Ryanair, a pan-European airline, offers low prices and no frills flights that are enjoyed by millions of passengers every year. With a current growth of 25% per year and a mission to firmly establish the Ryanair brand as Europes leading low-cost passenger airline, Ryanair needed strategies that keep costs low, but still provide the accurate and up-to-date information its executives need to make decisions. The airline realized that to achieve its objective it needed to update its IT infrastructure. Ryanair needed a robust and fully integrated IT solution that could support the airlines continuing expansion.

After thorough research, Ryanair chose SAP partner Fusion Business Solutions, an e-business solutions provider in the Irish and UK market, to carry out a complete systems reengineering project in its finance department, replacing the old systems with a fully integrated business solution. The project, which was completed on time and within budget, transformed the department into a streamlined, integrated operation that supports Ryanair s business processes and profitability.

Ryanair began its operations in 1985, and since 1991, Ryanair has made profitable growth at high margins. It now offers low cost air travel to 12 countries over 56 routes. Ryanair placed a US $2 billion order for 45 new Boeing 737-800 series aircraft and has received 20 so far. It also currently operates 21 Boeing 737-200 series aircraft. Currently, Ryanair employs more than 1,400 people and will fly over 9.5 million passengers in the financial year ending 31.03.02. In 2001 the company launched 13 new routes from Ryanairs first European base at Brussels Charleroi and six new low fare routes from London Stansted.

Undoubtedly, the most significant cost initiative in recent years was the launch of the www.ryanair.com Internet site. Its immediate success and instant customer acceptance enabled the company to increase the proportion of direct bookings to almost 75%, which generated large savings in central reservations systems fees and travel agent commissions.

In 1998, Ryanairs overriding goal was to replace the seven-year-old financial IT system that was affecting business efficiency with increasing downtime. The system was neither euro-nor year-2000 compliant and required time-consuming manual interfaces between modules. It also had inadequate and inflexible reporting capabilities (data older than three months could no longer be stored on the system). Ryanair was looking for a first-rate, long-term solution. The airline decided it needed a fully integrated financial solution that had the ability to interface with other operational systems, while having the scalability to support Ryanairs future growth across Europe.

Lorraine Cassidy, Financial Accountant at Ryanair, comments, One of our main objectives was to establish an outstanding route profitability system that would allow us to monitor costs. Such information is vital in not only keeping costs low, but also in highlighting cost reduction strategies. Our objective was tohave information readily available about all costs in detail. For example, it is vital that we know what routes are profitable in order to make scheduling and yield decisions in a timely and effective manner. We knew that to achieve such detailed reporting, we needed a fully integrated solution that has wide area network capability and the capability of interfacing with our other operational systems.

After thorough investigation into available systems on the market, Ryanair chose SAP R/3 as the most effective solution for the financial division. Ryanair had several reasons for selecting SAP, explains Patricia Carr, SAP delivery manager at Fusion Business Solutions. First, SAP gives the airline full integration and wide interfacing capabilities, which provides the basis for increasing Ryanairs internal control and better reporting. The success of SAPs solutions at Crossair in Switzerland made SAP the undeniable first choice for Ryanair.

Other strong reasons for choosing SAP included the flexibility to roll out the solution to other countries and to support Ryanairs continued growth and development. In addition, SAP solutions could easily handle transactions that involved multiple currencies and companies.

Fusion Business Solutions, a SAP-certified value-added reseller (VAR), suggested the Solution Life-Cycle Management (SLM) methodology and successfully implemented the system at the head office in Ireland. The project team implemented SAP Financial Accounting, SAP Controlling, SAP Materials Management, and SAP Fixed Assets in three months.

Following an off-site implementation procedure using a dedicated project manager and IT manager from Ryanair and three SAP consultants, the team was able to effectively prepare and proceed with the implementation without distraction. According to the project team, strong backing by management contributed heavily to the projects success. Senior management discussed any proposed changes in procedures and practices, and all decisions were prioritized. A huge emphasis was placed on training, and key staff members were involved in the implementation cycle. General staff training was carried out off-site to ensure that there were no distractions from the companys day-to-day activities. More in-depth training followed at a later date. The SAP consultants stayed on-site for two weeks after going live to ensure that operational problems could be solved without delay.