CAR

1. An Introduction to SAP CAR”
What is SAP CAR?
SAP CAR is an abbreviation for SAP Customer Activity Repository. SAP CAR is powered by SAP HANA’s real-
time computing capability to provide Point Of Sale data transfer from stores to the SAP CAR platform and then
provide sales analytics, inventory visibility, and demand forecasting in real-time.
In a nutshell, SAP Customer Activity Repository:
•Consolidates Omnichannel (Sales, Price & Promotions, Inventory, Availability and Sourcing) data to provide real-
time analytics for the consuming applications/businesses
•Provides accurate demand forecast and optimise Replenishment processes/decisions
•Provides a strong platform for better promotions and product assortments that can be used for personalised
marketing
•Provides real-time standard Fiori apps covering a wide range of SAP standard business processes/solutions

2. Why SAP CAR?
Basically, the current SAP POSDM (Point of Sale Data Management) technology is going to be out of maintenance
support by Dec 2020 so the next technology upgrade over SAP POSDM (on Oracle) is SAP CAR (on HANA).
In addition to the capabilities mentioned in the SAP CAR introduction space, the SAP CAR is a more reliable
platform. It accumulates all the POS data from various autonomous systems, processes it as per standard or
bespoke business processes and provides a harmonized and single source of truth POS data for all the
downstream consuming applications.
SAP CAR is a better technology platform considering it provides a lot of inbuilt standard features (depends on
CARAB bundle version) which can be readily used for the effective business/operational activities.
Considering that the SAP CAR platform is a one-stop-shop for Inventory Visibility, On-Shelf availability, Promotions
Management and Fiori Analytical Reporting, it helps to reduce the number of other “bespoke” systems doing the
same work and keep the SAP landscape lean. This helps reduction in the operational/maintenance costs for those
“legacy” or “bespoke” systems and keep the overall SAP landscape simple.
An Introduction to SAP CAR”

3. SAP Customer Activity Repository
What are the timelines to Greenfield implement SAP CAR?
• I think this is a subjective question because the timelines are derived from various factors such as and not limited to the:
• Organization’s Architectural Roadmap or business appetite to implement whole CAR suite including POSDTA (Point of Sale
Data Transfer and Audit), PMR, UDF(Unified Demand Forecast), OSA (On Shelf Availability), Inventory Visibility, Fraud
Management et al
• Duration to build a stable SAP CAR – Infra platform (on Cloud or On Premise)
• Total Number of customizations those need to be accommodated on top of the SAP CAR standard offerings
• Total Number of upstream and downstream integrations and their respective customizations
• Duration to prove the Latency, Volume throughout or other Non Functional Requirement
• GoLive Strategies (i.e. Pilots/Rollouts or a “Big Bang” approach) based on the organization’s desire to take a risk
What are your recommendations for organizations seeking SAP CAR as a future roadmap?
• I believe that considering POSDM’s end life of 2020 is just a year away, organizations planning SAP CAR as a future roadmap
should start the journey as soon as possible to disassociate with the POSDM platform before the end of 2020.
• Starting the SAP CAR journey early will not only help to avoid the SAP’s out of maintenance support operational risks but also
allows organizations to stabilize the new platform well ahead of time. This will also initiate the business improvements based
on real-time data analytics.
• Leveraging SAP CAR offerings i.e. Inventory Visibility, OSA, POSDTA, PMR, UDF et al. is a real game-changer as these all help
the organizations in better planning and decision making which at the end of the day improves the customer’s shopping
experience so it’s a win-win for both organizations and consumers.

4. • WHAT DOES SAP CAR OFFER?
• Near Real-Time Analytics at the Lowest Granularity
• Sales analysis has steadily grown in sophistication for retailers as computing has become more powerful and more affordable. Traditional sales reporting systems have some limitations when it comes to sales and inventory analytics:
• Analytics on the most granular level (TLOG) may not be available.
• Latency is so great that analysis has lost much of its relevance.
• New reporting requirements often lead to complicated changes in data models and the ETL process.
• SAP CAR addresses these limitations by providing near real-time access to transaction-level sales data – SAP CAR collects Point of Sales transactions at the TLOG level. This allows analysis and reporting on any level of granularity in seconds. When a POS trickle feed is used, new
data is available for reporting within minutes of the sale. You will be able to see the current inventory position of a particular product at a particular store. You will also be able to evaluate sales performance and promotion effectiveness at any store in real-time.
• Besides POS sales transactions, master data (product, store), transaction data (billing documents, sales documents, purchase orders), and inventory data (unrestricted on-hand inventory) can be replicated from your ERP system (SAP ECC or SAP S/4HANA ) in real-time using SLT
(SAP landscape transformation). In this way, SAP CAR can capture sales transactions across multiple channels, enabling the retailer to get a 360-degree view of the customers and cross-channel transaction data.
• Other modules can also consume this real-time sales and inventory data inside SAP CAR, such as OAA (Omnichannel Article Availability and Sourcing). We will discuss this topic in more detail in future blogs.
• Real-time reporting on transaction-level data provides the following benefits to retailers:
• Evaluate the actual profitability of stores, items, customers, and promotions (in any combination).
• Evaluate the effectiveness of loyalty programs, promotions, and other marketing efforts.
• Quickly respond to changes in customer behavior.
• Improved targeted marketing.
• Provide a more satisfying shopping experience and better interactions with customers.
• Report against master data directly replicated in real-time, rather than master data transformed in batches.

5. SAP CAR 2.0 features major innovations including:
• Multichannel Foundation (extending point-of-sale data transfer and audit capabilities)
• Inventory Visibility (providing real-time insight into current stock)
• Multichannel Sales Analysis (delivering simple, beautiful, and mission-critical SAP Fiori apps for
retailers)
• Forecast Capabilities (improvements to Unified Demand Forecast and Demand Data Foundation)

6. Simple and beautiful Fiori apps such as this Multichannel Sales Analysis dashboard were
made in Canada by the SAP Labs Montreal team for SAP Customer Activity Repository 2.0.

7. During his last executive visit to SAP Montreal in November, Vetter reported that Simon Paris (President
of the Industry Cloud organization) is so pleased with SAP CAR that he is asking Vetter for the secret to
the product’s success.
“A big part of that is the team,” Vetter said. “Everywhere I go, people are asking about CAR”.
The product already boasts big name customers such as COOP, Loblaw’s, Armani, etc., and the pipeline
is jam-packed with exciting prospects.
“I’m fortunate to work with a diverse team of experienced, multi-disciplined women and men” Proulx
added.
At the end of November, customers will be able to access a free, 3 day cloud based CAR trial, allowing
users to access various sales and customer segmentation analytics that leverage the underlying CAR
data.
For more information about SAP CAR, visit the CAR One-Stop Shop on Planet Retail and the SAP Help
Portal.
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Montreal-based creators of SAP CAR celebrate their latest release! Look under the hood
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