Migrating to the Euro: a Case of S/4HANA ERP System

Author: Natalia Lysenko

A well-established company specializing in advanced information and communications technology solutions approached IBA Group with a kuna-to-euro migration project. After the Croatian government passed the decision about the transition to the euro, the company contacted IBA Group with the request to switch their existing S/4HANA-based ERP system from HRK to EUR in accordance with the legally determined timeframe. The scope of work included key modules, such as Finance (FI), Controlling (CO), Material Management (MM), and Warehouse Management (WM).

Challenges

The client chose the IBA team for the project because we had vast experience in transferring ERP systems from one currency to another. However, the deadline was tight with no possibility of extension—something that only trusted providers and SAP partners are capable of doing. Another significant challenge of the project was keeping the existing functionality and data.

Solution

Before starting the project, the IBA team conducted a thorough due diligence with regard to the regulatory landscape in order to ensure timely delivery and compliance. After that, we ran a high-quality pre-sale and examined the customer’s existing IT infrastructure to provide accurate time, cost, and upload estimates, including the participation of the customer’s team so that no operational gap could occur.

Results

Once the project was implemented, the customer obtained stable ERP systems converted in the euro, preserving all the data, report forms, and productivity, as well as containing additional customizations.

Lessons Learned and Best Practices

The cross-currency migration of ERP systems requires extreme caution in the legal area to avoid financial accounting issues in the future. Whether the SAP version you are running is ECC or SAP S/4HANA, the transition of an ERP system to another currency can be performed quickly and cause no harm to your internal business cycles. For the implementation of such a project, one needs to have adequate preparatory measures in place or select a contractor that has a proven record of accomplishment. Another viable recommendation is to combine transition to the euro with conversion to SAP S/4HANA.