Case Study: Dutch Ministry of Defence boosts operational efficiency with CGI and SAP ERP

Dutch Ministry of Defence standardizes ERP for 60,000 employees with CGI

The Dutch Ministry of Defence, a major government employer with 60,000 staff, needed to drastically improve operational efficiency and cooperation between its armed forces branches. Their challenge, called the SPEER program, was to replace numerous obsolete and separate logistics systems with a single, integrated solution, a move that would require a significant cultural change and affect 10,000 users. Vendor CGI recommended and helped implement an SAP ERP package tailored for defense organizations to meet this need.

CGI formed a consortium to manage the project, working in mixed teams with ministry personnel to design new standardized processes. They established a dedicated "Bouwstenenfabriek" to build and test the SAP functionality, introducing it in phases starting in 2008 with a new financial system. CGI supported the large-scale change through extensive coaching and knowledge transfer. By 2014, all armed forces branches were successfully using the new integrated system, which replaced many legacy systems and delivered cost savings, more efficient operations, and better support for deployments.

Dutch Ministry of Defence