Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation: Supporting employees, communities, and energy needs
Explore Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation’s journey with SAP
One of Africa’s leading sugar producers, Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation Ltd. is Eswatini’s main employer with deep roots in the community. It wanted to be a product innovator and more-efficient energy producer. Cloud solutions from SAP are enabling the company to improve its agility, cost-efficiency, innovation, and employee engagement.
| Industry | Region | Company Size | Partner |
| Agribusiness | Eswatini (formerly known as Swaziland) | 4,500 employees | NTT DATA Group Corporation |
cost reduction by moving to SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition.
weeks to deploy SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition in materials management.
Group IT Manager, Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation Ltd.
| Industry | Region | Company Size | Partner |
| Agribusiness | Eswatini (formerly known as Swaziland) | 4,500 employees | NTT DATA Group Corporation |
cost reduction by moving to SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition.
weeks to deploy SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition in materials management.
Group IT Manager, Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation Ltd.
Increasing efficiency and employee engagement
Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation Ltd. (RES Corporation) is one of the largest companies in Eswatini, employing over 4,500 people. It produces two-thirds of the country’s sugar and 35.3 million liters of ethanol a year, sold in Africa and Europe. RES Corporation prides itself on caring for its people, providing housing and infrastructure for employees and their dependents. It runs the villages for the community, including schools, clinics, and hospitals, where more than 2,500 families are involved in sugar cane farming.
With its farm located 70 kilometers from the closest town, RES Corporation struggled to source employees and onboard them into the business. Also, the company needed to reduce its cost of production (to less than the world price for sugar) by improving efficiency. The inability to deal with impacts due to the climate in a timely manner lowered its yields and profitability, and the lack of data visibility resulted in costly decisions.
RES Corporation’s vision is to be Africa’s most-efficient energy producer – be that sugar, ethanol, or electricity. With plans to roll out new sugar-based products to three or four countries, RES Corporation needed to become more agile, cost-effective, and innovative. It also wanted to improve employee engagement and the overall experience of working for RES Corporation.
Group IT Manager, Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation Ltd.
Enabling cloud ERP and HR solutions to drive digitalization
RES Corporation selected SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition to streamline materials management, plant maintenance, project systems, and agriculture management. These key areas represent about two-thirds of its business costs. The company plans to deploy cloud ERP in finance, purchasing, sales, and manufacturing this year.
The business uses SAP SuccessFactors HCM for its core HR and talent management functions and to support and engage employees, especially millennials and new recruits who want a modern workplace where they can work remotely, efficiently, and flexibly. In addition, the company is currently implementing the SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central Payroll solution to give it more visibility into payroll and help ensure compliance.
SAP SuccessFactors HCM allows the company to manage monthly performance reviews, individual skills and training plans, and training approvals. Removing paperwork for training approvals and establishing the automatic booking of hotels and venues and cost payment have improved training uptake and the completion of skill tests. One of the reasons RES Corporation selected SAP SuccessFactors HCM was to enable employees to manage their data in a centralized place. Single sign-on – with one employee number – provides the relevant level of access to the different solutions. These capabilities assist with overall solution adoption and employee engagement. RES Corporation chose NTT DATA Group Corporation – with its strong expertise and global reach – as its strategic partner for the implementation to help ensure the right architecture.
Group IT Manager, Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation Ltd.
Delivering capabilities that strengthen agility and innovation
Moving to SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition allowed RES Corporation to create a clean core and scale up new processes and capabilities or scale down underutilized processes when needed. With 300,000 hectares of farmland and dispersed vehicles that must be maintained 24x7, fleet maintenance crews can save time and be more efficient and mobile with remote access to the ERP software. And enabling engineers to be increasingly in the field enhances productivity. Embedded analytics allow managers to pinpoint equipment that’s not being maintained in a cost-effective manner. Event triggers with material requirements planning inform employees about pressing issues, helping streamline processes.
With now-standard processes, it’s easier for the company to attract and manage resources. For example, two local graduate trainees were brought on board in two days, which would not have been possible previously. Employees are excited about the cloud ERP because they can work on their mobile devices wherever they are. For customers, the software helps ensure that products are available on time, while suppliers benefit from the tools used to report sustainability across the supply chain. Furthermore, the integration of the SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central solution with SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition streamlines data and processes and improves employee productivity with a consistent, engaging experience.
Group IT Manager, Royal Eswatini Sugar Corporation Ltd.
Preparing for energy stability and AI possibilities
The next milestone for RES Corporation is the launch of a new product in 2024. Following that, its focus will be on energy self-sufficiency and supplying energy to help stabilize and secure the electricity grid in southern Africa. It hopes that this will benefit both the business and the region.
RES Corporation believes that business AI will be important for its efficiency and strategy moving forward. It has started to identify several instances where it can automate tasks to improve their speed. For example, there are use cases on the farm that help predict yields and in the factory that involve maintenance and planning efficiencies. Other business cases are in finance and HR. Coombe concludes, “We’re very excited about Joule technology and what’s available from an SAP software stack.”
Featured partner
Backed by 150 years of history and innovation, NTT DATA Group Corporation provides SAP systems and data-center services in more than 50 countries and regions. As a leader in digital transformation and a member of SAP’s global partner network, the company offers consulting and services for designing, developing, and implementing SAP software and other IT solutions to improve management and operational processes for businesses of all types.