JOHANNESBURG, (CAJ News) – ESKOM, the South African power utility that has become the first company in the continent to receive the prestigious Advanced Centre of Expertise (COE) certification, said partnering with a leading global enterprise software solution provider has enhanced its
operations over the past decade.
Systems, Applications and Products (SAP), the German-headquartered company, has awarded Eskom the certification.
Sean Maritz, Acting Chief Information Officer and Divisional Executive at Eskom, said SAP had a positive impact on the utility’s operations over the last ten years.
He said with SAP’s systems in place, they had seen a significant reduction in system outages due to the improvement in their internal processes.
“Our internal IT ratings have also improved by 15 percent and we have experienced 10 percent fewer outages due to the increased levels of accurate real-time data in our systems,” said Maritz.
With this the new certification, the Eskom team now has integrated IT systems quality management in place, bringing complete transparency to the challenges and issues faced by the organisation as a whole.
The SAP certification conveyed a level of commitment to quality above all and highlighted Eskom’s commitment to ensure sustainability in the long term, the executive said.
“Throughout this process, we have challenged the silo thinking prevalent in the market today, securing a deeper understanding of how every action impacts other areas of the business, the economy, and indeed the people that live and work within South Africa,” commented Maritz.
Eskom will now focus on further improvement of the organisation’s IT systems.
This includes adding more business processes and improving the quality of the existing processes.
“With SAP as a partner, we have demonstrated to the world that we have a mature ITC environment and that effectively harnessed technology can change the playing field.
“Furthermore, this certification offers immense skills development benefits for our people as learners and interns become far more employable due to their exposure to the highest possible levels of SAP-optimised processes”
SAP Africa Managing Director, Brett Parker, said Eskom and SAP jointly decided to pursue the achievement of the Advanced Centre of Expertise cerification over four years ago.
“We commend Eskom for their efforts and are proud to see the first Advanced Centre of Expertise on the African continent. We also look forward to taking our collaboration into the future to achieve even
greater success,” said Parker.
– CAJ News
