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Standardized railway maintenance planning
SAP APLA Manager transforms work planning at BLS
As part of the OPAL project, BLS AG relies on valantic’s SAP APLA Manager to centrally manage maintenance plans in an automated and version-controlled manner. The result: higher data quality, reduced maintenance effort, and a fully integrated, digitally managed process from planning to feedback.
About BLS
BLS AG is a diversified Swiss transport company based in Bern. As a provider of rail, bus, ferry, and car transport services, BLS connects people, regions, and tourist destinations. In freight transport, the company ensures powerful international connections.
With the Lötschberg Base Tunnel, BLS operates one of Europe’s most important transit routes. The company is committed to sustainable mobility, relying on renewable energy, modern technologies, and digital solutions – with the goal of becoming climate-neutral by 2050.
Thanks to its strong regional roots, technical expertise, and clear customer focus, BLS actively shapes public transportation in Switzerland.
Initial situation
The maintenance planning at BLS AG had previously been carried out using multiple external systems and tools. Planning, scheduling, execution, and feedback were managed separately, leading to manual workflows, duplicate data maintenance, and a loss of efficiency.
Checklists, operation plans, and task matrices were created decentrally and stored locally. This resulted in inconsistent data sets and a high maintenance workload, as changes had to be made repeatedly across different documents.
The lack of a central solution led to limited transparency, more difficult coordination, and an overall slow and error-prone process.
Project goal
The goal of the project was to fully standardize and automate maintenance work planning and integrate it into the existing SAP system. With the SAP APLA Manager, the aim was to:
- centrally maintain reusable maintenance modules
- map all planning and feedback processes seamlessly within the system
- integrate version control, change tracking, and approval workflows
- significantly reduce maintenance effort
- ensure full compliance with all ECM requirements
Challenges
The greatest challenge lay in harmonizing the highly diverse processes across BLS locations. Over the years, each site had developed its own working methods, IT standards, and maintenance strategies – ranging from modern system environments to entirely manual processes. In addition, reactive rather than preventive maintenance approaches and individually managed, often locally organized data storage had become established.
These heterogeneous structures had to be integrated into a unified, end-to-end SAP process – without costly custom developments or risky system disruptions. At the same time, it was crucial to preserve existing, proven procedures at each site as far as possible to ensure user acceptance and enable a smooth transition into productive operations.
System
The SAP APLA Manager is seamlessly integrated into BLS’s existing SAP landscape. At its core is a structured overview of all work plans, complemented by powerful features:
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over 10,000 centrally maintained maintenance modules (IHBs)
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automatic updates of all affected work plans when an IHB is modified
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integrated version control and mass change assistant
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centralized cockpit with filtering and selection functions
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approval workflow and granular authorization concept
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intuitive user interface with minimal training requirements
Project APLA Key figures at a glance
1.000
SAP-integrated work plans
10000
Centrally maintained maintenance modules
100
Checklists replaced (in %)
100
ECM-compliance (in %)
Changes are automatically applied to all associated plans, eliminating duplicate work.
Checklists, task matrices, and manual work plans were completely replaced.
Thanks to the intuitive interface, only a short training period was required.
Yes, including an approval process, change tracking, and a structured history.
Outlook
With the SAP APLA Manager, BLS has created a future-proof platform for centrally managing work plans and updating them at any time with full system support. Processes are now traceable, standardized, and audit-proof, ensuring compliance with all ECM requirements through integrated approval workflows, change tracking, and structured version histories. The elimination of decentralized checklists, manual work plans, and task matrices has significantly reduced maintenance effort while improving data quality across all locations.
By harmonizing previously diverse processes, IT standards, and maintenance strategies into a unified, SAP-integrated workflow, BLS has not only increased efficiency but also secured a scalable foundation for the future. Future adjustments, extensions, and legal requirements can be integrated flexibly – without additional interfaces or media disruptions – ensuring that the solution remains adaptable to evolving operational and regulatory demands in the railway sector.
Do you like the project?
Would you like to learn how your company can also achieve future-proof maintenance with SAP EAM? Contact our experts now for a personal consultation!
Your Contact
René Balser
Managing Director
valantic Division SAP Services