A research-based biopharmaceutical company adopted cross-domain data governance policies, procedures and processes to support its ERP migration.
About
Our client, a $28B US-based global pharma company founded in 1987, leads pioneering research in virology and oncology medicine. Through innovative treatments and global health partnerships, they develop life-changing medicines to prevent, treat and cure life-threatening diseases.
Industry: Biopharmaceutical
Background: Our client’s ERP migration from Oracle to SAP had been underway for three years when First San Francisco Partners joined the internal ERP Transformation program to address significant data-related implementation challenges. The company’s new SAP system was a multi-phased migration. Phase 1 of 3 launched in 2023, replaced three legacy ERP systems across 35 countries supporting 18,000 employees. As part of this initiative, our team developed and led a formal data governance program to resolve and address critical data issues required to successfully launch the SAP platform.
Engagement Type
FSFP established and supported the client’s data office for the ERP data governance program to manage and deliver cross-domain data governance and domain-specific artifacts such as the data dictionary and data quality rules and standards.
Engagement Snapshot
FSFP played a crucial role in analyzing the biopharmaceutical company’s legacy data structures, enabling accurate migration to its new SAP system while maintaining business continuity across financial, supply chain and customer operations. Our team designed and implemented governance structures and stewardship processes that supported new data management principles and policies. This included developing and maintaining essential domain-specific artifacts — data dictionary, data quality rules and data standards — for the new data ecosystem.
Opportunity Areas
- Cross-Domain Data Governance Artifacts – Develop guiding principles, policies and procedures to establish a cohesive “North Star” for data governance.
- Domain-Specific Artifacts – Create a data dictionary for aligned definitions and standard data quality rules for vendor, customer and finance data.
- Workflows – Develop processes for modern data governance workflows and interim state needs to provide transitional data alignment throughout Oracle and SAP migrations across multiple releases.
- Data Quality Scorecard – Analyze SAP information steward scorecards to identify data quality issues and worked with data owners to achieve resolution.
- Business Process Data Mapping – Conduct business process data mapping to ensure all objects, datasets and attributes are transparent and available for lineage analysis.
Impact
Our engagement resulted in the following outcomes:
- Embedded cross-domain data decision-making to enable faster, more effective responses to ERP and related data changes.
- Developed and sustained a common data language and policies, ensuring consistency across enterprise operations and analytics.
- Enabled seamless integration of finance, vendor management and customer processes during a complex multi-year ERP migration.
- Improved data quality in the new SAP platform by implementing enterprise-wide scorecards and procedures to resolve data issues.
- Reduced downstream reporting and operational risks by enhancing understanding and management of data lineage changes.
- Strengthened data governance workflows, approval processes data integrity measures to support a proactive data quality system.
