Clariant: Optimizing Product Safety and Stewardship with SAP Software

Transcription

2 Company Clariant International AG Headquarters Muttenz, Switzerland Industry, products, and services Chemicals specialty chemicals Revenue US$6 billion Web site Thriving in an ever-fiercer compliance landscape Clariant International AG provides specialty chemicals to companies globally. Chemical manufacturers, their customers, and supply chains are subject to a fast-growing array of environmental, health, and safety regulations that, if not managed, pose serious risks to brand and revenue. Where does Clariant turn for help with product safety and compliance and risk of supply chain disruption? To solutions for product safety and stewardship from SAP. SAP solutions SAP Environment, Health, and Safety Management application; SAP Recycling Administration application; SAP EHS Regulatory Content packages Partner SAP Consulting SAP software provides vital help for Clariant and its supply chain to manage the health, safety, and environmental aspects of its products throughout their total lifecycles. The software also supports Clariant s overall commitment to sustainability, its clients, and its suppliers. Say, for example, Clariant wants to tap into a new market. Country-specific regulations, restrictions, and registration status information at the substance or product level can be easily obtained from Clariant s single, consistent, comprehensive, and reliable database of chemical compliance information maintained using SAP software. New products can be shipped more quickly, with confidence and at minimal risk, protecting Clariant s revenues and brand while engendering trust and benefitting suppliers, customers, and local authorities who are collaborating with Clariant on compliance and registration. All parties win and contribute to the protection of people, the economy, and the environment. Read more 2 / SAP AG or an SAP affiliate company. All rights reserved.

3 Sustainability for growth, profits, and competitiveness Clariant owns more than 100 group companies and employs more than 21,000 people. The group has four business areas: natural resources; plastics and coatings; catalysis and energy; and care chemicals. Clariant creates value by investing in growth both internally through innovation and externally through strategic acquisitions. Governments are issuing increasingly tight environmental protection and consumer safety regulations on all aspects of product lifecycles. Among the toughest are Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) and the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS). Any company that manufactures chemicals finds that adherence to regulations like these is crucial for protecting not only consumers and the environment but also the marketability of products and ongoing reputation of the company. ~90% Clariant products secured by SAP software Clariant is vitally concerned about sustainability. The firm cares deeply about complying with regulations not only to avoid fines and penalties but also to improve relationships with customers and suppliers. In fact, Clariant has formalized its goals reduce its energy consumption by 30% by 2020 compared with 2005 levels, and reduce its carbon dioxide emissions and waste by 45% over the same period and is on track to achieve them. 3 / SAP AG or an SAP affiliate company. All rights reserved.

4 Simplifying and managing mountains of complexity Ascertaining whether it is adhering to all applicable regulations is enormously complicated for Clariant. The firm uses over 240,000 substances globally in its manufacturing, delivers to more than 160 countries that all have their own regulations, and produces more than 15,000 safety data sheets annually. Clariant charters a corporate sustainability group supported by Michael Hartmann, head of global regulatory compliance. My group s toughest challenges are to accurately report on our compliance status and our cost of compliance, Hartmann says. In the past, that job was doubly difficult because of the disparate tools we were using. We had several solutions for product labeling that weren t consistent with one another, let alone with the various different tools we used for creating safety data sheets. We had to move away from that scattered environment and adopt one solution that comprehensively covered all our compliance requirements. Clariant was already an SAP shop for its business needs and had deployed the SAP Environment, Health, and Safety Management (SAP EHS Management) application many years before. Therefore, Clariant had no trouble making its decision. There is a huge benefit in having integration and consistency between enterprise resource planning and compliance software, as well as having both of them architected around a single database, says Hartmann. With a common source, the way SAP does it, you re going to get common results. The data on a safety data sheet is going to be the same as on a product label and the same as on workplace instructions. We didn t need to think twice about choosing SAP for our product safety and stewardship needs. 4 / SAP AG or an SAP affiliate company. All rights reserved.

5 Replacing dozens of solutions with one comprehensive family Clariant chose SAP solutions for product safety and stewardship to manage hazardous substance management, global label management, product compliance, safety data sheet generation, and recycling administration. Building on its longtime relationship with SAP Consulting and wanting to leverage the group s collaboration efforts and expertise again, Clariant chose SAP Consulting to help implement the solutions. The addition of product safety and stewardship solutions from SAP is helping Clariant remain a leader in managing health, safety, and environmental aspects of our products throughout their lifecycles, says Hartmann. We are providing better services to our customers while managing sustainability in a holistic way. The software is helping us bundle our know-how in fundamental product stewardship to comply with legal requirements while equipping us to add value to the business, support our product stewardship organizations, harmonize their business processes, and keep them highly efficient. A comprehensive database about our products, the substances that comprise them, and all necessary data about their compliance profiles is the pivotal building block in supporting adherence to regulations globally. That is what our solutions for product safety and stewardship from SAP provide, Hartmann continues. We also appreciate our close collaboration with SAP Consulting and the expertise its people delivered. SAP software provides the support we need to comply with regulations such as REACH and GHS. Michael Hartmann, Head of Global Regulatory Compliance, Clariant Produkte (Deutschland) GmbH 5 / SAP AG or an SAP affiliate company. All rights reserved.

6 Closing in on 100% coverage Clariant s rollout of its sustainability solutions from SAP is now nearly complete. Right now, about 90% of the products we sell worldwide are protected by SAP software, and we are planning for 100% coverage within two years, Hartmann reports. With the solutions help, Clariant is successfully demonstrating compliance with REACH, GHS, and similar regulations all around the world. Hartmann s group is also finding it easier to apprise the board about the cost of achieving compliance. Clariant is systematically whittling away at the array of legacy applications as momentum grows for moving to SAP software. The different approaches for generating safety data sheets are gone, for example, and so are the various labeling applications. SAP software fulfills all their functions. When we had all those disparate applications, we also had disparate groups that ran them which we have now consolidated into one. The labor savings alone are huge, not to mention all the software support costs we are saving, says Hartmann. Also, this single source helps us respond quicker to customer and supply chain requests for substance information, greatly improving customer service and relationships. 6 / SAP AG or an SAP affiliate company. All rights reserved.

7 Navigating an ever-denser thicket without adding staff The efficiency, data consistency, and content of chemical regulations, rules, phrases, regulatory data, and templates introduced by the SAP solutions help Clariant achieve a primary goal comply with expanding global chemical regulations without adding staff. Updating and delivering 15,000 safety data sheets annually, for example, is done at the push of a button. Integrated data enables Clariant to have better control and make faster decisions throughout a product s lifecycle. Immediate visibility of compliance status during sales order processing helps the firm respond to customer requests faster. Sales orders, purchase orders, and production orders are set up with alerts or automatic blocks. Checking compliance information helps prevent the purchase of noncompliant products. Attempts to purchase Clariant products that would be noncompliant at their destinations are immediately visible, allowing the company to resolve the problem quickly and avoid expediting changes. This visibility also reduces the risk of shipping the wrong products or materials. At the end of a product s lifecycle, the SAP Recycling Administration application assists with the proper disposal of materials used in manufacturing. In Germany, it is also helping Clariant evaluate the fees it owes under the European Union s recycling directives, calculate packaged goods amounts that are due to its recycling partner, and provide auditable transaction accounting. Having a state-of-the-art system gives us confidence internally in the event of an audit, enables us to respond faster to our customers, and helps us attract and retain employees with EHS expertise who are difficult to find. Michael Hartmann, Head of Global Regulatory Compliance, Clariant Produkte (Deutschland) GmbH 7 / SAP AG or an SAP affiliate company. All rights reserved.

8 Clariant Managing EHS standards One of Hartmann s strategic goals is to support innovation and time to market using design-for-compliance concepts. We are moving toward embedding product safety and stewardship considerations at the earliest phases of the design process, he explains. This means that at the very beginning of the product lifecycle process in addition to considering chemical cost and availability we will be able to consider the product s compliance status and our ability to market it. Clariant also wants to facilitate communication about sustainability issues throughout its supply chain by using the SAP Product Stewardship Network. The company would like to rely on this new cloud-based collaboration solution as its core platform for communicating all relevant product regulation information across the supply chain. CMP21396 (13/04) 2013 SAP AG or an SAP affiliate company. All rights reserved. 8 / 8

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