For the cytostatics product group, Teva’s existing SAP consignemt app was to be adapted to the new processes due to a new warehouse structure. Teva chose DATAGROUP as its redesign partner. With the new app, cytostatics can be picked smartly by scan and touch. Via this mobile solution, employees have an overview of what is currently in the consigment worklist at all times.

The goal of the project was to adapt an existing web app to a redesigned order process. The existing app was part of a larger app infrastructure developed in-house by Teva, which had many interfaces with existing architectures and legacy systems.

The challenge for DATAGROUP was to adapt the app in this complex framework so that it both met the new requirements and took into account the existing interactions. DATAGROUP succeeded in implementing these requirements of Teva accordingly and adapting the app to the processes.

Scanner Function for Easier Picking

Process reliability is ensured by this mobile solution and supporting scanner function.

The app offers the possibility to scan and verify the storage location as well as the goods and container barcodes via a counter-scan. This represents a fundamental simplification in the process. Furthermore, the app covers different picking structures – from a single package to a full original carton. Depending on the selected process, users use a barcode on a transport tray for single picking or stick a continuous barcode on an original carton. These barcodes can be used at any time to identify what contents are in the package and to which customer shipment the package belongs. This process gives Teva a real-time overview of which deliveries have already been processed and which are still open.

With the help of the app, the picker also has the option of directly posting an inventory. As soon as a storage bin becomes empty during the picking process – whether due to a regular stock reduction of the bin to zero or a difference booking – the app automatically opens an inventory window in which an inventory booking can be confirmed.

Another benefit of the app is that during the picking process, damaged goods can be booked out directly at the storage location using the mobile solution. This makes the work of the pickers much easier and supports them directly in their processes.

In hardly any other branch of industry are there such distinctive regulations and documentation requirements as in the pharmaceutical industry. Where elsewhere production is only controlled on a random basis, a company like Vetter Pharma-Fertigung GmbH & Co. KG from Ravensburg must subject each of its products manufactured on behalf of a customer to a separate visual inspection.

At Vetter, the quality inspection of aseptically pre-filled syringes, cartridges and vials is therefore a step that is on an equal footing with the other three production stages – preparation, filling and packaging. The finished syringe is tested to ensure that it is flawless and meets the requirements of authorities, customers and the market. More than 800 people are employed at Vetter every day to carry out these checks – almost a fifth of the total workforce! They document rejects and record good parts.

For a long time, Vetter’s results recording and batch evaluation were paper-based. Approximately 60,000 manufacturing specifications (= a kind of tally sheet) were printed out from SAP every year and made available to the employees of the optical inspection department (OC). They documented possible errors. A shift coordinator manually transferred these results to a batch evaluation and then to the inspection lot of the process order in SAP. A batch evaluation took about 2.5 hours for each shift coordinator and two media breaks had to be overcome.

Processes Became More Efficient and Smarter

The OC area at Vetter was facing fundamental changes. Following a management workshop, a specially established project team conducted a feasibility study and examined whether replacing the previous paper-based variant with a mobile app was feasible and economical. The result spoke for itself and so the decision was made to digitalize the process. Each OC workstation received a tablet and has since been entering its results directly into the ERP system via a SAPUI5 app.

The measure was part of a strategic initiative in which the pharmaceutical service provider is looking at factory processes of the future. The goal: to make current and future individual processes more efficient and smarter.

The feasibility study delivered promising results: The 60 testers recording the results digitally were convinced by the simple operation of the devices. An interdisciplinary, eight-person core project team at Vetter was then commissioned with an implementation project. With the support of DATAGROUP, a digital landscape was set up that integrates all results recording and batch evaluation processes.

DATAGROUP already accompanied the feasibility study and received the order to develop the apps in the follow-up project. A total of 28 different apps are now available for five process variants of optical inspection, including manual and semi-automatic OC. The OC employee logs on to the tablet with his SAP account, loads the corresponding app and enters his data into it. The production specifications for results recording and batch evaluation are thus automatically created in SAP, printed and attached to the process order papers.

Prime Example of Digitization

“Digitization in the pharmaceutical industry is a particular challenge because the effects of new technologies on pharmaceutical processes must be analyzed in great detail,” explains Fatih Kaya, team leader IT Business Applications and project manager at Vetter. For example, can the ceiling lighting be reflected on the tablet displays in such a way that it becomes more difficult to see possible errors? Can the display tolerate being disinfected with cleaning agent after each test procedure? “DATAGROUP has familiarized itself very intensively with our process-related requirements.”

The project is a prime example of digitization and ranks high in Vetter’s internal project ranking. Since November 2017, the employees have been trained in the use of the tablet devices. In order to integrate the new digitized processes or apps into existing systems and processes, further useful applications were developed. Malte Steinicke, Team Manager OC and Department Project Manager: “Using the programmed applications, the shift coordinators can, for example, easily assign an order to a specific room or create batch analyses – processes that used to be performed manually and were very time-consuming”.

Vetter is convinced that further digitization topics will follow in order to further increase productivity and efficiency in business processes.

“Our previous type of maintenance was no longer compatible with the high compliance requirements, particularly in the pharmaceutical sector, in the long term,” explains Christian Belzer, Deputy Head of Plant Engineering at Engelhard Arzneimittel.

The machines are full of precision mechanics, and there is a latent danger that vials or package inserts might get stuck. That is why strict maintenance is essential, which must be cleanly documented and is regularly audited by external auditors. It was expected that carrying out these processes in the SAP system and no longer on paper lists would lead to better traceability, more clarity for the examiner and thus the fulfillment of all current compliance regulations.

The manufacturer then comissioned DATAGROUP to introduce SAP Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) and OPRA (Optimized Proactive Lifecycle Approach), DATAGROUP’s SAP-based application for the maintenance of mobile and stationary systems and devices.

OPRA complements the EAM module with user-friendliness, process orientation and seamless integration of third-party systems and enables a technical, functional and visual integration of assets, people, processes, data and systems into SAP. In a first analysis workshop, Engelhard’s internal processes were examined and discussed how SAP EAM had to be adjusted as well as how to work with OPRA. The company’s controlling department as well as the IT and process management department were colsely involved, because in the end, maintenance is also about costs that can be saved through automated, well-documented procedures.

An Auditor’s Dream

Automation is the keyword: Engelhard has to carry out a whole series of maintenance steps repeatedly according to a specified cycle and pattern. These can be easily defined, processed, and, above all, docmented in a comprehensible manner with OPRA. This ensures that each inspection really does take place at the prescribed time. In SAP, all results are clearly documented and is possible to prove exactly when what was done – a dream for every auditor.

OPRA was introduced in spring 2017, the pilot took place in September and the solution has been running productively since the beginning of October 2017. Maintenance staff at Engelhard Arzneimittel currently work with the solution, almost all of them with the mobile version, i.e. they have installed the maintenance tool on their tablets. Only one desktop workstation was set up.

“Our maintenance staff should be as close as possible to the units and always have their tablet with them,” explains Christian Belzer. Next, Engelhard Arzneimittel is planning to expand OPRA with additional modules. For example, it is planned to introduce the OPRA Reporting module in order to be able to make secure decisions based on valid KPIs and reports and to strategically develop maintenance.

What is OPRA?

Holistic, SAP-based solution for:

• Plant Maintenance (SAP PM/EAM) and involved areas such as Production (PP,PS), Wuality Management (QM), Warehouse Management (MM, WM) etc.
• To optimize processes, increase acceptance, improve usability and increase data quality and data transparency

The CP-Pharma project encompasses the cross-channel sales process of wholesalers. In the project, the entire website was redesigned with the main focus on a responsive design and an integrated brand identity. The company’s website, which the webshop is integrated into, was implemented in a uniform Look & Feel App, programmed by DATAGROUP for the sales reps and customer target groups.