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May 5, 2008
Graceway Pharmaceuticals Goes Live with SAP® Business All-in-One Solutions from Answerthink and B4 Consulting
B4's 90-Day Rapid Implementation Migrates Pharma Company from SAP Business One to EzPharma™, a Qualified SAP Business All-in-One Partner Solution from Answerthink
Waltham, Mass. May 5, 2008 - B4 Consulting, delivering comprehensive Business Performance Management, implementation and support services for SAP® solutions, and Answerthink, a developer and provider of qualified SAP Business All-in-One solutions, today announced the successful implementation of EzPharma™, a qualified SAP Business All-in-One partner solution, at Graceway Pharmaceuticals (Bristol, TN). Graceway is a leading specialty pharmaceutical company, which brings branded prescription products to the U.S. and international markets. Using a Rapid Implementation Methodology, within 90 days B4 Consulting and Answerthink worked together to migrate Graceway from the SAP Business One solution to EzPharma™, developed by Answerthink for the pharmaceutical industry.
"Graceway is a compelling example of a company that uses the SAP solution suite to effectively grow its business," noted Klaus Schottenhamel, president and CEO of B4 Consulting. "Through an acquisition in 2006, Graceway went from a small pharma company to a multi-hundred million dollar enterprise. To keep Graceway's business on track during this transition, in late 2006 we successfully integrated all systems and implemented SAP Business One. At that time, SAP Business One delivered the precise functionality needed by Graceway and enabled Graceway to quickly respond to market conditions."
Graceway's unprecedented growth in 2007 demanded additional business processes and systems functionality. In the fall of 2007, B4 Consulting's Business Performance Management (BPM) team worked with Graceway to map out an IT strategy aligned with Graceway's business strategy, and the decision was made to migrate to SAP Business All-in One. EzPharma™, part of Answerthink's family of qualified SAP Business All-in-One partner solutions for life sciences, was selected to provide pharmaceutical-specific functionality.
"Using the EzPharma™ All-in-One solution as a baseline for Graceway's core business processes, we have achieved a very rapid deployment of a broad set of business processes in record time. Answerthink, B4 and Graceway worked extremely well together leveraging the best practices within EzPharma™ to complete this implementation," said John McGrath, managing director of Answerthink.
Answerthink and B4 Consulting Drive Successful Implementation of SAP Business All-in-One
Graceway's acquisition of a distribution facility and a vision for future mergers and acquisitions were catalysts for the use of the SAP Business All-in-One solution. Qualified SAP Business All-in-One partner solutions are preconfigured, industry-specific versions of the SAP ERP application combined with SAP Best Practice offerings, enabling streamlined operations, lower costs and a proven path to growth. Answerthink's EzPharma™ is a qualified SAP Business All-in-One solution, which features full support for Sarbanes-Oxley compliance and FDA validation.
"SAP is the gold standard in the pharmaceutical industry and B4 Consulting knows how to implement solutions from SAP," said Thomas Swetnam, vice president of IT at Graceway. "From our experience in implementing SAP Business One with B4 Consulting, we had complete faith in their ability to design and execute on a roadmap that would have us running SAP Business All-in-One on January 2, 2008."
The 90-day rapid implementation plan integrated Six Sigma and Lean manufacturing best practices, and capitalized on SAP Business One efficiencies. Moreover, the combined expertise of the Answerthink and B4 Consulting team in the U.S., Switzerland, and India delivered subject-matter knowledge in business process analysis, sales and order processing, pricing and product management, warehouse management, and financial transaction processing. "This team leveraged all their resources for dedicated and near round-the-clock project support," continued Swetnam. "Their high degree of dedication and knowledge gave us a truly seamless go-live."
The preconfigured benefits of the SAP solution combined with the advanced implementation methodologies accelerated the time to value of EzPharma™. Graceway's integrated, enterprise-wide information system features:
- Lean warehouse management and distribution
- Comprehensive accounting and financial management, including profitability analysis
- Integrated shipping with dynamic updates from FedEx/UPS common carriers
- Automatic revenue recognition upon acknowledgement of delivery
- Accrual accounting for charge-backs and returns
- Total inventory visibility from receipt with electronic QA release and inventory tracking
- FDA-compliant system validation
About Answerthink
Answerthink (www.answerthink.com), has achieved gold-level status as an SAP channel partner that develops and offers qualified SAP Business All-in-One partner solutions - industry-specific software, implementation, and training packaged solutions. By leveraging the best practices database of The Hackett Group, Answerthink helps clients improve performance and maximize returns on SAP software investments. Answerthink is a division of The Hackett Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: HCKT) and has offices in the United States and India.
About B4 Consulting
An SAP channel partner that has achieved gold-level status, B4 Consulting integrates business processes and technologies globally for customers who want enhanced results from their SAP solutions. With services for Business Performance Management, implementation and system integration, and Application Management Services, B4 helps small, midsized, and large enterprises optimize profits and throughput to enhance business performance. Authorized to resell SAP Business One and SAP Business All-in-One solutions, B4 also supports SAP Business Suite applications. Formerly known as IMG Americas - a company of S&T - B4 maintains a relationship with S&T, which has offices in 22 countries. B4 has headquarters in Greater Boston with offices in Greater Philadelphia, Chicago, New York City, and Mountain View as well as in Stuttgart, Germany.www.b4-consulting.com.
About Graceway Pharmaceuticals, LLC
Graceway Pharmaceuticals, LLC ("Graceway"), headquartered in Bristol, Tennessee, is a pharmaceutical company focused on acquiring, in-licensing, and developing branded prescription pharmaceutical products. Current prescription products marketed by Graceway include Aldara® (imiquimod) Cream 5%, Maxair® Autohaler® (pirbuterol acetate inhalation aerosol), Atopiclair® Nonsteroidal Cream, and Benziq®(benzoyl peroxide). Aldara, Maxair, Autohaler, and Tambocor are trademarks owned by or licensed to Graceway. www.gracewaypharma.com.
SAP and other SAP products and services mentioned herein as well as their respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and in several other countries all over the world.
All other product and service names mentioned are the trademarks of their respective companies.
