Tullow oil gears for digital agility with SAP

Tullow Oil, an independent oil and gas company, launched a digital transformation program to reduce costs, enable faster and better decision-makingand increase workforce productivity.

To provide a solid foundation for this transition, it needed to move its aging SAP® ECC enterprise resources planning (ERP) platform to SAP S/4HANA®.Doing so would accelerate its digital future through new SAP capabilities, an improved employee experience and modernized corporate businesssystems. Tullow Oil decided on a “brownfield” conversion that would essentially upgrade its SAP ECC ERP to SAP S/4HANA—an approach that wouldminimize any disruption to the business.

Tullow Oil and Accenture started to build the foundations for a digital future.

The effort included upgrading to the SAP S/4 HANA digital platform. The effort also involved updating connected systems to the latest versions, implementing SAP® SuccessFactors® as a single source of HR data and employee self-service, and introducing an improved user interface using SAP Fiori® apps. In early 2020, with Accenture already maintaining the SAP application stack, Tullow Oil saw the opportunity to drive additional cost savings through a business process outsourcing arrangement. In developing the managed services plan, Tullow Oil and Accenture focused on two key areas—strategic sourcing and finance.

The move to the public cloud and the brownfield conversion of SAP ECC to SAP S/4HANA—the first of its kind in the oil and gas industry—were completed with minimal disruption to the business.

The new platform is improving performance and agility. Real-time analytics via S/4HANA are providing insights to improve decision making and productivity. Tullow Oil is also competing better in strategic procurement, with savings of over 50% on a single contract. Process improvements are delivering better payment compliance, with on-time payments improving from 60% to 85% in six months. And in finance operations, simplified processes and better controls have helped significantly cut Tullow Oil’s open line items and reduce its open historical balance sheet items by 33%.