Huace Navigation: Switching to cloud ERP to support product innovation and global expansion
Redefining operations management for global success
To create industry-leading “blockbuster” offerings, Shanghai Huace Navigation Technology Ltd. (Huace Navigation) embarked on a digital transformation journey. The company deployed an SAP Cloud ERP Private solution and the SAP Master Data Governance application, together with the SAP S/4HANA Manufacturing solution for planning and scheduling. The result: unified global operations, an intelligent supply chain, and smooth business-finance integration.
| Industry | Region | Company Size |
| Industrial manufacturing | Shanghai, China | 2,000 employees |
increase in consolidated reporting efficiency.
increase in in-plant, direct-to-package production efficiency.
increase in the inventory turnover rate.
Senior Vice President, Shanghai Huace Navigation Technology Ltd.
Exposing gaps in existing digital management capabilities
Shanghai Huace Navigation Technology Ltd. is a leader in advancing mapping, navigation, and positioning solutions. Used in more than 50 countries worldwide by companies in the geospatial, digital construction, precision agriculture, and navigation sectors, the technology helps improve project efficiency and affordability.
Aiming to become a ¥100 billion (~US$14 billion) business, Huace Navigation is focused on extensive product development and global market expansion. To help it achieve this, the company urgently needed to upgrade its legacy IT systems. With multiple, disparate solutions for different products, customer bases, industries, regions, and channels, the existing IT infrastructure was highly complex. This not only resulted in duplicated IT efforts and wasted resources but, more critically, prevented management from gaining a unified and transparent view of operations, hindering effective performance monitoring across business units.
Meanwhile, as the company expanded globally, wide variations in accounting standards, tax policies, and regulations across markets further increased management complexity and compliance risks. A massive volume of reports was being generated by finance teams, who had to manually consolidate data from multiple sources and perform complex accounting adjustments. This not only caused inefficiency and delays in issuing reports but also greatly increased the risk of errors and created major challenges for report consolidation. Reporting delays, in turn, limited the management team’s decision-making efficiency.
Manual operations also extended to Huace Navigation’s supply chain management. For years, the company relied on Microsoft Excel to process orders and schedule production, making demand management inefficient and untimely. More critically, it prevented R&D, production, supply, and sales from sharing information on a unified platform, resulting in data silos and limited real-time visibility. In key areas such as production planning and raw material procurement, the company struggled to adjust plans promptly in response to changes in demand, leading to persistently high inventory levels. With its globalization strategy underway, Huace Navigation faced even higher requirements for supply chain responsiveness, accuracy, and inventory management.
Huace Navigation also found it difficult to identify potential bestsellers through precise product-level profitability analysis, as the complicated product management framework hindered accurate cost allocation. As a result, management lacked a clear view of the true profitability of each product.
To support its international expansion more efficiently, deliver business insights, and enable compliance with regulatory requirements, Huace Navigation looked for a modern ERP solution that would support a digital transformation.
Rebuilding management foundations with cloud ERP to increase control
Huace Navigation’s senior vice president, Yang Yun, emphasized that globalization “starts with changing the ERP DNA.” With the launch of SAP Cloud ERP Private and the SAP S/4HANA Manufacturing solution for planning and scheduling, the company established a groupwide data governance framework using SAP Master Data Governance, standardizing and sharing global data in real time on one platform. Huace also unified its multidimensional management system into a single digital platform, streamlining multiple core business processes.
To improve management efficiency and accuracy, Huace Navigation integrated business and finance operations through SAP Cloud ERP Private. A new cost allocation mechanism based on R&D, production, and regional sales helps ensure cost traceability and transparency on profitability for each project, helping “blockbuster” products emerge. Financial data now flows smoothly, is traceable, and automatically generates accounting vouchers. This automation reduces manual reporting effort, simplifies group-level financial consolidation, and supports sustainable business growth.
The new ERP enhances both compliance and business agility. With the SAP Cash and Liquidity Management application, version for China, Huace centralized domestic funds, boosting efficiency and freeing finance resources. Localized reporting now strengthens analysis and cuts operating costs. Meanwhile, the SAP Document and Reporting Compliance solution enables real-time electronic invoicing and reporting across countries, helping ensure consistent global compliance.
Replacing manual Excel-based workflows, the production planning and scheduling module now supports master supply planning, capacity planning, and detailed scheduling while accounting for material and capacity constraints. By digitalizing the sales-to-supply process, Huace Navigation gained real-time visibility and collaborative management. Predictive analytics, intelligent allocation, and advanced optimization tools now help balance resource use and maintain optimal inventory levels.
Driving ¥100 billion growth with blockbuster products and globalization
With the launch of SAP Cloud ERP Private, Huace Navigation has integrated 21 systems and turned nearly 1,000 pages of blueprint architecture into reality. A closed-loop management cycle of process iteration, data insight, and decision optimization enables efficient digital collaboration. Management personnel can now instantly access global operations data ranging from regional market share to competitor trends, supporting rapid decisions on strategic initiatives such as overseas warehouse deployment and localized R&D. This has aligned global operations, greatly enhancing market responsiveness and competitiveness. In addition, geographical barriers have broken down, enabling business units to collaborate in real time using a common data language and continuously improve operational efficiency.
Integrating business and finance has made Huace Navigation’s decision-making more precise and efficient. Cost allocation functionality now provides clarity and transparency into product profitability, delivering reliable data for its blockbuster products strategy. Financial efficiency has also improved significantly, with monthly reporting and consolidation delivered within three working days of the end of the month. Beyond monthly reporting, the finance team can now deliver key operational data in real time to the business, enabling agile responses. This integrated business-finance system has become a core driver for Huace Navigation to gain valuable market insight for its product strategy.
Globalization-localization functionality turns the management of compliance requirements into growth momentum. SAP Cash and Liquidity Management unifies bills, bank connectivity, and hybrid payments, significantly improving capital efficiency. With SAP Document and Reporting Compliance, the company generates electronic invoices and reports in real time within a single system, helping Huace Navigation meet regulatory requirements in China, Japan, Singapore, Hungary, and beyond. What’s more, continuous regulatory updates allow Huace Navigation to respond quickly to changes, freeing up resources for innovation and expansion, and increasing competitive advantage in global markets.
Using the planning and scheduling capability, Huace Navigation has upgraded its supply chain management with intelligent capabilities, significantly improving efficiency thanks to automated planning processes. Meanwhile, increased visibility across the sales-to-supply chain has removed collaboration barriers, enabling the company to respond faster to demand changes, optimize resource allocation, and address high inventory challenges effectively.
SAP solutions are supporting Huace Navigation’s growth toward becoming a ¥100 billion business. Following an implementation using SAP Services and Support, the company now also has a core group of talent proficient in both business operations and SAP solutions and concepts. This has embedded SAP’s management best practices into the company’s operations, helping ensure it continues to use the software effectively and sustainably in future.
President, Shanghai Huace Navigation Technology Ltd.