HANOS is an international wholesale distributor serving hospitality professionals with a wide range of high-quality food and non-food products. With a strong focus on customers, ingredients, and craftsmanship, the company operates across multiple branches, distribution centers, and a central headquarters.
To support its operations and continued growth, HANOS engaged Axians on two distinct initiatives aimed at improving financial planning and modernizing its data architecture.
Together, these initiatives form a coherent transformation approach: while each project targets a specific domain, both contribute to greater operational efficiency and a more robust, scalable data ecosystem within SAP.
Financial planning transformation with SAP Analytics Cloud
The first initiative focused on improving HANOS’ financial planning processes. Previously, budgeting and forecasting were managed through multiple Excel files, resulting in time-consuming manual work and fragmented data handling. This setup limited efficiency and made consolidation more complex across the organization.
To address these constraints, Axians implemented SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) Planning as a centralized solution. This platform enables HANOS to build budgets and monthly forecasts in a more structured and consistent way across its branches, distribution centers, and headquarters. The transition to a unified tool has reduced manual effort and improved data reliability.
Business controllers were closely involved in shaping the planning functionalities, contributing to a model that is more aligned with operational needs.
“The key to success for the SAC financial planning was the business engagement. The business controller designed and built the solution in close cooperation with our consultants, as he knew best how the planning process should look,” explains Erik Pos, Manager Operations & SAP at Axians Netherlands.
As a result, the process is now more standardized while remaining flexible enough to support ongoing business requirements.
Building a future-ready data platform with SAP Datasphere
The second initiative addressed the modernization of HANOS’ data architecture. Existing legacy systems, including Business Objects solutions, were no longer fully aligned with the company’s analytical and scalability needs. This created limitations in terms of data integration and future development.
Axians implemented SAP Datasphere as a central data warehouse to replace these legacy components. The new platform provides a more consistent and scalable architecture, aligned with SAP standards, and supports current reporting needs while preparing the organization for future analytical use cases.
The project was carried out in close collaboration between Axians consultants and the HANOS SAP competence center. This approach facilitated knowledge transfer and helped ensure that internal teams are able to manage and evolve the platform over time.
Reflecting on this collaboration model, Erik Pos states:
The shoulder-to-shoulder approach in implementing SAP Datasphere bridged the adoption and maintenance of the data warehouse towards the future.
Taken together, these two initiatives reflect a structured approach to addressing both operational and technological challenges. The planning processes are now more integrated and consistent across the organization, while the data architecture provides a clearer and more scalable foundation for reporting and analysis.
Rather than a one-off transformation, these changes establish a framework that HANOS can build on over time. The company is now better positioned to adapt to evolving business requirements and to support continued development in a controlled and sustainable way.