Newsbyte: SAP® Urban Matters Initiative Helps Improve Quality of Life in Latin American Cities

WALLDORF, Germany, Aug. 6, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- At an event today in Buenos Aires, SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) highlighted how the SAP® Urban Matters initiative is helping local governments in Latin America improve quality of life in the region's dynamic and fast-growing cities. The event featured discussions of how the Gobierno de la Ciudad Autonoma de Buenos Aires (GCBA) is using solutions and internationally-refined management practices from SAP to better respond to citizens, make faster decisions and manage contractors and budgets.

With 13 million people, Greater Buenos Aires is South America's second-largest urban area and is a global cultural and economic center. Governed as an autonomous city, the metropolitan area covers more than 5,000 square kilometers; GCBA must maintain approximately 700,000 objects: 450,000 trees, 125,000 lights, 54,000 sidewalks, 30,000 drains and 27,000 roads. In many cases, GCBA relies on contractors to address issues, often citizen-reported, such as uneven sidewalks, potholes or overgrown vegetation.

Before implementing multiple SAP solutions including SAP Mobile Platform in 2012, GCBA employees had no way to seamlessly manage this work and communicate specifications to contractors. They worked with paper records and disparate software applications and were unable to quickly route service requests to the appropriate departments.  This uneven, lag-prone management system sometimes resulted in suboptimal planning and service shortfalls.

Today, GCBA's Environment and Public Spaces Ministry is able to better integrate information and respond quickly to citizen needs through centralized incident management, permit registration and purchase management.  Supplier relationships have been improved, as ministry workers can now better assess contractor work performance and effectively communicate feedback.  Due to improved data access and recording of project progress, the ministry can track maintenance history on specific objects and equipment, which helps with planning budgets.

"Latin America is already the world's most urbanized region*," said Sean O'Brien, global vice president for Urban Matters & Public Security, SAP. "The region's rising economic influence and global profile, exemplified by the recent FIFA World Cup and upcoming Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, shows the promise and challenges of Latin America's cities. Urban best practices and technology that SAP has developed with public sector customers worldwide have a track record of successfully addressing those challenges."

SAP will host a similar event on August 13 in Colima, Mexico, including the Governor of the State of Colima, Mario Anguiano Moreno. The Gobierno del Estado de Colima chose SAP solutions to help it enhance government accountability in compliance with Mexico's General Law of Governmental Accounting (LGCG). Colima is using the SAP ERP application to integrate all financial processes, including tax collection, payroll and public works.

The State of Colima is among the most socially and economically advanced in Mexico, ranking sixth out of Mexico's 32 states on the UN's Human Development Index and classed as highly developed.** Colima's strong performance in such rankings is due in part to the commitment of Colima's leadership, at both the state and municipal level, to transparent and responsive government.

For more information, visit the SAP News Center. Follow SAP on Twitter at @sapnews.

*Atlantic Council, February 2014
**UNDP, June 2010

Media Contact:
Mat Small, +1 (510) 684-3552, [email protected], PDT

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SOURCE SAP SE