Whitepaper

Transition to
the New
Planning
Solution in
S/4HANA On
Premise

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Definition and description

Along with S/4 HANA transformation our customers struggle to decide which planning option should
they choose. There are multiple planning solutions available for the S/4HANA environment
and this whitepaper should help to select one which fits best.
In this whitepaper, it is assumed that S/4HANA planning functionality replaces following
ERP functionalities:
• Cost Center Planning by Cost Elements (KP06)
• Cost Center Planning of Activity Types (KP26)
• Cost Center Planning of Statistical Key Figures (KP46)
• Internal Order Planning – costs and Activity types (KPF6)
• Profit Center Planning – Costs/Revenues (7KEI)
• Profit Center Planning – Balance Sheet (7KE3)
• Profit Center Planning – Statistical Key Figures (1KEI)
• Profitability Analysis Plan (KEPM)
• General Ledger planned values (GP12N for tables GLT0 or similar)
• Special Ledger planned values

It is also assumed that customer requires to keep planning data within on-premise S/4HANA
tables (ACDOCP – Balance Sheet and P&L Plan, COEJ – CO-OM planning, GLPCP – Profit
Center Planning) etc.

Business rationale and trigger

Finance data model in S/4 HANA was radically redesigned which had also impact on
planning processes.
The right Planning solution is both a technical and functional decision. It depends on where
the source data is coming from, which features the customer needs and how much data is
required to be consumed.
Customer often expects that Planning in S/4HANA fulfill following requirements as former
ERP solution:
Cost Center Cost Element plan availability for:
• Cost Allocations
• Cost Center Plan vs. Actual reporting
• Plan Activity rates calculation

Planned Activity rates by cost center availability for:

• Product Cost Estimates – Costing runs
• PM or PP orders confirmations at planned activity rates
• CATS (Cross Application Timesheet)

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Planned Statistical key figures availability for
• Cost Center Plan vs. Actual reporting
• Allocation base for Allocation Cycles

Profit Center Planning availability for

• Integrated Cost Plan rolled from Cost Center Plan
• Revenue Plan by Profit Centers
• Profit Center Plan vs. Actual reporting (incl. selected Balance Sheet accounts)
• General Ledger – Balance Sheet plan

Description
There are following options offered within SAP tools
portfolio:
Scenario 1: Classic Planning transactions (ERP transactions enabled in S/4HANA)
Scenario 2: SAP BPC (Classic BPC)
Scenario 3: SAP BPC Optimized for S/4HANA
Scenario 4: SAP BPC11 for BW/4HANA
Scenario 5: SAP Analytics Cloud Integrated with S/4HANA for Planning

Scenario 5: The SAC is considered to be a strategic development option. However currently

some features are more robust in BPC (Scenarios 2-4). The BPC tools will be supported
through 2024 so there is no immediate need to move away from those tools. Customers
preferring to delay such a New planning implementation project can reactivate the classic
planning transactions using the SAP Notes described in this whitepaper.
Scenarios 2 – 5 (BPC, SAC) require additional license.

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Next 2 slides highlight main differences between Scenarios:

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The below flow highlights main decision-making process flow for the selection of the new
planning solution:

Technical details
Scenario 1: Classic Planning transactions
After S/4HANA transition some original ERP planning transactions and related SPRO
customizing disappear from the menu even though the former FI-CO planning transactions
are not supported anymore (according to note 2474069 and other notes mentioned at the
end of the whitepaper). There are situations when it may be the best option for the planning
transactions to be re-activated.
For example, if the customer needs to use planning allocation solution leveraging their actual
allocation, there is no equivalent feature in BPC yet. Only a simple allocation solution is
offered in BPC. Another reason is that customer wants to postpone redesign of planning for
later.

Scenario 2: SAP BPC (Classic BPC)

This option is applicable in the case customer already uses BW system (not BW/4HANA)
with BPC functionality or in case customer does not want to activate Embedded BW in
S/4HANA.
Within this scenario we are providing service for Technical Upgrade applicable for the
versions as follow:
SAP BPC 7.5 to 10.1 – minor manual adjustments in reports are needed (depends how the
reports were developed, as change from EVDRE to EPM functions are required.
SAP BPC 10.X to 11.X – technical upgrade supported without additional adjustments needed
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for standards functionalities.
During the upgrade process for bigger systems, there is also option to use SLO methodology
to migrate transactional data with Datavard Transformation Suite. With this approach the
impact for business users with minimizing the downtime of BPC system is really helpful.
As the pre-defined content, is available out of the box - the IFRS and US-GAAP Starter Kit
by SAP and by Datavard predefined solution also for HR Salary Planning.

Scenario 3: SAP BPC Optimized for S/4HANA (aka:

Integrated Business Planning for Finance)
The embedded BPC, formerly called Integrated Business Planning for Finance (IBPf) was
rebranded in release 1610 to BPC Optimized for S/4HANA. Key prerequisite for this solution
is activation of embedded BW. As a ‘rule of thumb’ SAP suggests that amount of data
persisted in the Embedded BW should not exceed 20% of the overall data volume of the
S/4HANA system. It means that Embedded BW is not intended as full Enterprise Data
Warehouse Solution however it can provide following benefits:
• Serve as a reporting platform for Analytical Fiori Apps, which read information from
Virtual InfoProvides build from CDS views from S/4HANA data
• Planning data storage in the same system as actual data
• Elimination of data replication (master data, actual data)
• Available Business Content (planning Queries, planning structures – InfoProviders,
analysis office planning workbooks)
• Quick activation of pre-built planning models using – content bundle or regular BW
Business Content Activation
Following workbooks are available from the standard business Content:

Standard planning workbooks are built to store data to Embedded BW first and subsequent
Planning function ‘Copy BPC to ERP’ triggers copy to S/4HANA ‘ERP’ tables. Afterwards
data is available for S/4HANA actual/plan reporting, plan allocations etc.
In the release S/4HANA OP 1909 are underlying data structures which store planning data
are united for all areas (Balance Sheet, Cost Center Planning, Internal Order, Market
Segment, Profit Center, Project etc.)
Workbooks for above mentioned planning areas refer to Aggregations, which are based on
Multiprovider /ERP/SFIN_M01 S/4HANA Financials: Plan and Actual Data
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This Multiprovider unites data:
Actuals (ACDOCA) accessible from the Virtual InfoProvider based ACDOCA,
Plan data stored in the BW – BPC InfoCube (/ERP/SFIN_R01) – default option
Plan data from ACDOCP – configurable option (InfoCube /ERP/SFIN_V20)
By default, plan data is stored in /ERP/SFIN_R01. In case customer wants to store data in
the table ACDOCP the default value of Variable /ERP/P_0INFOPROV should be changed
either at the Global Variables table – RSZGLOBV or at the Query level to (/ERP/SFIN_V20).
Another way is via ABAP, well because ACDOCP is an ABAP table! And there is a standard
API for that: Function Module FINPLAN_API_POSTDATA.
In case planning process is not available in the standard Business Content e.g. statistical key
figures planning (OP 1809). It is possible to use Option 1 or create own planning elements
for the missing planning process.

There are 2 major use cases for using Scenario 3:

SAP BPC Optimized for S/4HANA:
• All done with SAP BPC for S/4HANA - if customer does not need the complex
allocation algorithms of SAP S/4HANA and prefer to work with the basic allocation
features provided by SAP BPC for S/4HANA.
• SAP BPC for S/4HANA combined with allocations in SAP S/4HANA

Scenario 4: SAP BPC11 for BW/4HANA

BPC Optimized for S/4HANA and BPC BW/4HANA are two separate code lines which have
different features. In the future, SAP will decide how to achieve parity on features, but as
they stand they are different. BPC BW/4HANA takes advantage of the new BW/4HANA
architecture such as high performance, quicker data flow from S/4HANA.
If system was upgraded from BW to BW/4 HANA. There is option to recreate BPC solution
as a data restore of BPC 10.1 to BPC 11 or 11.1 (tested by Datavard).

Scenario 5: SAP Analytics Cloud Integrated with

S/4HANA for Planning
The SCP products are different from BPC. They were created by taking the best features of
SAPs prior planning and consolidation products. This is where future SAP’s development
efforts will be focused, and BPC solution support should end in 2024.

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Technical approach
Scenario 1: Classic Planning transactions
GL planning
According to 2474069: If you cannot immediately convert your entry of G/L planning data
and your reporting to BPC for S/4HANA, you can continue to use your G/L planning function
for a time in S/4HANA as well via the steps described below. The steps also contain
modifications. SAP reserves the right to deactivate the old ERP planning function definitively
at some point. Follow steps from 2474069 and 2253067 to reactivate old planning.
Subsequently migrate planning data from original ERP tables (e.g. GLT0 or FAGLFLEXA) to
the target S/4HANA system (table FAGLFLEXA) using selective migration tools.

GL planning in Special Ledger

Follow instructions from 2403964 - FI-SL: Reactivate specific planning transactions (SAP
S/4HANA). No need to implement steps from 2474069 if only Special Ledger planning is
needed. Subsequently migrate planning data from original ERP Special Ledger tables to the
target S/4HANA system using selective migration tools.
Note that it is also possible to run the two solutions in parallel e.g. use BPC Optimized for
S/4HANA for scenarios available ‘out of the box’ e.g. Cost Center plan and use old
transaction e.g. statistical key figure planning which is not part of Business Content (OP
1809).
Table FINS_DEPR_OBJECT contains deprecated objects such as planning layouts which are
still active. See notes mentioned at the end of document which contain details for
reactivation of classic planning.

CO planning

In case you cannot transition to SAP BPC optimized for SAP S/4HANA in the short-term,
but have strong reasons to continue to use the classic CO-OM planning functions. Classical
SAP GUI based interface or new CO planning WebDynpro based Interface (introduced in
ECC EhP 6.0 - see 1777947 - FAQ: New user interfaces for cost center planning) can be used.
Please be aware that the classic planning functions do not update the new planning table
(ACDOCP), which is available from SAP S/4HANA 1610. This means that legacy reports and
follow-on processes will continue to work, but that Fiori apps based on the new table will
not display plan data entered with classic planning functions.

Scenario 2: SAP BPC (Classic BPC)

Main advantage of this option is that existing planning process can be used also together
with S/4HANA.
If retraction of BPC plan data to FI, CO was implemented in SAP ECC. It needs to be
redesigned after S/4HANA transition due to changes in the data model.
This option will most likely require redesign of ETL logic for the master data and
transactional extraction. Especially if Z* DataSources or obsolete DataSources were used.

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Scenario 3: SAP BPC Optimized for S/4HANA (aka:
Integrated Business Planning for Finance)
Note 1972819 - Setup SAP BPC optimized for S/4 HANA Finance and Embedded BW
Reporting (aka Integrated Business Planning for Finance) describes details for all steps
needed for this option.
In general, it is possible to adapt Business Content Scenarios for the following areas:
• Balance Sheet Planning
• P&L Planning
• Cost Center planning
• Internal Order Planning
• Profit Center Planning
• Project Planning
• Market Segment Planning

Most of Planning Workbooks contain function ‘Copy BPC data to ERP’. After copy data
persisted in BPC BW InfoProvider will be updated in S/4HANA planning tables.

In some cases where Business Content is not available yet e.g. statistical key figure planning
– old transaction can be used (Scenario 1) in parallel with Scenario 3.

Scenario 4: SAP BPC11 for BW/4HANA

This scenario is similar to Scenario 2: SAP BPC (Classic BPC) and its main advantage is that
BW/4HANA infrastructure would be used for planning processes. As mentioned above
Processes used in Scenario 2: can be transferred to the solution BPC 11 and subsequent
improvements can be done to leverage new BPC 11 capabilities.

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Scenario 5: SAP Analytics Cloud Integrated with
S/4HANA for Planning
With the new release of SAP Analysis for Microsoft® Office, there is now support for SAP
Analytics Cloud planning models. Planning users can work in their familiar Microsoft® Excel
environment and connect directly to SAP Analytics Cloud.
There is full support of SAP Analytics Cloud’s public and private versions with which a
Microsoft® Excel User can create powerful planning and reporting worksheets.

Retraction of SAP Analytics Cloud Planning data is currently supported only into S/4HANA
Cloud (https://rapid.sap.com/bp/scopeitems/2EB) but not for on-premise yet.
Workaround solution was used to load data to S/4HANA tables by file export from SAC and
import functionality.
Newest SAC release (2019.23) release enables direct data transfer to S/HANA
https://www.sapanalytics.cloud/product_updates/release-2019-23/
Integration across scenarios are possible as well. SAC can write planning data to BPC using
native BPC writeback functionality. Planning data can be also transferred directly to
BW/4HANA.

Information Sources:
2474069 Reactivate G/L planning
2663384 Reporting on reactivation of G/L Planning in S/4HANA Finance vs the new BPC
for S/4HANA Finance
2606517 FAGL_PLAN_VT returns error Message no. FAGL_PLANNING_EHP3000
2570898 S/4HANA Transaction FAGL_PLAN_VT: Runtime Error PERFORM_NOT_FOUND
2253067 Object changes for reactivation of G/L Planning
2148356 Order Planning by Cost Element
2135362 Project Planning by Cost Element
2142732 Project Planning Overall
2061419 - SAP BPC for SAP S/4HANA Finance (Alias: SAP Integrated Business Planning for
Finance): Copy Plan Data to Classical ERP Planning & Reporting
2081400 SAP BPC Optimized for S/4 HANA Finance (aka: Integrated Business Planning for
Finance): Compilation of Information
1777947 - FAQ: New user interfaces for cost center planning
2742613 Obsolete or replaced transaction codes and programs in Finance applications of
S/4

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About Datavard

Datavard is a recognized global leader in data transformation and management solutions

with decades of experience helping many of the world’s largest organizations to transform,
innovate and optimize their critical data assets.
Datavard brings unparalleled SAP® data and system expertise for SAP S/4HANA® and SAP
BW/4HANA® migration, Big Data landscape design, cloud migration, System Landscape
Optimization (SLO), transformation and system harmonization.
Datavard is a privately held company with more than 200 data-driven employees around
the world. We are headquartered in Heidelberg, Germany.

www.datavard.com

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