A New Name, the Same Powerful Platform

Before we dive into what's new, you may have noticed a change: SAP Cell and Gene Therapy Orchestration is being renamed to SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration

This isn't just a rebrand – it reflects the reality of where the platform is already being used and where it's heading. The core capabilities of product – treatment order orchestration, end-to-end COI/COC traceability, scheduling, and logistics coordination – extend well beyond cell and gene therapies to radioligand, allogeneic, plasma-derived, and device-enabled therapies. The platform and its functionality remain unchanged. Documentation and application references will be updated with the R2611 release.

Read the blog for more context – “From Cell & Gene to Advanced Therapy: Evolving SAP's Orchestration Platform for a Broader Future“

Release 2605: What's New

Release 2605 is one of the most integration-heavy releases we've delivered. The headline themes are:

• Scheduling Lifecycle Management: significantly expanded – from rescheduling to partial scheduling to a new slot calendar
• Subcontracting Purchase Order Integration: CMO orchestration with SAP S/4HANA
• Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) Integration: Project-based therapy program tracking
• Decentralized EWM Integration: Extending the existing centralized EWM support to separate-system warehouse deployments

Let's walk through each one.

1. Scheduling Lifecycle Management:  Scheduling in earlier releases covered the initial slot booking. In 2605, we close the loop on the complete scheduling lifecycle.

   What's New

   • Rescheduling: Users can book a new slot for a treatment order. The system automatically references the prior scheduling request, obsoletes the previous booking, and releases associated future manufacturing slots – no manual cleanup required.
   • Partial Scheduling: Limit a scheduling request to a specific range of milestones rather than requiring a full end-to-end calculation – useful when only a portion of the supply chain needs to be (re)planned.
   • Backward Scheduling: Calculate treatment timelines from a target delivery date backward to determine required collection and manufacturing dates – enabling date-driven planning for time-critical therapies.
   • Manage Milestone Slots (new app): A dedicated calendar view showing available, soft-booked, and hard-booked slots per day per material. Users can view capacity and book directly from the calendar.
   • Scheduling Request Cancellation: Supports both complete and partial cancellation. Partial cancellation releases only future processing slots, leaving completed steps intact.
   • Full Scheduling Request History: All scheduling requests per treatment order are visible with drill-down into request details, status, and linked milestones.
   • External Scheduling Tool Integration: A new Approve Schedule button allows triggering schedule approval via a configurable external scheduling API endpoint – for organizations that run constraint-based scheduling outside SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration.

   For organizations managing high-value therapies with tight manufacturing windows, these enhancements move SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration from slot booking to full scheduling lifecycle management.

2. Subcontract Purchase Order Integration for CMO: Contract manufacturing is a core reality of advanced therapy production – many sponsors rely on CDMOs/CMOs for one or more manufacturing steps. In 2605, product supports the full subcontracting purchase order (SC PO) lifecycle with SAP S/4HANA.

   What's New

   • Automatic SC PO creation: When an intermediate or finished product transit leg shipment is schedule-confirmed, a subcontracting purchase order is automatically created in S/4HANA. The ERP Data tab on the shipment shows the PO number and status.
   • SC PO as ERP Document Type: Supply chain coordinators can now select Subcontracting Purchase Order as the ERP document type for Intermediate Product and finished product  Transit Leg flow steps in Manage Flow Definitions – alongside the existing Stock Transport Order option.
   • Full lifecycle: PO updates (dates, Business Partners, quantities), cancellations, partial goods receipt (PGR), PGR reversal, and component consumption/reversal are all synchronized bidirectionally via Event Mesh.
   • COI Validation on Goods Receipt: The COI ID in the received material's batch characteristic must match the SC PO header. A mismatch causes the posting to fail and raises an exception – maintaining patient-centric traceability across outsourced manufacturing.
   • Component Consumption: The component consumption (Biospecimen component material) is updated on the SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration when PGR for the Subcontracting material is posted in the S/4 HANA system. When the biospecimen component consumption is updated during the PGR of the subcontracting purchase order, a consumption event for the biospecimen component material is sent – this event updates the  Processing Activity and biospecimen shipment consumption status of the Biospecimen material, COI/COC records, and sends an outbound event to treatment center platforms.
   • Quality Disposition: Usage decisions for a Subcontracting material batch from S/4 HANA or from SAP Batch Release Hub trigger disposition events that flow back to SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration, completing the traceability chain.
   • Vendor Update at PO Item: The subcontracting CMO vendor can now be updated at the purchase order item level – supporting drop-shipment scenarios from collection centers directly to CMOs.

   This is a significant step for multi-party advanced therapy supply chains, enabling sponsors to orchestrate CMO scenarios through standard SAP S/4HANA procurement processes with full visibility in SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration.

    

3. Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) Integration:  For organizations running advanced therapy programs within project structures linking therapy supply chain entities to S/4HANA project accounting objects enables real-time cost visibility and program-level monitoring.

   What's New

   • WBS field: Now available on treatment orders, biospecimen shipments, intermediate shipments, finished product shipments (transit and final leg), and processing activities.
   • Manual entry of WBS : WBS can be entered manually in the treatment order screen and then it is display across all linked entities.
   • WBS is also propagated automatically from S/4HANA Sales Order responses to finished product final leg shipments and up to the treatment order, when WBS is entered in the sales order in S/4 HANA.

   ERP document integration: When SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration sends Purchase order, process order, or sales order creation events with a WBS value, S/4HANA uses the WBS and other supplied fields to fetch and convert matching/relevant purchase requisitions into purchase orders or planned orders into production orders – ensuring consistent project assignment across the entire ERP document chain.

4. Decentralized EWM Integration:  SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration has supported centralized EWM (embedded in S/4HANA) since earlier releases. In 2605, we extend this integration to decentralized EWM deployments, where EWM runs as a separate system from S/4HANA – a common architecture in large manufacturing networks with specialized warehouse operations.

When goods movements are executed in decentralized EWM, material document creation requests are routed through S/4HANA from the decentralized EWM, which triggers the corresponding outbound events to SAP ATO. This is similar process as compare to the sending of the events in embedded EWM during the material documentation creation. The material document can be created by the goods movements or by the stock transfers for the quality disposition.  The full HU-to-SU (Handling Unit to Sub-Unit) sequential mapping logic applies across all supported ERP document types:

In all cases, HU-to-SU mapping is included in the event payload, ensuring full serialized material traceability across the decentralized warehouse landscape.

Additional enhancements in 2605: Beyond the four headline areas, 2605 delivers a range of enhancements across the platform:

Custom Milestone Management: A new Configure Milestones app enables customers to define business-specific milestones for treatment orders, processing activities, and all shipment types. A new inbound event allows external systems to push milestone updates, with full change logging and workflow trigger support.

Configurable Courier Instructions: A new Configure Courier Instructions app lets administrators predefine order-type-specific handling requirements. Instructions are auto-populated at shipment creation, shown with include/exclude controls during courier booking, and synchronized bidirectionally with courier partner systems.

Dosage Quantity Tracking (DOS UoM): The Dose (DOS) unit of measure is introduced to track clinical dosage quantities independently from manufacturing units (bags, vials). Dosage data flows from Processing Activity Yield through shipment allocation and synchronize to S/4HANA — important for CAR-T and other variable-dose therapies.

Expanded Configuration Transport: 12 new configuration entities are now transportable (including COI/COC Event Profiles, Courier Instructions, Rules, Destinations, and more). Sub-entity transport is now automatic — transporting a parent entity cascades its sub-entities in a single operation.

Manual Biospecimen Collection Management: Biospecimen shipment collections can now be created and edited directly in the UI, enabling standalone operation during upstream system outages.

Authorization Hardening: Stricter role enforcement across Manage Orders, Manage Shipments, and Scheduling apps as part of a systematic GxP compliance review.

Data Privacy Integration NextGen (DPP): GDPR-compliant retention management and personal data reporting are now supported via the DPI NextGen service.

Looking Ahead

Release 2605 significantly deepens SAP Advanced Therapy Orchestration's coverage of complex, multi-party therapy supply chains — from CMO orchestration and project accounting to full scheduling lifecycle management and decentralized warehousing. As the platform continues to evolve under its new name, our focus remains on making the end-to-end orchestration of advanced therapies more connected, transparent, and resilient.

We'd love to hear your feedback. Drop a comment below or reach out to the product team directly.