Features - Financial Plays Of The Week:

SAP HAS CONTINUED SUCCESS IN UPSTREAM OIL AND GAS INDUSTRY

SAP announced that Marathon Oil Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Marathon Oil Corporation, is the first company to go live on the new production and revenue accounting capability of mySAP Oil & Gas for the upstream industry.

Marathon implemented a broad range of mySAP.com e-business solutions to manage its various businesses, including core SAP business applications that support financial accounting and management, plant and equipment maintenance management, e-procurement, and data warehousing. In addition, Marathon is using upstream industry-specific capabilities, including production and revenue accounting, joint venture accounting, and offshore logistics management.

"We are very pleased with the successful, on-time implementation of mySAP.com," said Gary Newberry, Marathon project executive. "Our SAP solution allows us to efficiently manage our business throughout the world by empowering our people with the information they need to do their jobs at whatever level they are in the company. It has improved our ability to collaborate both internally as well as with external partners and customers so we can more effectively compete in the marketplace."

Marathon intends to further enhance its SAP solution with the "go live" of mySAP Human Resources and mySAP Enterprise Portals to facilitate internal and external collaboration.

Global acceptance of upstream industry solutions

In addition to Marathon, many other leading global oil and gas companies, including ChevronTexaco, BP, Nexen, Inc., Equiva Trading Company, and Tesoro, are increasing the value they derive from current SAP solutions by adding upstream industry-specific capabilities. Also, independent producers such as Hunt Oil are selecting mySAP.com for their e-business infrastructures.

SAP's upstream capability for the oil and gas industry delivers the tools and automated processes an upstream business needs to add value and increase profits in today's business environment. Capabilities include production and revenue accounting, joint venture accounting, production sharing accounting, and offshore logistics management.

Chevron-Texaco is leveraging its existing SAP implementation by extending its platform to include both production and revenue accounting and offshore logistics management. The process improvements and integration that these capabilities provide are seen as key to increasing savings through the combined operations of Chevron and Texaco.

BP, along with its accounting outsource supplier, PwC Consulting, has initiated a project to replace current legacy production, revenue, and oil supply applications with the production and revenue accounting capability from mySAP O&G. The installation will be integrated with BP's existing upstream implementation for the continental U.S. PwC Consulting is the SAP service partner of choice for mySAP Oil & Gas in the upstream industry.

Nexen, Inc., one of Canada's top oil and gas producers, has also recently completed an implementation of mySAP.com for its Canadian operations. The implementation included the joint venture accounting capability of mySAP Oil & Gas for the upstream industry. Nexen is in the process of extending its implementation to its U.S. operations and has licensed the production and revenue accounting capability from SAP.

Both Equiva Trading Company and Tesoro have also licensed the production and revenue accounting capability for use in its "first purchaser" requirements. The ability to use production and revenue accounting capabilities from the perspectives of both oil purchasers and oil producers provides companies with the ability to fully integrate with SAP applications that support other business operations.

Hunt Oil, a leading independent oil and gas producer with global operations, recently signed on with SAP for the upstream oil and gas industry functionality to help gain enterprise-wide standardization, improve business process integration, and manage costs. Hunt's implementation plans include the production and revenue accounting and joint venture accounting capabilities of mySAP Oil & Gas.

"SAP is very pleased with our customers' progress in the oil and gas industry," said Dieter Rafalsky, senior vice president, Chemicals, Mining, and Oil & Gas Industry Business Unit, SAP AG. "Solutions like joint venture accounting, offshore logistics management, and production sharing accounting provide the industry-specific functionality necessary for upstream oil and gas companies to benefit from the integration and openness of the collaborative business environment provided by mySAP.com. Many other independent oil and gas producers are now expressing a strong interest in how mySAP.com can help them better manage their business today with the flexibility for future growth."

About mySAP Oil & Gas

With more than 20 years experience providing technology solutions to the petroleum industry, SAP has developed a solution tailored to the needs of the upstream, downstream and retail functions. mySAP Oil & Gas, part of the suite of industry-specific solutions within the mySAP.com e-business platform, delivers comprehensive tools and integrated business processes to help companies in the petroleum industry collaborate and succeed in the global, Internet-driven economy. The SAP solution integrates the entire oil and gas value chain -- from wellhead production to the service station.

For more info, please visit www.sap.com/solutions/industry/oil-gas.

About SAP

SAP is one of the world's leading provider of e-business software solutions. Through the mySAP.com e-business platform, people in businesses around the globe are improving relationships with customers and partners, streamlining operations, and achieving significant efficiencies throughout their supply chains. Today, more than 18,000 companies in over 120 countries run more than 50,000 installations of SAP software with subsidiaries in over 50 countries.