SAP GROW Fast in 14 Weeks: How Vialtis Won Its Operational Independence

What Problem Was Vialtis Trying to Solve?

Vialtis needed to separate its technology operations from its former shareholder's infrastructure without interrupting the business. Vialtis operates, manages, and develops road infrastructure in Colombia, with a focus on road safety, mobility management, and regional connectivity. When a company changes ownership, becomes independent, or enters a new growth phase, the ERP that runs finance, procurement, sales, and accounting has to keep working every single day while someone replaces it underneath the business.

That combination, a hard deadline for independence due to a carve-out and zero tolerance for disruption to live concession operations, put the delivery method at the center of the project.

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Standardization Over Customization: The GROW Fast Model

SAP GROW Fast is a recent SAP methodology built to move companies toward standardized processes instead of custom-built ones, the practice that has historically driven up the duration, cost, and risk of ERP projects. GrowFast by Perceptio is the SAP-Qualified Partner-Packaged Solution (QPPS) built on that methodology: SAP S/4HANA Cloud combined with Perceptio's own accelerators and intellectual property, aimed at cutting the time, risk, and complexity of these implementations.

The number that matters is the gap it closes. A carve-out ERP replacement of this kind has traditionally taken several months, often more than a year. Vialtis reached go-live in 14 weeks, and Perceptio reports it as the first completed SAP GROW Fast implementation in the region. Julio Medina, co-founder and CEO of Perceptio, frames the shift plainly: “More than a technological milestone, this case shows that a business transformation that historically took years can now happen in a few months, provided there is the right methodology, a highly specialized team, and a client willing to adopt best practices.”

Implementation done in record time: 14 Weeks until Go-Live

The timeline held because the project reduced the number of decisions built from scratch. Every customization, each exception to the standard process, adds analysis, development, testing, documentation, and ongoing maintenance, and that is where ERP schedules typically slip. GrowFast by Perceptio instead put SAP's pre-configured, best-practice processes at the center of the project, so the work was concentrated on configuring, adopting, and operating a standard rather than negotiating exceptions to it.

Perceptio, UNITED VARS's member for Colombia and Ecuador with close to 26 years of experience guiding companies through SAP transformations, led the implementation. That adoption of standard process over custom rebuild is, according to Medina, usually the harder condition to meet, harder than installing the technology itself. It requires the client's willingness to run the business the standard way rather than reproduce every legacy process inside the new system.

It is also a first for the alliance in this region, not only for Perceptio: A member completing the first SAP GROW Fast implementation in the Americas shows what a hand-picked local market leader inside UNITED VARS can deliver, and it is the kind of proof point the whole alliance can point to when a mid-market prospect anywhere asks what “delivery-first” actually looks like in practice.

What Changed for Vialtis' Finance Team

For Vialtis, operational independence meant keeping the business running while the platform underneath it changed completely. Diego Arroyo Baptiste, CFO of Vialtis, describes the challenge directly: “Our main challenge was achieving operational independence without affecting business continuity. With this implementation, we achieved a secure transition to a modern platform, ready to support the company's future growth.”

Beyond the shorter timeline, Vialtis ended its technology dependence on its former shareholder and moved onto a platform built to add automation, real-time analytics, and artificial intelligence over time. Because finance, procurement, sales, inventory, and administration now sit in one integrated system, information can move between areas that previously ran on separate tools or separate processes.

What Does This Mean for Other Mid-Market Companies Considering an ERP Change?

It means the multi-year ERP project no longer has to be the default. SAP built GROW Fast around a defined scope, approved tools, and standardized templates specifically to reduce the risk and complexity that used to stretch these projects out. As Medina put it, the Vialtis case shows that “the transformation can happen under a more agile and predictable model,” and that mid-market organizations modernizing their operations can now implement an enterprise management system in months, not years, which shortens the return on investment and cuts the risk that comes with a traditional project.

That is also where a mid-market company's choice of implementation partner starts to matter more than its choice of software, since every SAP customer has access to the same GROW Fast methodology. UNITED VARS brings together 70 hand-picked local market leaders, real people on the ground in 100+ countries, so a mid-market company anywhere can reach the same standardized, delivery-first approach that took Vialtis live in 14 weeks, through a member that knows its local market and regulatory context, backed by an alliance built for end-to-end SAP delivery.

Mid-sized companies should go global without losing speed or local identity. UNITED VARS brings together hand-picked local market leaders with real people on the ground in 100+ countries to remove legal, cultural, and language barriers. As a strategic alliance, UNITED VARS provides clear accountability from start to finish. UNITED VARS is the world's only SAP Platinum Partner alliance, delivering end-to-end SAP services for the mid-market.

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FAQ

What is SAP GROW Fast?

 SAP GROW Fast is an SAP methodology that moves companies toward standardized, pre-configured SAP S/4HANA Cloud processes instead of custom-built ones, with the goal of shortening implementation timelines and reducing project risk.

How long does a SAP S/4HANA Cloud implementation normally take?

Without a packaged, standardized approach, ERP replacements tied to an ownership change or carve-out have traditionally taken several months, often more than a year. Vialtis, using GrowFast by Perceptio, went live in 14 weeks.

Is GrowFast by Perceptio the same thing as SAP GROW Fast?

GrowFast by Perceptio is an SAP-Qualified Partner-Packaged Solution (QPPS): SAP's GROW Fast methodology and SAP S/4HANA Cloud combined with Perceptio's own accelerators and intellectual property to speed up delivery further.

Can a mid-market company outside Colombia follow the same approach ?

Yes. The methodology itself is not market-specific. What changes by market is the local delivery team, regulatory context, and change-management approach, which is why working with a hand-picked local market leader inside a strategic alliance like UNITED VARS matters as much as the SAP technology itself.