SAP S/4hana: An Introduction

Devraj Bardhan is a distinguished global SAP leader at IBM, renowned for his exceptional track record in leading large-scale transformation projects that have significantly driven business growth through innovation and digital efficiencies. As an esteemed subject matter expert (SME) in SAP S/4HANA, SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP), and artificial intelligence (AI), Devraj has played a pivotal role in expanding IBM's digital transformation capabilities by developing and implementing global templates and intelligent workflows. He maintains strong collaborative relationships with both SAP and IBM customers, fostering the incubation of groundbreaking ideas. Additionally, Devraj spearheads the NextLevel SAP BTP & AI partnership, which leverages joint intellectual property creation between IBM and SAP to drive mutual success. Devraj can be reached via www.linkedin.com/in/bardhan or on social media channels like X, Bluesky, and Mastodon as @devbard.

Axel Baumgartl is leading the transformation office for the Global Partner Organization of SAP. In his role, he focuses on accelerating the transformation of operations, processes, and applications to support the activation and enablement of the SAP ecosystem based on his 20 years of experience with SAP transformation projects. He is the author of several publications and books about SAP products and he developed a method for enterprise architecture blueprinting.

Madalina Dascalescu is an associate partner at IBM. With more than a decade of experience, she contributed to numerous SAP transformation projects, aiding clients in optimizing their operations and orchestrating robust enterprise architecture to facilitate sustained growth. Madalina had held various consulting roles, supporting the implementation of materials management, transportation management, yard logistics, and extended warehouse management solutions from SAP. As part of NDT Global, an SAP customer, Madalina was responsible for the SAP S/4HANA solution architecture team both on the implementation project and within the global center of excellence. Additionally, Madalina played a pivotal role within SAP, notably as part of SAP 4.0 pop-up factory, where she led the setup and showcasing of integrated digital supply chain and Industry 4.0 solutions, aimed to demonstrate their efficacy to customers.

Mark Dudgeon, now retired, was the Global SAP CTO of IBM Global Business Services, SAP Service Line. He has more than 23 years of experience in architecture design and delivery for some of IBM's largest SAP deployments. Mark's role also included ensuring that IBM has the right partnerships, capabilities, and offerings to support its customers in their digital transformation journey with SAP. You can reach Mark via Twitter @MarkPDudgeon.

Piotr Gorecki is a program manager and enterprise architect working at IBM Global SAP Center of Competence. He has almost 30 years of experience in planning and delivering complex business transformation programs based on SAP solutions. Piotr has been working on global and local SAP projects in several industries, including consumer products, life sciences, retail, and telecommunications. In his current role, he helps customers define their road maps to SAP S/4HANA and identify new solutions and technologies that enable reaching their business goals. Piotr can be reached via www.linkedin.com/in/piotrgorecki/.