Porsche: Boosting efficiency, performance, and intelligence
Explore Porsche’s journey with SAP
Porsche has been guided by the principle of always getting the most out of everything – even its data. The legendary sports car manufacturer successfully automated processes, broke down silos, and gained deeper data-driven insights by deploying the SAP Analytics Cloud and SAP Datasphere solutions.
Markus Hartmann
IT Project Management Lead
Porsche
The Challenge
Bringing enterprise data to the engine of a high-performance business
Porsche strives to turn performance into success in “the most intelligent way possible.” That drive for innovation can be seen in the company’s high-performance vehicles sold throughout the world.
Data is an essential part of Porsche’s mission of intelligent innovation. However, the company needed a uniform, governed environment.
In the past, different lines of business and regions had their own data solutions. All too often, IT would be left in the dark, as data was offloaded and uploaded by individuals. This led to a loss of governance in reporting.
Getting the right sales data to its network of more than 600 dealerships was also time-consuming. Porsche relied heavily on extracting data from multiple sources and then inserting the data into spreadsheets to look for insights. This manual process meant that preparing for sales meetings could take days and slow down the closing of deals.
Markus Hartmann
IT Project Management Lead
Porsche
The Solution
Transforming data with a hybrid data warehouse and analytics
Porsche already had several systems in place, including SAP systems (such as the SAP BW/4HANA solution and the SAP ERP application) and third-party solutions. With all these systems in place, the company didn’t want to add more to the mix. Instead, it needed a single virtual layer to connect all these systems and optimize the flow of data.
All of this would need to happen in a governed environment to prevent any errors. Extending SAP BW/4HANA to the cloud with SAP Datasphere accomplished all this and more.
Additionally, Porsche simplified its data strategy with SAP Analytics Cloud.
The Result
Empowering sales and business operations with a governed data landscape
By restructuring its data landscape with SAP Analytics Cloud and SAP Datasphere, Porsche eliminated redundancy, removed silos, and automated processes. This enabled its lines of business to save time and draw valuable insights to help shape decision-making.
Now, a new hybrid data warehouse empowers Porsche’s employees to connect and model data in a safe and governed environment. Starting with the sales department, IT administrators gave access to the Spaces feature. Here, users can experiment with the data through virtualization and share models across Spaces, with IT knowing that the original data is safe and secure.
By setting up a visual dashboard with SAP Analytics Cloud, Porsche’s dealerships can instantly see sales data, lead information, and what’s in the pipeline on a granular level. The dealerships can quickly pull and understand the data that’s relevant to them while sales leaders get a broader view of the sales trends. All this cuts the prep time for sales meetings from days to mere hours.
These dashboards also made an impact on day-to-day operations. Now, sales members can check dashboards first thing in the morning to get a real-time overview of what needs to be accomplished. With the success of this project, SAP Analytics Cloud is now used across the organization with 3,000 users in departments ranging from customer relations to controlling to human resources.
Markus Hartmann
IT Project Management Lead
Porsche
Future Plans
Extending the power of unified data management and analytics
Now that sales members can easily access the data and deeper insights they need, Porsche plans to roll out the self-service capabilities of SAP Datasphere beyond the sales department to provide rich insights to different lines of business.
The open platform of SAP Datasphere connects with SAP Analytics Cloud, so users can quickly start making the most of the data. This revamped data architecture, with SAP Datasphere at the center, helps Porsche continue turning performance into success.
SAP helps Porsche run better
Key business outcomes and benefits
- Increased business performance in the most intelligent way possible by extending its existing deployment of SAP BW/4HANA
- Modernized the entire data landscape cost-effectively and without burdensome investments
- Restructured the data landscape to eliminate redundancy, remove silos, and automate processes
- Created a safe and secure environment to experiment with data through virtualization
- Eased and accelerated access to information and deeper insights to help stakeholders get more value from enterprise data
Featured solutions and services
- SAP Analytics Cloud streamlines sales data for a global network of dealerships.
- SAP Datasphere brings data-driven capabilities beyond the sales dealerships and to the rest of the organization.
About Porsche
Synonymous with high performance, Porsche specializes in the manufacturing of some of the world’s most coveted sports cars, SUVs, and sedans. The German-based company is owned by Volkswagen AG and produces a lineup that currently includes the 718 Boxster/Cayman, 911 (992), Panamera, Macan, Cayenne, and Taycan.
| Industry | Region | Company Size |
| Automotive | EMEA | >36,000 employees |
About Porsche
Synonymous with high performance, Porsche specializes in the manufacturing of some of the world’s most coveted sports cars, SUVs, and sedans. The German-based company is owned by Volkswagen AG and produces a lineup that currently includes the 718 Boxster/Cayman, 911 (992), Panamera, Macan, Cayenne, and Taycan.
| Industry | Region | Company Size |
| Automotive | EMEA | >36,000 employees |