Fusion Consulting
Driving Smart Business Transformation with SAP

Innovation in patient care, regulatory requirements, and effective drug development are pushing the pharmaceuticals and life sciences industry rapidly toward digitalization. In response, digital transformation (DX) is gaining ground with increasing use of digital technologies in R&D, quality control, manufacturing, supply chain, and commercial operations. There is also heightened focus on enhancing customer and patient experiences by delivering integrated digital healthcare solutions. That said, the road to digitalization is a bumpy one, as the transformation process is saddled with legacy ERP systems, complicated and often inconsistent master data environments, gaps in end-toend customer experiences, and manufacturing and supply chain issues.

Easing the DX journey of pharma and life sciences organizations is Fusion Consulting. “We enable digital transformation of enterprises through strategic deployment of SAP and related backbone applications, focusing on implementation of the S/4HANA digital core,” says Ash Ings-Lamb, Director for ERP and DigitalInnovation at Fusion Consulting. The company brings highly skilled business and technical capabilities along with immense technical expertise and extensive knowledge in SAP ERP implementation. As an SAP Gold Partner, accredited with SAP Recognized Expertise in Life Sciences, the highly-specialized decade-old boutique consultancy also facilitates S/4HANA-enabled transformation of industries like FMCG and chemical.

To enable the smart transformation of organizations, Fusion leverages intelligent enterprise data science and analytics solutions, data governance and orchestration platforms, cross-functional process automation and optimization, and digital cloud-based technologies based on decoupled data and API-first architectures, running integrated end-to-end business processes. The company has robust capabilities in ERP implementations, data asset services, business insights, program management, human capital management, and organizational change management (OCM). Fusion provides tailored DX services by implementing SAP backbone applications like S/4HANA, Master Data Governance, Ariba, and ECC, as well as non-SAP applications like SalesForce and Workday. Simultaneously, the company deploys SAP’s novel embedded analytics and intelligence features from S/4HANA, and integrates the digital ERP core with intelligent technologies like AI, machine learning, and predictive analytics. To extend enterprises’ capabilities further, Fusion progressively embeds smart solutions running on S/4HANA with cloud-native applications on hyperscale cloud platforms like Azure or AWS, thereby integrating cloud operations with the digital ERP core.

Digitally Transforming Pharma and Life Sciences Space

Built around a strategic focus on S/4HANA implementation, Fusion lays the DX foundation for clients by setting up a digital, future-ready S/4HANA-based ERP core.

This is enabled through best-in-class processes that leverage efficient operating models and best practices developed from seasoned engagements with the pharma and life science industries. Supporting Fusion in its endeavours are its in-house Competence Centres and Life Science Digital Innovation Lab.

While streamlining DX for clients, Fusion takes into account the high-level compliance needs of the pharma and life science space in keeping with the FDA and international regulatory bodies. To that end, the company strives to strike a balance between the imperative for agility and compliance and control in the pharmaceutical environment by implementing DX programs using client-specific hybrid-agile frameworks. These frameworks combine traditional waterfall techniques with agile methods such as Scrum, Kanban, SAFe, Spotify, and LeSS—crucial for SAP deployments in highly regulated GxP pharma environments.

Within these frameworks, Fusion incorporates phase gates, QRC reviews, and other classic large program management techniques because their work has the potential to directly impact patient safety, product quality, and regulatory compliance, as well as client reputation and financial risk. This is achieved through combining an agile product management mindset with waterfall approaches that support the complexities involved in DX for pharma and life science companies.

A Culture of Excellence and Collaboration

Fusion’s depth of technical expertise is backed by its world-class consultants, who deliver end-to-end SAP-based DX projects with an enviable track record of S/4HANA implementations on a global scale. Enabling them are their capabilities in green and brownfield implementations, including onpremise, cloud, and hybrid deployments, sophisticated system design, legacy system integration, and intelligent data analytics.
What makes Fusion stand out is its ‘one team’ ethos. Its executives and consultants embed themselves within client organizations to build deep, long-term, trusted relationships. Through an incredibly hands-on approach, the company acts as the advisory and strategic partner of choice, while developing digital innovation roadmaps for clients. Possessing unique skillsets and specialized industry know-how, the Fusion team’s functional, technical and business backgrounds allow the company to be laser-focused on driving the smart transformation of the pharma and life science industries. The cherry on top is the company’s adaptable, multicultural, collaborative business culture with flat decision-making processes that actively encourage participation at all levels.

That’s not all. Fusion fosters an innovation and design mindset with in-house learning platforms and educational programs for comprehensive training and upskilling of client workforces in digital technologies, agile methods and product management. “We ease OCM for our clients by supporting them on the journey to build a highly-skilled and digitally-aware, agile workforce,” states Ings-Lamb.

Setting the Stage for Cutting-Edge ERP Deployments

In a recent, noteworthy instance of initiating DX, Fusion, working with a partner, was asked to enable customer experience transformation, via the restructure of an existing brownfield application landscape. Fusion assisted the client in reconfiguring a tightly-coupled existing enterprise CX SaaS platform by implementing a decoupled architecture using a flexible API deployed on Azure. It then integrated the platform with additional components deployed on Google Cloud Platform and other cloud CX SaaS platforms that leverage Azure components to integrate with an existing data lake for ETL and analytics functions. The project is on-going and aims to positively impact specific CX business KPIs, whilst building support for further CX transformation initiatives and setting the stage for far-reaching DX through S/4HANA implementation and further adoption of cloud-native solutions.

Going forward, Fusion will expand its SAP Business Technology Platform offerings, SAP Customer Experience Suite solutions, and expand into related non-SAP cloud technologies and customer data platforms. The company will also build technical and functional skills in traditional SAP workload migrations to the cloud for its pharmaceutical and life science clients. With a rapidly expanding presence across Europe, North America, Latin America, and Asia-Pacific, Fusion will continue to empower the smart transformation of enterprises with cutting-edge S/4HANA-based ERP solutions.