AMERICA ONLINE TO KEYNOTE AMERICAS' SAP USERS' GROUP'S SAP ERP UPGRADE SYMPOSIUM

Manufacturing News, Source : The Manufacturer US
Published : 14 Jun 2007 20:58

June 14, 2007-The Americas' SAP Users' Group (ASUG), the world's largest customer-run community of SAP professionals, will host its SAPTM ERP Upgrade Symposium June 20-21 at the Doubletree Hotel in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

The event offers more than 25 upgrade-related educational sessions, presented by SAP customers, partners and SAP subject matter experts. In addition to the opportunity to hear directly from SAP about how you can streamline the upgrade process, the event offers 11 customer-driven education sessions and opportunities to exchange best practices on upgrading your SAP ERP environment. Some of the companies confirmed to present their upgrade story include Bayer Corporation, Brother International, Chevron Phillips, Coca-Cola and Johnson & Johnson. The customer keynote presentation will be delivered by America Online (AOL).

The symposium is the third ERP Upgrade event the organization has held since SAP's announcement that SAPTM ERP 2005 will be the company's "go to" release for all SAP R/3 customers through 2010. The event will focus on providing quality education to attendees that have both decided to upgrade, as well as those considering an upgrade. The ASUG SAP ERP Upgrade Symposium is a very timely event, as survey results from the same event held by ASUG in February indicated that 94% of SAP customer respondents expected to upgrade their SAP ERP environment by the end of 2008.

"Whether a company has upgraded or is considering and upgrade, this event is a great opportunity for companies to bring their entire teams to share their real-world upgrade experiences, and walk away with the tools and best practices they need to start leveraging the new Enterprise SOA platform," said Rod Masney, ASUG President.

The event will kick off with a keynote presentation by Martin Riedel, of SAP AG that will address the future product roadmap for SAP ERP and the importance of the upgrade path. In his SAP keynote, Michael Golz, CIO, SAP Americas, will talk about the upgrade experiences and main benefits that this system upgrade has brought to SAP themselves.

One of the highlights of the Symposium will be a customer keynote by Blair Barrow, Director, ERP Solutions, America Online. In his [presentation entitled "AOL's approach to the upgrade and how we plan to benefit," Barrow will share his company's approach to the upgrade, realized and expected benefits from the Enterprise SOA architecture now in place and key lessons learned during the upgrade.

"ASUG is committed to bringing our members the highest quality information on strategic planning and best practices for upgrading to SAP ERP," said Cyndi Leamon, ASUG Director of Education and Events. "Our ASUG SAP ERP Upgrades Symposium is just one of several ways ASUG serves its members with year-round, virtual and face-to-face educational opportunities."

In addition to product presentations from SAP America and SAP Labs, leading customer companies will share upgrade best practices, insights on managing Unicode conversion considerations, tips on reducing cutover times, and suggestions for planning for the technical aspects of going live.

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