Calibration Management integrated with SAP®

The era of departments operating in silos without one knowing or caring what the other is doing is coming to an end. New regulations and pressure to improve efficiency, reduce waste and increase profitability are driving greater collaboration and harmonization. Companies are now looking for solutions to facilitate this collaboration, reduce redundant data entry and improve information flow.

Integration of one of Blue Mountain's calibration management solutions, either Calibration Manager® or Blue Mountain Regulatory Asset Manager®, with SAP® software provides best-in-class calibration features (measurement data collection, reverse traceability, instrument-centric management, etc.) with the maintenance and enterprise management capabilities of SAP. This integration reduces redundancies, improves productivity, provides better information for decision making throughout the organization.

Powered by NetWeaver® Certification Blue Mountain Quality Resources has completed the process for and earned "Powered by NetWeaver" status for Calibration Manager 4.2. This means that the SAP Integration and Certification Center has certified that Calibration Manager 4.2 properly integrates with the SAP NetWeaver® Exchange Infrastructure (SAP NetWeaver XI) component of SAP NetWeaver to exchange critical data with instances of the SAP Business Suite family of applications. Blue Mountain has also demonstrated that Calibration Manager integrates successfully with the SAP NetWeaver Portal Release 6.0. This certified solution provides a valuable foundation for the integration.

However in most cases, whether you are looking to integrate Calibration Manager or Blue Mountain Regulatory Asset Manager with SAP, the final integrated solution will be customized based on how your company is using both SAP and the Blue Mountain software.

Information Flow
In a typical scenario, new equipment entry would be centralized within SAP. Calibration work is then scheduled within the Blue Mountain software, and an official work order number is obtained from SAP. This way calibrations can continue to be managed with a more instrument-centric approach while still reporting the work back within SAP's work order system. The metrologist uses Calibration Manager to organize his work and to collect the appropriate information from the calibration. Once the work is completed and reviewed, the work order status is updated and cost tracking data and performance indicators are passed up to SAP for aggregate analysis for better business decisions.

Typical workflow between the applications (click to enlarge)

One of the early steps in the integration process is to determine what sort of information should be passed and under what conditions. This process is designed to enable your business processes to continue across applications and is specific to how both applications are configured. Therefore the solution is customized to meet your precise business and technical needs.

Proven Methodology
The integration of Blue Mountain software with SAP follows a proven and SAP certified methodology developed to meet the rigorous quality requirements of regulated life science companies. Taking advantage of the integration engine and XI HTTP adapter, information from and to the Blue Mountain database is handled through a tested API (Application Programming Interface). Additionally, iViews provided by the Enteprise Portal Business Package allow users within SAP to view regular updates from the Blue Mountain database. The distributed n-tier architecture of the Blue Mountain software means that this regular sharing of information does not impact the users of the system.

Integration with SAP (click to enlarge)

For life science companies that will require the integration to be validated before it can be put into use, the completed integration will include appropriate IQ and OQ validation scripts specific to their particular solution. Assistance running these scripts, in addition to PQ script generation and execution are also available.

Webinar and web demo
We will be presenting a webinar to discuss the nature and benefits of integrating with SAP and the decisions involved, followed by a brief live demonstration of the integrated solution. The event will be at 2p EDT on May 1, 2008. Sign up here.

SAP, Powered by NetWeaver, SAP NetWeaver and BAPI are the registered trademarks(s) of SAPAG in Germany and in several other countries.