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SAP Plant Maintenance keeps maintenance inside the ERP. Seal traces a failed calibration to the batches recorded against it.

Seal, the GxP execution system, is your eBR, your QMS and more. Neil, your AI agent, does the paperwork across your systems. You sign. Paradromics cut operator paperwork by 80%. Start with one process beside SAP Plant Maintenance.

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Where SAP Plant Maintenance falls short.

From SAP’s own documentation and product pages.

  • Modules
    Plant Maintenance and QM
    Order type
    Defined in Customizing
    Equipment category
    Defined in Customizing
    Inspection type
    Defined in Customizing

    Calibration set up across two modules.

    An SAP calibration inspection combines Plant Maintenance and Quality Management, with an order type, an equipment category and an inspection type defined in Customizing first. In Seal, Neil configures the first process from your procedure, and your team approves it.

    SAP Help Portal, Calibration Order
  • After the result
    “Not ready for use”
    Earlier work
    No review described
    Seal
    Uses since the last good check

    A failed calibration sets a status.

    In SAP, the usage decision sets the test equipment to “Ready for use” or “Not ready for use”. Its calibration documentation describes no review of earlier work. In Seal, the uses since the last good check are traced.

    SAP Help Portal, Calibration Order
  • An order holds
    Operations, materials, tools
    And
    A settlement rule and costs
    The batches it served
    Not in the order

    Built to settle costs.

    SAP’s maintenance order plans tasks and enters, assigns and settles their costs, with rules for account assignment, settlement and budgets. In Seal, your team composes the record types and steps your procedures need.

    SAP Help Portal, Maintenance Order
  • SAP’s AI
    Suggests a past order
    The planner
    Copies it
    Neil
    Drafts the change

    Its AI finds past orders. Neil does the paperwork.

    SAP’s AI recommends maintenance orders “that solved similar incidents from maintenance history”, for a planner to copy. Neil prepares the change itself and the paperwork around it, for your team to approve.

    SAP, maintenance order recommendation

See it in Seal.

Real Seal screens with fictional test data: a calibration out of tolerance, the earlier work it touched, and a repair.

  1. 1

    A calibration keeps its first reading.

    CAL-0882 records the original error beside the adjusted one, restricts the instrument’s use, and opens a review of its earlier work.

    Calibration CAL-0882 of shelf-temperature probe TT-204 in Seal: five reference points with original and final errors, the −40 °C point originally outside limits, the adjustment, use restricted while review stays open, and the linked prior-use assessment OOT-061.
    1. The original error, kept−0.8 °C at −40 °C stays recorded beside the final −0.1 °C.
    2. Use restrictedNot authorised until review and earlier use are settled.
    3. Earlier use, assessedOOT-061 follows the instrument into its earlier work.
  2. 2

    The instrument, followed into its work.

    OOT-061 finds each batch and qualification the instrument measured in the review window.

    Assessment OOT-061 in Seal: the calibration event and original point, a review window from 3 February to 7 September 2026, the recorded uses in two freeze-dryer batches and a temperature mapping, each open, and the evidence needed before a decision.
    1. The review window3 February to 7 September 2026; when the error began is unknown.
    2. Every recorded useTwo freeze-dryer batches and a temperature mapping, each open.
    3. Evidence before a decisionSource traces and independent probes, compared first.
  3. 3

    Maintenance on the same records.

    WO-007 starts from the calibration finding, records the repair, and checks the pump before it returns to use.

    Work order WO-007 in Seal to investigate low pump flow on HPLC-007: the source calibration finding and maintenance plan, the repair with part lot and technician, three post-service flow readings against 0.98 to 1.02 mL/min awaiting review, and the return-to-service review.
    1. From the calibration findingCAL-007: pump flow outside tolerance.
    2. The repair, recordedThe part, its lot and the technician.
    3. Checked before returnThree flow readings against 0.98 to 1.02 mL/min.

What Seal’s customers measured.

Each figure links to the customer’s story.

QualityAcclinate and Skye Biologics

−50%
quality cycle times at Acclinate, from a procedure change to everyone trained.Acclinate
−40%
non-conformances at Skye Biologics, with training checked before execution.Skye Biologics

RecordsMiAlgae and Bioventix

−75%
documentation time at MiAlgae, from the lab to commercial production.MiAlgae
−80%
document admin time at Bioventix, after two decades on paper.Bioventix

SAP Plant Maintenance and Seal, side by side.

Every source is listed under References.

SAP Plant MaintenanceSeal
What it isMaintenance within SAP S/4HANA¹The GxP execution system, with CMMS built in
Built forMaintenance and its costs in the ERP²Process development, the lab, manufacturing, batch release and quality
Data modelThe maintenance order, with its costs to settle²Primitives your team composes: record types, their relationships, steps and checks
AIRecommends past orders for a planner; SAP’s wider asset range adds predictive maintenance³⁴Neil, Seal’s AI agent, prepares changes to the process; your team approves them
PlanningMaintenance plans create orders⁵Due work keeps the reading behind it
CalibrationPM order with a QM inspection lot⁶Every calibration point kept with its source and standard
After the resultUsage decision sets the status⁶Use decided for the intended use
Earlier workNo review described in its calibration documentation⁶Recorded uses since the last good check, traced
Costs and partsSettled in the ERP²Parts lots traced to assets and uses
Getting startedOrder and inspection types set up in Customizing⁶A 48-hour evaluation of one process, once the scope is agreed and the inputs received

Summary

The story
SAP Plant Maintenance is good for maintenance inside the ERP. SAP was founded in 1972 to create software that integrates business processes, beginning with financial accounting and inventory,⁷ and its maintenance order is the object for entering, assigning and settling costs.² Calibration is a special maintenance order spanning two application components, Plant Maintenance and Quality Management, with order types, equipment categories and inspection types set up in SAP Customizing first.⁶ Its AI recommends past maintenance orders from history for a planner to copy, and SAP’s wider asset range adds predictive maintenance and an operations assistant.³⁴ If maintenance is mainly a cost to plan and settle, it can work well. GMP teams need eligibility checked at the moment of use, in the same system as the work.

1What SAP Plant Maintenance offers.

SAP PM puts maintenance in the ERP beside materials, purchasing and finance.¹ Maintenance plans generate orders when a date or counter reading falls due,⁵ and orders hold operations, materials, tools, a settlement rule and costs.² Calibration sits in Test Equipment Management, which links Plant Maintenance with Quality Management.⁸ SAP also markets autonomous asset management, which it says converts signals and requests into prioritised work packages.⁴

2Neil does the paperwork beside SAP. You sign.

SAP keeps the costs, purchasing and finance it settles. Seal’s REST API and Scripts can read order identity and status and equipment status from the maintenance APIs your SAP edition exposes, starting with read access, and the SAP S/4HANA Cloud connection brings selected business partners into quality work such as a supplier review.

Neil, your AI agent, assembles the uses since the last acceptable check, the evidence behind them and what is missing, and can answer a question such as “Which results used HPLC-007 between the last acceptable flow check and today’s failure?” with each fact traced to its record. People approve, and Neil is not used in GMP execution.

3Start beside SAP.

  1. Choose an equipment family whose uses matter, such as the HPLCs used for release testing.
  2. Bring the equipment list with its SAP equipment numbers, a recent calibration order with its inspection results, and one method or process that uses the equipment. Start with sample material, or arrange an NDA first.
  3. Neil drafts asset records, specifications and point-of-use requirements, and your team reviews them against the originals. Once the scope is agreed and the inputs received, Seal prepares the first working process and its validation pack to evaluate within 48 hours. Production timing then depends on scope, interfaces, migration and your release requirements.
  4. Connect SAP read-only for the order and equipment status the process needs, and agree which system owns asset identity, work orders, calibration results and current restrictions.
  5. Test the exception paths: restrict an asset, trace its prior uses and show the evidence required before it returns to service.

References

  1. 1Maintenance Management, SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition documentation, SAP Help Portal. https://help.sap.com/docs/SAP_S4HANA_CLOUD/2dfa044a255f49e89a3050daf3c61c11/f9f9400b81de4235b910887d91d925c4.html (read 5 November 2026)
  2. 2Maintenance Order, SAP S/4HANA documentation, SAP Help Portal. https://help.sap.com/docs/SAP_S4HANA_ON-PREMISE/efc7922405fd4d56b7571930c5eaa798/d784b8535c39b44ce10000000a174cb4.html (read 5 November 2026)
  3. 3SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition, maintenance order recommendation, SAP. https://www.sap.com/products/erp/s4hana-cloud-private-edition-maintenance-order-recommendation.html (read 5 November 2026)
  4. 4Enterprise Asset Management & Maintenance Software, SAP. https://www.sap.com/products/scm/asset-management-eam.html (read 5 November 2026)
  5. 5Maintenance Plan, SAP S/4HANA documentation, SAP Help Portal. https://help.sap.com/docs/SAP_S4HANA_ON-PREMISE/2bc3ee8d1c83404e8cf62418640004f2/cde3c2537d3ab74ce10000000a174cb4.html (read 5 November 2026)
  6. 6Creation of a Calibration Order, SAP S/4HANA documentation, SAP Help Portal. https://help.sap.com/docs/SAP_S4HANA_ON-PREMISE/efc7922405fd4d56b7571930c5eaa798/efc7b65334e6b54ce10000000a174cb4.html (read 5 November 2026)
  7. 7SAP History: 1972-1980, SAP. https://www.sap.com/about/company/history/1972-1980.html (read 5 November 2026)
  8. 8Test Equipment Management (QM-IT), SAP S/4HANA documentation, SAP Help Portal. https://help.sap.com/docs/SAP_S4HANA_ON-PREMISE/2bc3ee8d1c83404e8cf62418640004f2/7fcfba538c95b54ce10000000a174cb4.html (read 5 November 2026)

AQuestions and answers

Is Seal better than SAP Plant Maintenance?

Yes. SAP Plant Maintenance is good for maintenance inside the ERP. SAP was founded in 1972 to create software that integrates business processes, beginning with financial accounting and inventory, and its maintenance order is the object for entering, assigning and settling costs. Calibration is a special maintenance order spanning two application components, Plant Maintenance and Quality Management, with order types, equipment categories and inspection types set up in SAP Customizing first. Its AI recommends past maintenance orders from history for a planner to copy, and SAP’s wider asset range adds predictive maintenance and an operations assistant. If maintenance is mainly a cost to plan and settle, it can work well. GMP teams need eligibility checked at the moment of use, in the same system as the work. Seal has no fixed model of one kind of work. It is built from primitives: record types, the relationships between them, and the steps and checks that use them, which your own team composes into your process, with Neil able to prepare each change for approval. So one platform runs process development, the laboratory, manufacturing, batch release and the quality system, and each change becomes a new version, released once its selected tests pass, while earlier runs keep theirs. Moving from paper and legacy systems, Paradromics keeps calibration records on one platform and cut operator paperwork by 80%.

Do we have to replace SAP?

No. SAP keeps the costs, purchasing and finance it settles. GMP equipment evidence moves to Seal one equipment family at a time, with order and equipment status read from SAP.

Does Seal have an SAP integration for maintenance?

Seal’s SAP S/4HANA Cloud connection is a library of selected business partners for quality work such as supplier reviews. Maintenance records connect through Seal’s REST API and Scripts against the maintenance APIs your SAP edition exposes, starting with read access.

How does SAP S/4HANA handle calibration?

As a calibration inspection that combines Plant Maintenance and Quality Management. A calibration order creates an inspection lot when released, results are recorded in Quality Management, and the usage decision can set the equipment to “Ready for use” or “Not ready for use”. In Seal, the restriction applies to the intended use and the impact assessment opens with the uses since the last acceptable check.

How does SAP’s AI compare with Neil?

SAP’s maintenance order recommendation suggests past orders that solved similar incidents, for a planner to copy. Neil prepares changes to the process itself, with their tests, for your approval, and each change is released as a new version. Neil is not used in GMP execution.

How long does it take to start with Seal?

Once the scope is agreed and the inputs received, Seal prepares a first working process and its validation pack to evaluate within 48 hours, configured from one of your procedures. Production timing then depends on scope, interfaces, migration and your release requirements.

Start beside SAP Plant Maintenance.

Keep SAP for costs, purchasing and finance. Seal’s REST API and Scripts read order and equipment status, so Neil and your team can work from them while you start one equipment family in Seal, and nothing has to move on day one.

Book a demo