SAP’s Integrated Treasury Solutions Drive Global Efficiencies

Turbulent Economy Underscores the Importance to Protect Liquidity and Profitability Through Harmonized Cash, Liquidity and Risk Management Solutions

BARCELONA, Spain - SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) today announced that leading edge customers, including Franz Haniel & Company and Roche, are experiencing unmatched, end-to-end process efficiencies and improved business performance across the entire spectrum of cash, liquidity, and treasury and risk management through the deployment of treasury applications from SAP. The announcement was made at the EuroFinance International Cash and Treasury Management Conference, being held Oct. 1–3 in Barcelona, Spain.

In the wake of the current global credit crisis and volatile commodity, interest rate and foreign exchange markets, it becomes increasingly challenging for global businesses to ensure they have access to liquidity while protecting profit margins, at the same time complying with regulatory and financial reporting standards. As a result, treasury departments require a higher degree of visibility and control over the complex, interconnected processes associated with managing cash, liquidity, investment operations and risk.

In response, a rising number of global businesses are turning to comprehensive treasury management software from SAP to ensure healthy cash flow and adequate liquidity, and protect profit margins from fluctuations in interest rates, commodity prices and currency exchange rates.

The Haniel Group is an international corporation with more than 50,000 employees and 29.2 billion euros sales in 2007. The company’s activities vary from pharmaceutical trade, recycling and trading of raw materials for the stainless steel industry, to supply of textile services and washroom hygiene, to mail order for office or plant equipment. Haniel recently embarked on an effort to streamline its treasury operations and strengthen its IFRS 7 compliance.

“Our prior IT applications made it very difficult to capture exposure data from across the company, perform the required stress testing and perform regulatory reporting,” said Andreas Laroche, executive for Corporate IT, the Haniel Group. “No other vendor provides the fully integrated approach that SAP provides. Our financial reporting and compliance procedures run much more smoothly and we are in the position by using treasury applications from SAP to do proper hedge accounting. In addition, the SAP In-House Cash application has strengthened our liquidity management.”

Haniel deployed the SAP® Treasury and Risk Management, the SAP® In-House Cash and the SAP® General Ledger applications to provide an integrated solution that links treasury and core finance operations.

F. Hoffmann–La Roche AG discovers, develops and provides innovative diagnostic and therapeutic products to patients and healthcare professionals. Headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, the company selected SAP for its treasury management for the comprehensive integration with standardized financial supply chain processes, as well as for the ability to centralize cash and treasury processes across the entire company.

“We operate a highly efficient and automated in-house bank that would not be possible without the SAP In-House Cash application,” said Martin Schlageter, head of Treasury Operations, F. Hoffmann–La Roche AG.

“The high reliability, support for industry standards, integration with local accounting systems and ongoing SAP treasury solutions product enhancements ensures that our treasury department will meet current and emerging requirements,” added Susanne Erkens-Reck, head of Corporate Finance Informatics, F. Hoffmann–La Roche AG.

“Treasury departments will take on an increasing role as finance and equity market experts and will be expected to uncover hidden growth opportunities for their companies,” said Svatopluk Alexander, managing director, Commercial Services, BearingPoint. “The harmonization of global cash management and payment processes, in addition to integrated financial planning, ensures that the treasurer transforms into the role of ‘global champion’ by enabling enterprise-wide transparency on cash, liquidity and financial risks.”

Treasury applications from SAP are natively integrated with each other and with the SAP General Ledger to help ensure transactions and positions are automatically and accurately recorded to meet financial reporting and compliance mandates. Native integration minimizes the integration costs and risks associated with point solutions in wide use today, and allows global businesses to sense and respond to changing market conditions in real-time.

“Today’s global enterprises demand a more comprehensive approach to managing their treasury operations,” said Rebecca Polley, vice president of Financial Solutions Management, SAP AG. “Unlike other technologies used to address these challenges, SAP applications enable our customers to effectively manage the full spectrum of cash, liquidity and financial risk, which is becoming more critical in light of the ongoing turmoil in the financial markets. Utilizing a single, easy-to-use dashboard, SAP enables treasury professionals to analyze and manage the full range of market risks, including commodity, interest rate and foreign exchange risks. In addition, treasury applications from SAP are fully integrated with SAP General Ledger to enable companies to more confidently comply with global financial reporting standards.”

In January 2008, SAP received the 2007 Treasury Management International (TMI) award for the best back-office and accounting system, and for demonstrating innovation and excellence in treasury management.

Visit SAP at Eurofinance booth number L38. To learn more about the natively integrated treasury applications from SAP that enable global corporations to manage every aspect of cash, liquidity and risk management capabilities, please visit www.sap.com/financials.

About SAP
SAP is the world’s leading provider of business software(*), offering applications and services that enable companies of all sizes and in more than 25 industries to become best-run businesses. With approximately 75,000 customers (includes customers from the acquisition of Business Objects) in over 120 countries, the company is listed on several exchanges, including the Frankfurt stock exchange and NYSE, under the symbol “SAP.” (For more information, visit www.sap.com)

(*) SAP defines business software as comprising enterprise resource planning and related applications.

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