Whenever you hear the word SAP from a layman , in almost all the cases they pronounce it wrong as "SAP" (like the sap of the tree) , it happens with me also when i first speak this word . Actually the correct way is "ess-ay-pea" pronounced as S (separate) , A (separate) and P (separate) not in continuous 'SAP'.
SAP stands for Systems Applications and Products in Data Processing is a software that integrates all the business functional areas of a company in a synchronous way .
The business fnctional areas or functional modules or application areas represents various modules on the basis of the business areas such as
1.SD - Sales and Distribution.
2.PP - Production Planning.
3.WM - Warehouse Management
4.MM - Material Management.
5.FI - Financial Accounting.
6.PM - Plant Maintenance etc
Let me explain the above definition in detail , Tata Motors producing variety of cars having headquaters in different different locations of India say for example Hyderabad , Delhi , Mumbai and Bangalore . Now at the time of festivals suddenly the selling of cars increases , so the sales department ,SD(Sales and Distribution) has to inform the PP(Production Planning) to give more cars to the Warehouse Management , the Production Planning in turn send report to MM(Material Management), which in turn send report to different different vendors to get the different parts of cars such as tyres , steels , glass etc and finally report goes to FI (Financial Accounting) and the final report of the entire process goes to the CEO . The entire process have to be done at the same time to be more productive . Now suppose the SD module is maintained differently from other modules , so the revenue generated from sales and more requirement of product has to be updated manually into other modules , which is not at all synchronous and more prone to errors.
Thus to solve this problem we use SAP because it has very high level of integration between various functional modules which ensures proper synchronization and consistency with zero error . SAP integrates all its functional modules because of its centralized database for all the different modules of business.
Now upto this point you are clear about SAP , now know some of the facts about SAP
SAP came from the German word "Systeme, Anwendungen, und Produkte in der Datenverarbeitung".
It is developed by five IBM employees Hans-Werner Hector , Hasso Plattner , Dietmar Hopp , Klaus Tschira and Claus Wellenreuther in 1972 .
