In an exclusive event, Partners from Japan participated in the extension of SAP Business Technology Platform Hack2Build initiative.

Typically, during the Hack2Build event, partners come forth to create a prototype and then plan to build a full-fledged business solution with support from SAP to generate business value for our customers by leveraging SAP Business Technology Platform ( SAP BTP).

The theme for this initiative emphasised the Japanese Partners to  build extensions and integrations using SAP BTP. The Hack2Build, beyond hackathon event, was run as a virtual initiative, held between May 17-24.

Binal Corporation, CTC, Hitachi Ltd and Hitachi System participated and showcased their innovation on SAP BTP in less than a week’s time.

Itochu Techno-Solutions Corporation (CTC) –CTC was adjudged as the Winner.

CTC demonstrated the much-needed integration with Sansan, a 3rd party business card management system with SAP Concur. In Japan, the tax rates for entertainment expenses with external parties and in-house entertainment expenses are different. Austere management of entertainment information, including attendee information, is required for applying entertainment tax rates appropriately. Although, SAP Concur has the function to manage such attendee information manually, CTC perceived a need to connect core systems such as SAP S/4HANA and SAP Concur with Sansan, the business card information management solution, the most widely used in Japan. During the prototype phase, the solution depicted the API integration through batch linkage with FTP/HTTP between Sansan and SAP Concur, where attendees’ information in Sansan is sent to SAP Concur to register.

Image : Sansan integration with SAP Concur by CTC

In the next phase, CTC plans the Enterprise-scaled application which will include integration with core accounting system and use SAP AppGyver for supporting own interface to enable employees and finance department users to adopt the solution.

The other prototypes developed and showcased are by :

• BINAL Corporation: to Improve trade practice efficiency by integrating SAP S/4HANA with LOGIWORKS, BINAL’s trade management solution on cloud)
• Hitachi Ltd.: Purchase requisition with chatbot using SAP Conversational AI and SAP S/4HANA
• Hitachi Systems: Business Partner master registration using smart devices with SAP Workflow and SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation (RPA) services

The panel of judges consisted of the following SAP leaders:

• Martin Grasshoff, Director Product Management, SAP Extension Suite
• Rudi Held, Global Head of SAP Co-Innovation Lab Network
• Shinichi Oda, Head of Industries and Customer Advisory, SAP Japan
• Takeshi Oga, Chief Transformation Officer and Head of Digital Ecosystem, SAP Japan

We would like to thank the Judges and the SAP teams which provided their expertise to successfully execute this initiative in Japan.

Next steps would be to support all the participating partners to build the full scope of their application in the next weeks.

Authors: Akira Ogawa , Vasanth KUMAR