re:retail: SAP Türkiye Genel Müdürü Uğur Candan ile Hızlanan Dijital Dönüşümü Konuştuk!

Hello, everybody.

Today, our guest in our Retail program,
which we, as Vispera,

prepared to address the change
in the fast moving consumer

and retail sectors is

Uğur Candan, SAP General Manager.

Welcome, Uğur.

Thank you, Gökhan,

thank you for giving me
such an opportunity.

SAP is a place where I make good
friends in my professional career.

During the pleasant time of our work,

we carried out various
and successful projects,

including fast consumption and retail.

You've been in different
roles within the team

since the foundation of
SAP Turkey in 2001.

And you witnessed different
customer experiences.

We look forward to hearing
your opinions on this subject

in our conversation.

But before we get into the conversation,

I'd like to ask a question

about the period

we're going through.

Digital transformation has been on the
agenda of institutions for a long time.

Now companies are going through

an accelerated transformation
process due to the COVID.

As one of the world’s
leading technology companies,

SAP contributes a great deal

to the digital transformation of companies

with 440,000 customers
in more than 180 countries.

Can you share with us three factors

that will help companies succeed
in accelerated digital transformation?

Thank you, Gökhan.

Let's give greetings to
all those who listen to us.

I truly love the organization I work at.

Let's greet our professor, too,
Mrs. Aytül.

This is something
we get a lot of questions about.

It is a thing that I follow very warmly.

Because we have operations
in 180 countries.

In China where this first came out,
or in the Far East,

we had the opportunity to monitor
the topic and measure its effects.

So I can give you some new statistics.

- It'd be nice.
- I will do that.

First one:
as in all IT companies, the projects

in which all our customers are involved
have turned into "remote".

Two: I work in an institution
where friends

who are experts
in this field of statistics.

Let me put it this way:
The company had five big projects

in the same period,
with four big projects.

24 percent of the project gains were made.

Now, it's not easy to understand why.

We can easily identify this:

The main factor in all of
the new projects was that

it was easy to start at the time
when the ready-made effects of the work,

which people said, "how to do it."

You know, there's a bunch of institutions,
you'll fix something up in your house.

You can't find time for a while.

Then you find the time.

That was the same
with the organizations like this.

For instance, I always say,

if there are friends listening to us

who are in charge of
manufacturing planning, they know.

Where production is disrupted,

the stalls are immediately
taken into care.

If there's nothing to do,
you'll clean up the counters,

or oil up.

They say, "what are we
going to do this shift?"

clean up the place.

You'll make them clean up the place
instead of doing nothing.

It's like that. We had the chance
to do important things quickly.

So when we had a bunch of customers
like this, we also did new things

in a group of clients in order to
capture new business opportunities.

The first thought was, for example,
I was just in a meeting with the press,

and there were the electronic sales
scenarios that were first detected.

My regular store is closed,

so I can sell it at my online store.

So these things have gone up enormously.

But that's the tip of the iceberg.

I'd like to open up the part
that doesn't appear.

I think it will give you
very important tips.

First of all, SAP continues to say
to the market that:

By the way, it is something
I personally believe in and underline.

The situation we are in
does not have a solution book.

It doesn't have a readbook
that tells us how to solve it.

So, who will win?

It's very simple,
asking the dealer, the customer,

the business partner
and the employee "what can I do".

I look at the best examples
in Turkey and in the world.

It's a little bit like...

The man asked either
to his business partner

or asked his client what they needed.

For instance, let me give you
an example from our own offices,

you probably have the same thing,

or it will come to you, Mr. Gökhan.

What's that?

Our employees say, "Give us packaged food.

I don't want to go
and eat from the restaurant

or the dining room downstairs,

I can even spend the day with a sandwich."

everyone agrees on this.

- Right?
- Yes.

There's one company in the U.S. that says,

"I'm going to automate all companies,
for packaged food."

They sent us a picture.

And if you see the ads, it says,
environmental health,

"sustainable," what the guy did,

he threw a shelf there,
with his logo on it,

he put the products there,
and put a piggy bank next to them.

It doesn't consume electricity,
and one says, "I trust you, brother."

If you even open up an office,
if you buy a packaged food

all of these foods are green foods
suitable for environmental health,

occupational safety,
the most environmentally-friendly

and certified products of
the highest brands.

He also says that, I choose the product
here according to this criteria.

People say, "Why don't you
put a biscuit and put a coke?"

and the guy says, "I won't,"

a psycho firm like this,
I won't give its name.

But what is beauty?
Billion-dollar business market.

How did this guy find it?

He asked the ATMs and vending institutions

"What do you need?"

But what happens is
the employee doesn't go in

during the day for replenishment.

The man sends his staff there,
to unload the safe,

even if it's a box or wood there,

at one in the middle of the night.

Nobody sees it, that box is always full,
and nobody sees it.

Now, in these kinds of structures...

You know, as SAP,
ask these three things.

We gave these away, by the way,
the software called Qualtrics.

In this product line, we were
selling one, and now we're selling two.

Two times of the demand.

And the demand for this has increased

from the cloud because
everyone wants to interact.

They said it the other day.
Do you know the hardest thing?

If I know Gökhan Arıksoy, I'll call him,

and ask him, "you know this,
what do you think?"

But what if you don't know?

We used to be in the office yelling,

and we were asking who would help me.

Ask it now. "No, I'll just write a blog."

Why would you do that?
Who would read that?

So the question of what people
think about competence,

intellectual capital is another question.

So one, the reaction, two,
is the power in human resources.

From now on, when CEOs are interviewing,

I'd stake my life you'll hear this cliche:

"We now want to abolish
personnel employment by experience."

Why? Because they saw it.

He's facing a problem that even
his most experienced staff can't solve.

Who solves it?

A person who has a lot of
quick intelligence, is interested in art,

does sports, has an open worldview
and can produce projects with his mind.

We weren't evaluating it.

What do you do? This.
Are you good at it? Yes.

For how long? Fifteen. Alright.

That's done.

So human resources are
at a high level of demand.

Our experience economy solutions,
which perceive these creative solutions,

we call it experience economics,

are in tremendous demand.

I don't count sales,
services, marketing functions.

They won't sell anything without it.
That's everything to them.

The important thing is:

"I'll listen to you, and make a project"
system is over.

This is done, too.

I mean, in this environment now,

I don't know how many
people are going to listen, watch,

but we can't interact.

You know Cem Yılmaz says,
"It's been done."

"Bring it in
and I'll put it in service fast.

It shouldn't do everything,
but should produce fast."

This is starting to get incredible demand.

With accelerated solutions,
those who got the right answers

by asking the right question began to win.

If you think that
we see this very clearly,

that we are living in it,
and they are three weeks ahead of us,

not only in Turkey, but in the Far East,

the same statistics have
slowly come to Italy,

for example, and I am waiting
for them to come to Turkey

in a few weeks.

Exactly, we've been working with clients

from Brazil to India.

They all had the same thing
with a certain phase difference.

So what we're observing is that
even though countries are different,

people's reactions are very similar.

Therefore, it is important to be able
to read customers, employees

and the market well in order to
develop correct solutions.

The COVID-19 process has brought
"new normal" into our lives.

Of course, how close is the "new normal"
in Turkey to the old normal,

and is it really the "new normal"?

But "new normal" exists in our lives
in one way or another.

In this period, can you summarize
the three technologies that support

SAP customers’ business processes
in the fast consumption and retail area

under the concept of "new normal"?

Great. Let me start with
what I think is important to you.

When the problem changes,
the answer to the question changes,

the methods change, everything changes.

Let's give an example from the retail.

The famous retailer runs the business.

He has a format they visualize,

not even a report.

That doesn't usually even
go to certain levels online.

It's a print-out, as I just showed.

At best, where there are managers,

there's a debate in PowerPoint.

Now, try to analyze the data
in this environment

and solve the business problems there.

So all the walls between where
the problem is and where it's reported

should be torn down.

And again in the SAP world,

you're a friend of mine
who knows SAP as well as I do,

so the data warehouse is
an analytical solution,

and the data-analyzing tool
that's running through real-time data

in the data stream
that's learning the analytical solution,

and what's really cool about it?

Where does it connect to you?

SAP tells you the reason why you exist
that what's actually happening

in the world is that we need to close
the gaps between the system

and something that happens.

IOT is the bridge for that.

But the work starts with
starting the bridge, not over.

And then, to make sense,
to visually infiltrate it,

to be able to "book" the relationship
within that visualization as "transaction"

which is another relationship

that you don't "book" as "transaction"...

"Yeah, I sold three,
but that's because this is there,

and I sold five
but that's because it's here",

and you can track down
the transection system after it happens.

How do we know if the product on the
shelf is in stock and is not on the shelf?

Furniture, it's in stock
but it's not selling.

So, if it's everywhere,
then should I not put it on the shelf?

It doesn't change anything if you do it
after the situation happens.

That's what the guy's gonna find out.
He'll say it doesn't sell for three hours.

So, the way things happen in the
real world and the things

that have happened
have to be united.

And people will try
really hard to do this.

Because uniting the physical and web stock

has become a real business problem.

It's okay when you're 5% in it,
you're okay at 10%,

at 20%, you'll say "God damn it but ok."

What will you do when it's 100%?

Currently, 100 percent of the
revenues of some people are online.

Then the man will have to sell

the product on the shelf online.

It used to be about not having
stock on the shelf.

like "I didn't sell it, damn".
Now that's not what it's about.

Everything is coming closer.

There are new concepts
like "Click and collect."

The normal "brick and mortar" retailer
also creates some business models

that it delivers online
but at its own location.

My sister lives in America,

she changed all her shopping
to "click and collect".

She orders it, goes there with her car,

and "ma'am, welcome." here is your order.

Can you imagine the effect of this now?

So these are increasing quickly.

That's the first one.
The second is profits.

Even if you open the box in the first
place, even if it doesn't seem like

it has anything to do with

what a profitability analysis did,

I know you have a lot more scenarios,

but let's move on from there,

every square millimeter
in that shelf scenario

has a disparate profitability "impact"

and the profitability
approach has changed.

Because we were stacking the shelves,

and it had a doctrine,

a normal life doctrine. Not now.

I wonder if the new Uğur Candan...
I wasn't going but...

We've been going to Migros
for 15-20 days, right?

My experience there;
am I thinking the same?

I'll tell you. I am not.

I am not thinking the same way.

Let me give you an example
from Spain's largest.

Spain's largest retailer
called SAP and said,

"The number of products on the shelf..."

He looks at it
and sees the gap for 5 products.

He said, "I need to cut it by half,
decrease it from 5 to 3 or 2."

We asked him why. Alright, he can do it

but everything has its limits.

After a while, you start cutting down
on that advertising income.

He said he needs some space in the store.

Look at how he describes the problem.

The man says "I don't want it,"

even if he buys ads for other categories
in order to make room

for another category in the store,
if he makes a claim, if he has income,

even if they pay him
for putting it there.

"Because there's a whole new category,

and I've got to compress
that category there.

I'm not going to go over
and knock down the wall

and rent the store next door,"

so it started off as a "spacing project".

The main theme
of the project is "supply chain,"

where we're going to improve planning
with real-time technologies

that open a square meter
in the store. Let's see.

I wouldn't think about it for 40 years.

So, to sum up,

I think such matters will make
your way very clear.

Whatever you're doing to tell the world
market about ready-packed things,

Gökhan, I beg you, your team, my team;

let's sit down and make sense of it
and tell everybody about it.

But if you ask what others are,
of course human resources.

It began to get a lot of demand.

Because it is possible for me
to tell what intellectual capital is

with stories that could be novels.

So nobody's going to do anything without
looking at expertise or work experience.

If I were choosing another
third heading, I'd say supply chain.

Repairing the supply chain
that's already broken is

probably a year's activity.

Uğur, there's a question I remember.

It's actually a buffer question.

The SAP usually had
two very important headlines

when it launched
big transformation projects.

One is finance, "digital finance",

and another is "supply chain management",
"digital supplier network".

Is this still the way
it is in "new normal"?

Now...

Or are there others?

Now the supply chain has gone cold,
because it's really broken.

For instance, most companies in Turkey

and in the world,
we've got the supply chain,

I did a lot of it myself
when I was young.

"We have 3,000 suppliers,

we'll reduce them to 300,
then we'll reduce them to 40-50,

the power of bulk buying, and we'll
work even closer, we'll integrate."

What happened to those who did this?

The store is closed because
one of 30 suppliers has COVID.

wWho didn't do it has come
to the forefront,

who still fought such a guerrilla war
with three thousand suppliers.

Turkey, the geography of the guerrilla war

will steal share
from the global supply chain.

Here's your doctrine sentence.

I believe this. Why?
Our "lot size" is small, we're flexible,

a region like China that doesn't have to
do business with large "lot size."

What will happen? When will it happen?
It'll happen if you are aware of it.

Is there something broken
in the supply chain?

The manufacturer who has a solution

will win.

The manufacturer
who notices those broken parts.

We're playing a game
that tries to balance things out

as if they're the same.

New game hasn't started.

So, to start this new game,
your question earlier...

Let me say something about finance.

Broken supply chain,

environmental health, occupational safety

and profitability are a definite game.

One of Turkey's largest producers
sells cologne.

I went to the meeting,
the sales report came, they got sad.

I asked why?

And it was the first days of COVID.

What will they do? It's not even clear

how they can disinfect the COVID.

They're pumping the shifts,

and producing like crazy.

They're almost not sending employees home.

It was a joke. They're working full shift.

I asked them why they're sad.
And they answered:

"We've been number 1
in England for five days."

"So how?

- Why are you sad then?"
- "We gave the product domestically."

Now first: You'll win if you sense it.

Second: You'll win if you can maneuver
flexibly after that feeling.

Three: you'll win if you produce by paying
attention to your profitability analysis.

Not only for selling.

Maybe if he produced
half as much as he did

and gave away all of
what he produced to that X market,

which is the smallest retailer in
which he is number one in the X market;

enter a store, it'll probably be
10 kms away.

Enter a store and go to
the cosmetics aisle in Sainsbury,

and see how big is the smallest aisle
in England.

It's impossible to be number one there.

So, these are important.

We have been given fronts

where all of the questions have changed.

Do you know what our problem is, Gökhan?

It is the syndrome of

being able to put solutions

that will quickly cure the problems
of customers who understand

what we are telling and
who can understand very quickly.

After a while, everyone will be aware
of what we're talking about.

They did because it was
the most selling product.

Those who are not selling
the product at the moment,

will live the same with
a phase difference of two months.

So I repeated this.

I have one last question.

By the end of 2021,
what are the top three applications

that will be brought to
fast consumption and retail

by emerging technologies such as
artificial intelligence, artificial vision

the Internet of Things and blockchain
in the next one and a half years?

Distribution, sales, service
in short term.

I'd add production in long term.

But the logistics is broken.

They broke our toy there.
And they took it away, too.

They just broke it and threw it away

and we can't even glue it together.

So we need to do something new.

Whoever tries to repair their old system,

we'll get out of there.

We have nothing to do with them.
Let's just not go there.

Who wants to redo it, whoever says
I don't want to experience it from scratch

when these problems happen again.

Here is the keyword.

"I don't want to face something
like that next time it happens."

It'll happen again, I'm telling you.

We have operations in 185
countries or 180 countries.

It'll happen again.

We'll call it COVID-19,
COVID-21, COVID-99,

even "Cavit", I don't know.

But some things will happen.

Do not think that this society will stand
on the ground like a bouncing ball.

We'd be very optimistic,

we'll drop it
and it'll stop on the ground.

That's not going to happen.

So, whoever comes to us and says,

"I don't want to experience it again,"

we'll carry them around,
help them any way we can.

What's good about
the Turkish market is that

we are in developed markets,

and many IT companies in Turkey say
that you are developing.

For instance, they put us side by side

with Africa, and Dubai.

In quote, "developing",
which means you didn't develop.

Who is Turkey with; Europe,

Part of Southern Europe. Why?

Because the maturity of this market,
I'm sorry but,

they can only "range mark" me
with Spain, Italy.

Sometimes they bend my hand,
sometimes I bend their hands.

We all respect each other.

And I'm the smallest of all,
don't get me wrong.

Italy is 2.5x bigger,
Spain is 2x bigger than me.

And yet these engineering roles,

thanks to you,
I'm not just saying that for myself,

but because we're bringing them to their
knees thanks to bright staff like you.

We need to get the better ones ready

to turn into profit, that's all.

In terms of the supply chain,

production-related benefits
for embedded companies in Turkey

can be quite substantial,
especially in "new normal".

I believe that it definitely will.

But the rule of the next game,
a billion-dollar question:

"Where's the money?"

Because it ran away somewhere.

Now, it's like a hide-and-seek game.

It's hiding,
and now everyone's looking for it.

The flexible one,
hard-working one will find it.

And the equation will change.

We need to put
our advantages forward here.

That's right. Uğur, thank you very much

for your time at re:retail.

We had a lovely conversation.

No, thank you, brother.
You gave me this chance.

And also our viewers...
We couldn't interact this time.

Next time, we'll build
a more interactive environment.

Hopefully, we will continue
our conversation in a face-to-face,

side-by-side, in a physical environment.

Thank you so much, Uğur.