3E content update in SAP Product Compliance: the steps explained

Regulatory requirements change constantly — new classifications, updated dangerous-goods rule sets, additional languages. For your SAP Product Compliance (formerly SAP EH&S) to produce correct safety data sheets, classifications and transport data, the regulatory content has to be updated regularly. 3E (Verisk 3E) delivers this content for SAP EHS — from the property structure through phrases and substance data to classification rules and SDS templates.

A 3E content update is not a single button press, but a sequence of steps that build on one another. This post explains the order — and why it matters.

Why the order matters

The content building blocks build on each other technically: substance data and classification rules use properties and characteristics from the property tree and reference phrases. If a block is loaded in the wrong order — or the latest phrases are not loaded before the data — the result is incomplete or simply incorrect.

Rule of thumb: structure first, then language, then data, then rules, and templates last. Running the latest expert rules on old data risks faulty classifications.

Step 0: Preparation

Before the first transport:

• Read the supplied documentation and the ReadMe of every package.
• Check your EHS/SAP release status and apply the required SAP notes.
• Collect all transports in the delivery and respect the prescribed installation order and prerequisites — older packages must come before newer ones.

One important point: manually changed standard classes, characteristics or value assignment types are overwritten by the transports. Back up such objects beforehand.

Step 1: Property tree

The property tree delivers the classes, characteristics and value assignment types — the property structure everything else builds on:

1. Upload the transport files to the SAP application server (co-files and data files).
2. Import the transport requests — in the prescribed order.
3. On each EHS system, follow up: allocate phrase sets, generate the WWI symbols for the reports, set up table-based value assignments, and check and extend the copy/inheritance templates.

Step 2: Multilingual phrase library

The multilingual phrase library (formerly the CED catalogue) holds more than 16,000 phrases in around 45 languages — the text building blocks of your safety data sheets:

1. Create the passive phrase catalogues.
2. Upload the import files and load them into EHS.
3. Import the phrases, then merge them.
4. Import the phrase set assignments.
5. Handle placeholder phrases and — where needed — add customer-specific phrase groups.

Important: your own graphic allocations (bitmaps) as well as fields such as the phrase code are overwritten by an update. Customer-specific adjustments therefore have to be deliberately re-applied.

Step 3: Substance and reference data (OCC)

Substance and reference data enter the system through the SAP EHS Open Content Connector (OCC) — separately for Product Safety (classification & labelling, occupational exposure limits, global inventories, national regulations) and Dangerous Goods (ADR, RID, IMDG, IATA/ICAO and many more). If you use both, you run the steps for each package separately.

Technical part:

• Install OCC or bring it up to the current level.
• Set up the SAP EHS customizing.
• Import the multilingual phrases — a prerequisite for loading the data correctly.
• Install the substance lists / reference database and the mapping database, and set up the additional tools.

Regulatory part:

• Review the filter settings and use the supplied tools (e.g. analysis and acceptance reports).

Step 4: Expert rules

The expert rules determine secondary data — the actual substance and mixture classification according to the rule sets of different jurisdictions. They run on a separate EHS Expert server:

1. Install EHS Expert on a dedicated server (separate servers for test and production are recommended).
2. Set up and test the RFC connection to the EHS system.
3. Configure EHS Expert.
4. In the SAP EHS customizing, create the objects each rule set needs — such as user exits and data origins, and where required additional value assignment ratings or custom text categories.
5. Deploy the rule sets (compiled rule files and content databases) on the Expert server.

Here too: load the latest phrases and substance data first — otherwise the rules return incorrect results.

Step 5: SDS report templates (WWI)

The final link in the content chain is the report templates for the actual safety data sheet. 3E delivers WWI templates for more than 100 countries, grouped by region or similar legislation (e.g. EU, North America/GHS, APJ, Latin America, CIS). Each main template consists of several sub-templates (“includes”) to keep the size of each individual template small.

Important: these are standard templates. They cover the regulatory framework, but have to be adapted to the customer’s needs — for example the company logo, the company details in section 1 of the safety data sheet, and further customer-specific content and layout requirements.

Prerequisites: additional customizing (identification listings and generation variants), possibly SAP notes — and the required graphics (GHS pictograms, UN dangerous-goods labels) have to be copied into the GRAPHICS folder of all WWI servers and relevant front ends.

The steps:

1. Import the transport requests.
2. Set up the identification listings.
3. Upload the template files.
4. Import the report templates.
5. Create the generation variant.

Because the templates bring together properties, phrases and the calculated classification data, they sit at the end of the chain — only then can a complete safety data sheet be generated.

Step 6: Verify

Finally comes verification against the supplied checklists — per area (property tree, phrase library, substance and reference data, SDS templates) and specifically for Product Safety and Dangerous Goods (for SAP EHS and SAP Transportation Management). Only once these checks pass cleanly is the update released for productive use.

Conclusion

A 3E content update follows a clear logic: structure → language → data → rules → templates → verification. Each step has prerequisites, and the order decides the data quality in your productive system.

These are exactly the updates we support as part of our regulatory content service — from delivery to a live system. If you are planning your next 3E update, or are unsure whether your content is current: get in touch.