UI/UX. On the other hand, there is a really strong need at our facilities that has not yet been adequately covered by any product, which is why the discussions very often very quickly assume a high degree of commitment.
At this point, it should be mentioned that we started our market entry activities in mid-2022 and were able to announce the first large and significant order at the beginning of 2024. That is a real success story.
Q: From your customer’s perspective, what are the most appreciated features of the Flexso solution?
A: Many, but unfortunately not all, of our customers have a clear idea of how they want to position themselves in terms of digitalization within administrative and support processes. The question here is how decentralized stakeholders can effectively and efficiently operate the third-party funding process holistically with central offices, i.e. without media discontinuity and a stable data model, so that funding can be acquired in the best possible way and later accessed without losses. The Flexso solution offers three key features here, and of course more, but more on that elsewhere:
- the Flexso solution integrates itself into the SAP landscape of our customers and uses existing information from the organizational structure (e.g. cost center) and the back-end of SAP when it comes to information such as personnel data, transaction data from the areas of procurement, finance and planning. This creates an integrated scenario based on the end-to-end process, which results in trust and less data management. Such a system is also less prone to errors, as data is only maintained once. The first major key factor is therefore the precise integration into the existing SAP landscape.
- the research process is a less structured process for our customers today, at least in the decentralized areas. There are a large number of tools in use here to map the pre-award phase, to manage fundraising and to set up controlling. This is mostly done with Excel. The Flexso solution creates standards, harmonizes processes and thus creates process reliability. It is helpful that this approach is not necessarily a big bang, but can be implemented step by step thanks to the modular structure of the solution. So you start where the pain is greatest. A change process takes place based on the reasonable ability of the organization to implement this process of change. Particularly in the decentralized area of the process, the utmost vigilance is required here.
- our customers are very interested in long-lasting solutions. This creates security and trust, which then leads to long-term cooperation. With the modern SAP platform of BTP, this is given in the technical structure. As the Flexso solution is part of the SAP Industry Cloud, another binding fact is created. And with the modern and inductive UI/UX based on FIORI, a workplace can be created that runs stringently through all SAP processes. This is important because our customers demand a consistent experience.
Q: Can you talk a little bit about your collaboration with Flexso?
A: What unites us? The desire to work with our customers on their problems and challenges. And everything works on this basis. At the beginning of our relationship, we gave ourselves a clear picture of the upcoming market entry. GISA will take the lead for the German or DACH market. We will gradually be put in a position to present, introduce and finally support the solution. We are on our way and we still have a lot to do. In parallel, we have integrated and set up the Flexso solution in our SAP S/4HANA master so that specific German issues can be demonstrated in concrete terms.
Our common goal is to understand the requirements of the HER market in a close and cooperative approach and to implement them profitably from the customer's perspective.
Interview with Zjef Mallaerts, partner at Flexso Digital
Q: Can you introduce your company briefly?
A: From a full end-to-end SAP suite, additional apps and extensions to integrations and managed services: whatever it takes to boost a business, at Flexso, we can take care of it – in close collaboration with our customer, of course. Our offices are located in Belgium, The Netherlands, Luxembourg and Austria, and our team of over 500 SAP consultants is active in over 50 countries.
As a leading SAP partner and reseller, we are also a proud winner of numerous SAP Partner Awards, including an SAP innovation award in 2022. We are also an SAP Build partner, marketing and delivering several solutions on the SAP Store. We offer for example multiple SuccessFactors extensions as SAAS solutions, with some of them being implemented by numerous customers.
Q: Why did you develop the solution?
A: Based on our more than 20 years of experience, we also specialize specifically in research management & administration with our Flexso Research Management Package. This modular set of over 25 Fiori applications enables an institution or company to implement a digital research management process, from the pre-award stage, all the way to project closure.
We started to develop this solution because we saw a need for it in multiple institutions of higher education and research. Our blended team of dedicated research project analysts and digital developers, and our knowledge of both SAP technology and the business research management processes made us uniquely qualified to develop this solution.
Q: What are the typical customers for this solution and how has the solution helped these customers?
A:Our solution is typically selected by institutions of higher education and research, such as universities, colleges, but also private research and development organizations. Academics and researchers want to focus on their research. Unfortunately, that’s often just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to a job in this field. The administrative workload, complex financial flows and juggling of other data often go unseen. And yet, a lot – up to 40% – of a researcher’s time goes to approving requests, reporting, managing budgets and changing sponsor demands, and more. The Flexso Research Management Package helps to streamline that administrative workload.
Q Are you looking for collaborating with more SAP partners like GISA?
A: We are definitely looking to partner up with other great partners such as GISA in the future! Our solution is one of a kind and could potentially help customers worldwide. However, we don’t have the manpower or the local know-how to attempt to implement our solution everywhere. Being close to your customers and speaking the native language is really key in this matter. That is why a partner such as GISA with their knowledge, enthusiasm and focus is such a valuable partnership to us. We are definitely on the lookout for other partners sharing this same DNA!
Closure
For universities and research institutes in Germany, Austria or Switzerland which think they could benefit of GISA’s competencies, consider to contact GISA to explore. For SAP partners and organizations in the rest of the world which think they might benefit of Flexso’s experience and solutions in this area, reach out to Zjef and Flexso team to discuss collaboration possibilities.
For further information, visit GISA’s website, Flexso website, and the solutions on the SAP store.
GISA website
Flexso website
Flexso industry cloud solutions on SAP Store
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