At the ERP Lab at FHWS in Schweinfurt, students learn how business tasks can be planned, controlled, and managed digitally. They also engage in their own experiments and research.
Artificial intelligence (AI), digital transformation, and Industry 4.0 are three key topics for the future. FHWS and Prof. Dr. Alexander Dobhan agree, and have integrated them into the ERP Lab in Schweinfurt. ERP – Enterprise Resource Planning – stands for company resources that can be planned, managed, and monitored. Now, the lab is not only a place for students at the Faculty of Business Engineering to learn about ERP systems, but also a place where they can conduct their own experiments and research. “The original idea was to make processes more accessible, but we have also expanded the research side”, explains Dobhan, who runs the lab. He is also interested in what the future will look like and how it could be shaped: AI, digital transformation, and Industry 4.0 are changing radically ERP systems radically. Professor Dobhan believes that ERP is companies’ most important business application – “every company above a certain size uses ERP to manage its business processes”. ERP provider SAP, for example, is one of Germany’s most valuable listed companies. That is why Dobhan stresses the importance of illustrating the relevance and mechanisms of systems. “The problem is often that students initially don’t understand the systems’ significance – sure, they’ve heard of SAP, but many are unaware of what it does exactly - that is why it is so valuable to have visible practice partners.”
Projects and visions
Last semester, the ERP Lab ran a project seminar on the topic of chatbots. Chatbots are system applications that use artificial intelligence to communicate with people in natural language. The project: in future, room reservations at FIS should be made by chatbot instead of manually by e.g. the secretary's office. “This is a current question for us at the company and something we are looking at”, explains Jessica Obert. Five students from the Faculty of Business Engineering were given the challenge of developing a prototype that would be able to book meeting rooms at FIS. Everyone involved gathered at FIS for the kick-off event. “It was great to have the students on site”, says Obert. The students also enjoyed the project, as student Shilpa Sharma explains. “Our partners at FIS, in particular the project supervisors, were really helpful at all stages of the project That way we could learn a lot.” For Prof. Dr. Dobhan, the key focuses are practical applications and realistic case studies. Another student, Thorsten Weber, emphasises why he appreciates this approach. “I find labs or practical approaches in general much more useful, and when I think of the projects I was able to join as part of the ‘Digital Business’ specialisation – well, I really learned a lot.” Student Lara Albert likes the fact that “students get the chance to discover the world of enterprise resource planning through different software systems.” And that the doors of the ERP Lab are always open.
FHWS also regularly runs projects with other partners, but the partnership with the ERP Lab sponsor has a stronger long-term focus. “Long-term partnerships are important to me in both research and teaching”, says Dobhan. FIS is, he adds, an ideal option as the company is practically right on their door step on their doorstep and an important player in the region.
The aim of the ERP Lab is to create an environment full of opportunity by providing on the one hand an excellent interface between teaching, research, and transfer to business. “At the same time, the lab is for illustrating and demonstrating processes, future technology, and the impact on ERP systems.” For students, it is important to test their ideas and theoretical concepts with real data, says student Dominik Goletz. “I did Master’s projects on the optimisation of master data quality in ERP systems using artificial intelligence. Here in particular, the available infrastructure was a huge benefit and I was able to test my programs directly.” There are two sides to the vision behind the lab, as Lab Director Dobhan explains. “The development of business applications and the integration of new options – and the creation of small use cases within a big idea allowing us to test things for research and teaching.” Above all, the vision is to be both useful and interesting for students and the ERP Lab partner alike. As Dominik Goletz says, “theory is definitely important, but not as important as practical experience when you’re trying to enter the job market.”
