​According to recent research from Standard & Poor’s, Brexit has cost the British economy £66bn in under three years – approximately 3% has been shaved off GDP. The knock-on effect is that manufactures across Europe could end up taking the brunt of newly imposed tariffs, along with the impact of harsher borders between the UK and Europe.

Once Brexit happens, European countries will impose stricter policies on imports from the UK. And the UK, respectively, will restrict goods from the EU being imported – creating additional costs for manufacturers who currently rely on supplies from EU countries.

A skills shortage

Over the last six months, we’ve been contacted by a number of manufacturers in Belgium who are in desperate need of SAP CO PC consultants. These roles have primarily been created due to Brexit and the changes in product costing elements that will affect the European manufacturing industry. New data requirements and changes to off-the-shelf SAP systems has become a real hot topic amongst the manufacturing sector. There is extensive work being done to reconfigure product master data in SAP systems with information such as revised routings or sourcing information, BOM & cost data, supplier data, invoicing, dispatch note requirements, tax reporting, customs duty and shipping costs. But crucially, there are a limited number of people with these skills!

It’s likely that Brexit will call for SAP systems to handle more complexity in terms of the information held and frequency of data submission for customs declarations. It is important for businesses to consider how much systems changes Brexit will cause, including short-term fixes, so that they will be able to move more quickly when the situation becomes clearer.

How we can help

Contact us if you’re considering the impact of Brexit on your SAP system. Our virtual bench of local Dutch and French-speaking SAP consultants will help you assess and map the impact on pan-European supply chain & manufacturing operations.

Argyll Scott are specialists in postmodern SAP solutions. We believe that the effectiveness of any ERP system depends on the effectiveness of the people who incorporate it. Postmodern ERP is about ensuring the value of an integrated core ERP system augmented by user-centric, cloud-based best of breed solutions.

We cover the full spectrum of SAP resource across both functional and technical disciplines, our talent pools are predominately offline, with that in mind my team and I would be happy to provide comparable resources against your current suppliers / third party system integrators.

SAP expertise areas:

• Core SAP (FI, CO, SD, MM, PM, PP, QM)
• Process experts R2R, O2C, P2P and S2P
• Technical SAP ABAP, Data migration, SAP MDG/M and Basis
• Niche areas SAP BRIM, Hybris, Ariba, Hana and S/4 Hana Suite