Expert Blog - Hybris vs. SAP’s Web-ChannelPosted by Andreas Halbig in SAP CRM: Web Channel on Jul 9, 2013 11:55:23 PMinShare19

 

Like the fall of the Berlin wall, the assassination of John Lennon or the day Neil Armstrong took his giant leap for mankind, Wednesday 5th June 2013 will enter the annuls of history as SAP’s where were you when moment… Ok, maybe a little melodramatic, one might even say a poor attempt at some tabloid style headline rhetoric, but whatever you feel about the first few lines of this blog, if, like us, you’ve been investing heavily in SAP’s flag ship Web Channel Experience Management (WCEM) juggernaut, the announcement probably left you wondering if all the wheels hadn’t just fallen off your multi-channel car. To say this announcement came as a shock, would be to underestimate the furore that it has generated, both in the community groups and the internet at large.  The weeks since have been awash with near endless speculation and rumour as to the merits and motivation for this acquisition, with opinion ranging from excited anticipation to frustrated consternation, and generous helpings of plain old dazed and bemused in between. However, regardless to which camp you have currently hitched your wagon, the same burning question still exists… to which basket should I currently be stashing my proverbial e-commerce eggs? Before we get going on the meat and potatoes of this blog, I think now would be a good time to reflect on the history of SAP’s e-Commerce solutions and consider how this has motivated the recent announcements.  Whilst the thrust of this article is not a SAP E-Commerce history lesson (Ingo Woesner has already done a great blog on the Evolution of SAP's E-Commerce solutions), we believe that this does provide some interesting information for framing the story so far. 

- The History - The evolution of SAP’s e-Commerce platform has been a long and sometimes frustrating journey. From those tentative first steps with the ITS, to the launch of their much loved, but often maligned ISA solution, right through to today’s state of the art WCEM platform (and recently announced Hybris acquisition) there has often been much to debate. For us, ISA was their first serious move into the e-Commerce market, it’s obvious advantages of tight integration and generally competitive functionality offered a compelling argument for many customers (large and small) who saw adopting this platform as a coherent and complementary strategy for their e-Commerce aspirations.  With some attention to detail, a reasonable budget and a little time and effort, ISA could be fashioned into a product that provided a pretty good customer experience, yet allowed the IT department to leverage their core investment in SAP skills to support. 

However, this was the era of the internet bubble, before long SAP faced some stiff competition in the market place, as the pace of development picked up, their resolve seemed to falter and they took their foot of the gas.  Their original promise of tight integration (particularly for SAP CRM customers) still rang true, but could no longer be counted as the compelling argument it once was, other vendors stole a march. To think that SAP made no notable extension to ISA would be inaccurate; CRM 4.0 saw the completion of “e” commerce holy trinity - sales, service and marketing.  CRM 5.0 brought us further enhancements to e-Service with complaints and spare parts, with e-Commerce gaining campaign integration and newsletter subscription.  However, by this time SAP was under increasing pressure, their slow pace of development, coupled with a seemingly lack lustre program of product investment, vision and strategy saw them lose significant market share to their competitors. Despite further changes in CRM 6.0 and 7.0, with the notable inclusion of loyalty management, the image conscious B2C crowd was already moving to pastures greener.  SAP’s competitors could claim to have all this, and more, packaged in an environment which was more appealing to the marketing and sales departments of any business. Whilst selling the tightly coupled integration benefits of the SAP solution were easy for SAP IT departments, the end user and key influencers could not readily buy into this. To them the other products out there looked better, claimed to cover the full feature list and all had stories to support their SAP integration claims via various tools. It was only until the implementation that the true complexities enabling scenarios such as product configuration or true closed loop marketing across the channels became clear. By this time the investments were made and compromises taken to implement the chosen solution. The last remaining bastion of SAP’s ISA product then became the B2B space, here, the lower focus on image, the greater propensity for tight back office integration, and the use of the SAP Enterprise Portal to deliver additional content seemed to balance the equation in favour of ISA.  Without notable exception, the vast majority of the higher release implementations we worked on over the next few years were overwhelmingly focused in this direction.  Then, in 2011, along came the new WCEM upstart from SAP, a new contender to the e-Commerce throne. Although, this was a product that had been completely re-designed from the ground up, it somehow felt familiar, for many, and certainly for us, it looked like we had finally turned a corner and emerged with a solution that addressed prior ISA acceptance issues, this was surely a turning point in the fortunes of SAP’s e-Commerce offering! Although WCEM 1.0, being a brand new product, had some limitations and was focusing on B2C functionality, it did not feel hastily put together, in fact, when you looked under the hood, the architecture felt like a master stroke of design, a real thoroughbred in the SAP stable. As systems integrators and web channel consultants, we were enthused and genuinely excited by the prospects for this new product. From our perspective, WCEM had all the bells and whistles (JSF, CMS etc…); those key features that could really make the difference in a sale to a customer, not only that, for once it really looked pretty good out of the box! Furthermore, SAP had made commitments to a real development roadmap and strategy for this product; we were going to see continued and sustained investment in new features and its initial B2C focus was soon to be complemented by additional B2B functionality leveraging the renowned and robust back office processes available in the SAP CRM and ECC offering. Tight integration, state of the art functionality, usability and look and feel, were now words that could finally be in the same sentence.  Customers were going to be able to leverage real and tangible benefits from implementing their B2B and B2C processes across a single, tightly integrated SAP platform, the world looked like a better place. However, the story told by the market did not seem to match our expectations, there was talk of the cloud and the lack of functionality provided for the dominant B2C retail space; were we wrong, was it really that far behind its competitors? We did some research to understand where exactly this impression was coming from and how WCEM was being perceived by the SAP customer base and a few themes began to emerge: 

1. The years of missed opportunities and believed lack of investment with ISA were starting to take their toll; WCEM had inherited an image problem plain and simple. Many customers were unconvinced that the leopard could change its spots, and questioned the rational of backing the WCEM horse over a more established non-SAP solution, despite the obvious integration investments required.

2. The buzz in the market was now all about the Cloud, SaaS and all that comes with it, particularly within the SMB space. Here, in unfamiliar territory for SAP, they were finding it increasingly difficult to compete with the likes of SalesForce.com.

3. Although WCEM has the capability to work with alternate backend environments other than SAP ECC or CRM it is seen as exclusive to these systems. This places some limits on its reach into other customer groups where this is not always desirable, such as the retail channel and especially for emerging start-up companies. Then came WCEM 2.0, where among other things, many in-store processes were introduced. SAP’s retail market expectations were high, but the general acceptance by their retail installed was modest, few made the jump to WCEM even with the promise of support for retail specific article types.  The main reasons for the hesitation were: 

1. SAP’s failure to engage with the Marketing departments effectively, they continued to be seen as a technology provider, hence too focused on talking to IT.

2. The tightly integrated processes connecting the Web Shop with the physical store (introduced in WCEM 2.0), required the implementation of SAP CRM and MDM, but the adoption of these solutions remained limited within the SAP retail customer base. As a consequence, despite the comprehensive retail store functionality and obvious integration benefits, only a few retailers signed up for WCEM.    More recently, with the introduction of WCEM 3.0, things were really starting to come together. The proposition started to become easier to sell, and all the initial promise of ISA was becoming a reality, customers were starting to believe in the product, it looked like we were destined for success. 

- The Acquisition - 

Whaam! (as goes the famous painting of Roy Lichtenstein by the same name) along came SAP’s announcement, it was to purchase Hybris. The bottom literally fell out of our WCEM world overnight.  After the shaky start, all that subsequent effort, and just when we were all starting to make headway, had SAP just managed to kill WCEM!?! 

Well, the good news is we don’t think so! During the rest of this blog, we hope to show you just why WCEM is here to stay, and how bright this future will be.  But first, let us spend just a little time considering the motives for this acquisition.  As we have alluded to before, SAP has really faced some stiff competition in the Cloud computing market and received criticism for their product portfolio and strategy. This is of particular relevance when you consider the context of this acquisition, SAP’s major focus in recent times (aside for HANA) has been the SME, their Business ByDesign software solution has been specifically developed to target this market, but in recent times, it would seem that they have struggled to get much traction when going head-to-head with the likes of SalesForce.com. There is however, no doubt that SAP has committed heavily to continue its e-business strategy even more so that it did in the past and truly has potential to dominate this space. The potential for SAP lies in its ability to bring to bear the fully integrated components of a business application suite to meet the demands of a multitude of business scenarios for small, mid and large scale enterprises. To our knowledge, no other product has the breadth and depth of integration provided by SAP, yet they still lack credibility to be able to go the final few yards. Enter Hybris, with this product, SAP has found the missing ingredient, they now have all the tools necessary to complete their Cloud offering, and has gained instant industry credibility to boot. In our humble opinion, it is now not a matter of if, but when, SAP will make their mark in this space. So what, I hear you say, I thought this was a blog about WCEM?  Well, hang on, there is method in our madness.   At present, the only clear message to come from the annals of SAP HQ in Walldorf has been the Cloud computing mantra, but is this really surprising if you stop to think about it for a while. The process of legal and regulatory approval takes time; it’s feasible that this deal my still fall through and if we recall for a minute SAP’s targeted acquisition of Retek in 2005 (Forbes, 2005; CNET News, 2005; CNET News, 2005) the parallels are obvious.  On this occasion, SAP once again  wished to assume a

dominate presence in the retail sector, they made commitments and investments to the market, only to have the rug pulled out from under them by Oracle.  Like the child touching the hot stove, you learn from your mistakes.  As is normal in these situations, SAP will likely have instructed its staff to keep Hybris at arm’s length and refrain from speculation, therefore, pushing SAP for more details is unlikely to bear fruit and we must wait to see how this unfolds once the ink is dry. Thus, it is left to the likes of us, having lived and breathed SAP for decades to attempt to illuminate the paths SAP will likely tread. So, are we any further forward with our tale, well yes and no is the answer to that! For now, I think we have established some of the ground work, now we need to think a little harder as to how this might all fit into our bigger picture.  Let’s take some time to explore the respective strengths, weaknesses and features of both products so that we might make some informed speculation on how things might shake out in the future. 

- The Clients - Drawing on our previous comments, it’s interesting to compare how the respective client portfolios stack up, and how this may affect and influence the future direction of both solutions.  SAP has already clearly articulated that Hybris will continue to be run as a separate company under the control and direction of its current management.  One can obviously debate at length the strategic and long term viability of this statement, and if SAP acquisition history really points in this direction. One thing is clear. Hybris does have an existing installed base (especially non-SAP clients), which SAP will be keen to retain, grow, and potentially convert to their Cloud based service offering as well as a Web Channel solution. 

Figure 1 Customer Groups Of the estimated 500 worldwide Hybris implementations, roughly 20% are current SAP suite users (Patrick Finn VP of Channels, Hybris US, Vantageb2b, 2013).  We also know that 50 to 60% of the Hybris customers fall into the retail sector from which approximately less than 60 would be SAP suite users – we know retail to be a target growth area for SAP. The question is why these customers would have chosen Hybris over a more tightly integrated scenario with WCEM. Maybe some of the reasoning behind their decision has been highlighted earlier in this blog. Certainly for these customers the prospect of a tighter SAP supported integration between their customer experience platform and SAP

suite must be a very welcome prospect. Whilst for SAP having the immediate opportunity to penetrate further into the retail sector gives them a boost to execute on this.So, what about all those SAP Web Channel implementations I here you say?  Well, again, here we find ourselves asking another interesting question.  Given this customer base, why would SAP choose to consciously make a move that would damage this revenue stream?  Comparing the SAP WCEM and Hybris customer bases does not appear to show any major conflict between these two groups. For sure SAP has a strong interest to penetrate further into B2C retail, yet this does not justify the initial public assumptions that this deal will result in Hybris replacing SAP WCEM. From all of our investigation and analysis it is firmly our opinion that: 

Hybris does not compete; it completes SAP’s solution. We believe this statement to be true, both in terms of functionality and customer base. Whilst there is no denying that Hybris has an established foothold in the retail space, including customers utilising the SAP suite, the past few months have seen positive growth for WCEM sales which now exceeded those in the Hybris/SAP context.  With over 700 SAP Web Channel implementations (compared with 500 existing Hybris installations), the conclusion must therefore be, SAP’s e-Business investment will continue to grow, albeit, now positively influenced by intellectual property and capabilities of Hybris. Quite obviously, many of these customers have selected WCEM based on the functionality offered, the tight integration provided and the published roadmap of development. Furthermore, while Hybris capabilities for the B2C scenario benefits from the more centralized / product driven maintenance functionalities with a Product Catalogue Management (PCM) which leads to the better back-office user-experience (e.g. for Marketing managers), the integration with additional components such as contracts, dynamic pricing, complaints and services makes staying with the WCEM solution a compelling proposition. In short, to force either set of customers to migrate their implementations to a new platform that may not provide all the functionality of the one they are currently utilising does not seem to make much sense. This would also be a dangerous strategy providing these customers cause to look outside of the SAP product family. The much more likely and beneficial solution would be to incorporate the best parts of each solution into future software releases, providing a clear and concise upgrade path to new features and functionality. 

- The Features -

Much has been made in the press of the features available within the Hybris solution, particularly those in relation to product catalogue management and end user experience, especially from a retail perspective. But do these features really represent compelling reasons for abandoning the WCEM product? Product catalogue management forms the cornerstone of each product, and in WCEM, is provided by leveraging the SAP Master Data Maintenance (MDM) solution (certain scenarios provide support for the legacy TREX solution). Hybris on the other hand, has its own purpose built Product Content Management (PCM) solution, which was designed exclusively for this purpose. In this area, we would conclude that Hybris PCM, based on the evidence is ahead. Criticisms from some quarters surrounding ulterior motives for MDM adoption do seem to have some merit, but equally such a technology would have been hard to discount given the initial requirements of WCEM solution. However, whatever your view, both solutions form stable and robust components of their respective architectures. If we look to the future, we feel that PCM probably has the edge; and a future integration scenario for WCEM does not seem beyond the realms of possibility. Obviously one can point to the incredibly tight integration between the SAP CRM and ECC systems as one of the huge benefits that it brings to the table. Clearly this is an area where Hybris comes up short, with SAP integration provided only through 3rd party integration technologies.  There is no doubt that SAP will not leave this unaddressed, but the question remains how they will tackle it. Perhaps their move into upcoming ODATA services is highlighting the way. Features strong on the WCEM side can typically be seen where this tight integration serves to benefit. Product configuration is a very good example of this. Hybris like most other multichannel products struggles when providing a product configuration function to its SAP backend customers. Although

there are some partner products that aim to address this gap none can provide the seamless integration of the WCEM environment. Similarly e-Marketing also benefits in this regard with integrated closed loop scenarios between the CRM marketing platform, the customer experience channel and the analytical components. Sure with a tool such as Hybris all of this is achievable to some degree with developments, partners and partner products. However, today the expectation is shifting to a more plug-and-play model. People are undertaking this effort to get products working together but it for sure is not what they want to be focusing on nor bearing the costs of. For sure, there is a significant feature overlap between Hybris and WCEM, how SAP addresses this in the future will be interesting to observe, but in our opinion, as they stand today, neither is a clear leader as a candidate to replace the other. Instead, we prefer to look at the underlying technology as a basis for which product provides the most benefit to the on-going development of the products. Then we see a bolstering up of that environment into a new evolution of both WCEM and Hybris. Will there be a migration strategy for both? At this point in time maybe even SAP cannot answer that question. But it would be a risky strategy for SAP to face existing WCEM customers with the choice of a new implementation of SAP products thus opening the door to reviewing alternate products and an ensuing potential loss of customers. So in the short term we believe SAP will include Hybris into the product line up in the areas it fits well today and where SAP needs to penetrate further such as the retail sector and cloud based solutions. No doubt they will continue to evolve Hybris in these areas but they can also not leave WCEM alone and will execute on the existing pipeline of product evolution already planned in that area. Of course they will have their eyes firmly on an end state of a complete feature suite with tight integration built on technology platform providing their customer with the basis to take advantage of the technology enablement functions anticipated from things such as HTML5. 

- The Technology - One aspect of the technology that is quite interesting are the opportunities presented with the Hybris PCM. Building upon our brief feature comparison, PCM, in our opinion represents a good candidate for HANA integration, and this may also be seen as a key driver for the future direction of the product catalog management in both solutions. Other considerations must also be given to the general frontend architecture. Here, in our opinion, WCEM is the clear leader, Hybris, being the elder statesman of the two products is based upon the aging spring framework. By comparison, WCEM, the relative newcomer to the party, has been grounded in the latest technologies Again, many comparisons can be drawn between the two products and this is really beyond the scope of this blog, but for those of you who are eager to hear more, an in-depth comparison will definitely be the bases of a later blog in this series. 

- Conclusion - In our opinion, SAP acquisition of Hybris can be seen as a strong market play, allowing it to make significant leaps forward in some sectors. They are also clearly well positioned in the all-important analyst competitive profiling, but if you are a WCEM customer this is not the only game in town. What information SAP is happy to disclose regarding the Hybris play clearly indicates that this will be their go to market approach for the customer experience enablement in the Business ByDesign suite. Without doubt they will be working to underpin this with HANA and completing the triumvirate with the Hybris mobile capability they deliver on their theme; in the cloud, in memory and mobile. When you look at it like this you can hardly fail to recognise the power play that SAP is making in the cloud CRM / customer experience world of business applications. Like other successful cloud solutions, we all knew that SAP would be the ones to lead us into the same paradigm shift for business suite applications. To be sure they are pulling no punches here, and we could well be seeing the beginning of the blow that finally sends the likes of SalesForce.com to the canvas. 

So is that it? You want cloud you’ll be Hybris, you want on premise its WCEM? Well maybe this is how it will shake out, or so it would seem in the next few years. This however, is not the SAP we know, where constant innovation and striving for product excellence are touchstones. As we have tried to point out through this blog, in no way should WCEM be considered the less attractive cousin of SAP Customer Relationship Management, in fact the opposite is true. In WCEM, SAP has truly a next generation multi-channel platform, well architected, feature rich and ready to deliver on the hopes we all had of ISA many moons ago. Whilst the jury may still be out on the Hybris acquisition, we firmly believe that this can only represent good news for WCEM; the lift in profile that we can expect will only serve to help WCEM break-free the residual stigma of ISA and allow it to be viewed as a complimentary part of a winning customer experience platform. As for the future beyond, well this is hardly a winner–takes-all strategy, leaving those who backed the looser high and dry. In true SAP fashion, we expect to see a genetic engineering evolution of both platforms bringing together the best of both. So should anyone invest in WCEM right now? Well, unless you’re an SMB looking for the ultimate cloud based business suite experience; all other on-premise SAP customers ought to be looking seriously hard at WCEM right now. Forget all that you have previously thought, WCEM’s reality is very much what you may immediately be lead to believe. Is there really anyone left that still believes they don’t need to refresh their customer experience on a 2/3 year cycle? Thinking in these terms, and facing an upgrade from WCEM to the next evolution as it merges with Hybris, or being on any other vendor’s platform trying to make the jump back, we think it is clear which path is going to get your future customer experience ambitions to market quicker. In a shameless plug for our work, this blog represents the first in a series of posts that we will be writing over the coming weeks and months, if you enjoyed reading this, please stay tuned to this channel for more in-depth comparison and editorial opinion on the WCEM and Hybris solutions. Authors

Jason JonesSAP CRM Multi-Channel Architect & Managing Director of ecomize Graham HopkinsSAP CRM / ERP Solution Architect Andreas HalbigSAP Web-Channel Solution Architect About usEcomize are an CRM E-business specialist consultancy focused on delivering market leading Customer Experience solutions based on the SAP Web-Channel  products. Our team, with an average of 10 years hands-on industry experience, is implementing innovative business solutions based on the SAP Web-Channel and Multi-Channel product portfolio to clients throughout Europe and the Americas. BibliographyByrne, T. (2013 йил 3-6). Real Story Group.From http://www.realstorygroup.com/Blog/2563-The-Case-Against-Adobe-CQ-WEM CNET News. (2005 йил 22-3). Oracle outbids SAP for Retek.From http://news.cnet.com/Oracle-outbids-SAP-for-Retek/2100-1014_3-5629280.html Forbes. (2005 йил 18-3). Why Are Oracle And SAP Fighting Over Retek?From http://www.forbes.com/2005/03/18/cx_ld_0318retek.html Real Story Group. (2013). Web Content & Experience Management.Retrieved from http://www.realstorygroup.com/Research/CMS 

Vantageb2b. (2013 йил 16-05).From http://www.vantageb2b.com/blog/sap-users-can-integrate-their-hybris-ecommerce-platform-with-their-erp-solution#.UdE-h-uuzYS8693 Views Tags: sap, cloud, wec, wcem, salesforce, multi-channel, businessbydesign, hybris, wce, retekAverage User Rating(12 ratings)

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27 Comments

Stefan Kliment Jul 10, 2013 7:37 AMHi Andreas, I still think there remain a lot of issues that have to be addressed by SAP once this acquisition goes through. But great in-depth article nevertheless! The font was really hard to read, had to

copy/paste it into another document so it would go easier on my eyes.  Regards,StefanLike (2)

oAndreas Halbig Jul 10, 2013 11:28 AM (in response to Stefan Kliment)Hi Stefan, thank you, we just scratched the surface and haven't gone into the details so much. The original blog was far deeper in detail, but we wanted to avoid to get too technical especailly as the blog was anyway far too long already.  There is indeed a lots of issues, which SAP has to address as soon as the deal is finalized, but these are topics we have to discuss in detail end of the year. Btw. the font did look perfect on Mac's, but obviously the copy & paste out of the word document was doing not good. I removed the "hardcoded" styles and hope it is now easier to read on Internet Explorers as well. Thank you for making me aware about that.Like (2)

Sathia Gamesh Aug 16, 2013 10:42 AM (in response to Andreas Halbig)Hi Andreas, With the recent acquisition of HYBRIS, it seems that SAP may not invest in WCEM and obviously on one particular day, might be in the near future,  SAP may scrap down WCEM . What would be your advice/suggestion for all those who spent day in and out working/learning WCEM all through these days. Regards,SathiaLike (0)

balaji bodagala Jul 11, 2013 6:04 AMHi Andreas, Nice blog,Thanks for sharing your thoughts,i like WECM framework the way it was built. Regards,BalajiLike (2)

Ashwaray Chaba Jul 13, 2013 3:12 PMHey Andreas, As always a very good blog,can you please also explain a little technical architecture of Hybris.I am a SAP WebChannel and WCEM consultant,so will WebChannel Consultants be proffered for a Hybris implementation ?also what kind of upgrade technically do SAP WebChannel Consultants have to undergo in future for Hybris implementations.Has SAP currently has any plans for upgrading WebChannel consultants knowledge for Hybris as well by providing required trainings. Regards,AshwarayLike (0)

Sam Bayer Aug 1, 2013 7:49 PM"it’s feasible that this deal may still fall through" Not really. http://bit.ly/12J1F1i SamLike (1)

Sam Bayer Aug 4, 2013 3:07 PMIn addition, according to Forrester: "Hybris becomes the only commerce offering from SAP. With today's closure of the deal, SAP will cease further investment in their WCEM (Web  Channel Experience Management) solution. This should come as no  surprise given that the weakness of this solution in the market was the  impetus for the acquisition in the first place. Going forward, all  commerce related opportunities at SAP will be strategically directed to  Hybris. Existing WCEM customers can expect SAP to continue to support  them on the product, but over time will be encouraged to make a  transition to Hybris." I can see registration in hybris training courses going through the roof in the coming days. Sam

Like (1)

oDaniel Ruiz Aug 4, 2013 10:17 PM (in response to Sam Bayer)it was rather the obvious outcome.. not sure about 'hybris training', there is nothing there other than Java and well known frameworks - what I'm sure it will happen is that their Partner Program will sky rocket as developers need access to documentation (and I think we won't be able to access thru SAP).Like (0)

oStefan Kliment Aug 7, 2013 7:54 AM (in response to Sam Bayer)Hi, you might want to check out yesterday's live webcast:http://sapve.sap.com.edgesuite.net/public/?1386 The relevant question can be found in the Q&A section at around 1h32m. The answer pretty much says it all. Regards, StefanLike (0)

Stefan Kliment Aug 20, 2013 7:45 AM (in response to Stefan Kliment)Unfortunately the video is no longer available. If anyone knows where to find a recording, I'd appreciate it if you let me know. Cheers, StefanLike (0)

oTarun Bakshi Aug 9, 2013 5:08 PM (in response to Sam Bayer)Hi Andreas, Any comments now as SAP has declared that investments on WCEM will be stopped by SAP and Hybris will be the flagship eCommerce product? Do you have any clarity on what it means for customers waiting for WCEM 4.0 or 3.X? Is it good or bad for WCEM consultants who have spent significant time in adapting to WCEM and now sudden change puts them in dilemma of what to suggest to clients. I know you have been very positive about this acquisition but how do you see it now and any positivity that you can share with us? Thanks,-TarunLike (0)

Andreas Halbig Aug 16, 2013 3:45 PM (in response to Tarun Bakshi)Dear all, our blog was focusing on the technical aspects and the needs of the existing SAP customers, who decided to use SAP by purpose as it did fit their needs perfectly. Those clients had choosen WCEM before Hybris, because it was simply for them the better choice and it is still the case for today's situation! The last word has not been spoken, but we are nevertheless surprised by the straightforward answer to SAP's current Web-Channel products in the Webcast, whose web link Stefan Kliment kindly shared with us - the answer +/- was "hybris will become SAP's only commerce solution". For me a bit too much the kamikazee approach. Few month ago, the initial news was from our side seen as not well considered in the interest of any sales activities and we think, the most recent answer was not better; too many open questions left, far too many, if you think beyond the obvious. The problem is, that so far we see only managers speaking. Those people just see numbers and have issues to see the essential difference between applications; the difference, which is is making it easy for us to "quickly" go live or is forcing us to go for far more custom code. Some people here will disagree to our opinition and say, well, it was to be expected. I personally think, it does implicate a confirmation for their argumentation. Over the past decade, i experienced many situation, where the complexity of E-Business solutions are completely unterestimated - sometimes i had the feeling, people expect it is just a quick thing you simply enable within a few hours; install it, press few config switches and here we go. Experts specialized on backend / back-office solutions, do think a customer facing solution is not so much different as a solution like the CRM Web-Ui - well, you do this mistake only once (hopefully) .. Front-end solutions have to be extremly agile and flexible, but you need know-how to keep this consquential freedom manageable or you end up in a neverending drama and high maintenance cost. As junior (ages ago) i blamed myself SAP daily and I was probably seen by my former Swiss colleague as the strange german guy, who was crying out of pain every few minutes - well, now I think i was the one (at those times) who simply closed the eyes and pointed with the fingers to others. Fortunately, everything has changed til today, we became experts, the solution developed further and  it became a pleasure working with it, but the basic initial story line is still in place - it's unterestimated, complex and for entrants overwhelming (like any other solution including Hybris). Actually a big issue for the product manufacturer, because this is the reason why projects very likely fail. Would you assume, that you can  drive  & compete a formular 1 car, just because you can drive a car? It's like working together with a special expertise partner, compared to a regular partner. This is the same story with SAP as it is with Hybris. Also Hybris does have seen such issue, but i very much like, that they force their partners to go through an comprehensive training programm including certification process, before they actually  are allowed to serve Hybris customers - "LIKE"! 

 You want from me a answer of how it will continue? Well, the name Hybris will be obviously now promoted to the maximum and it will become the main product for SAP's  Web-Channel. I personally do not care, if Hybris becomes part of WCEM or parts of WCEM will become Hybris - one way is easier as the other, but both are doable. There will be now a  phase for all of us (including SAP & Hybris), where we have to find a orientation. Hybris is compared to WCEM / ISA simply too different in the way of the integration and also the  processes - it's not denyable, that this will have a massive impact. Putting out the one and only right statement for all clients is not possible, but we invite clients to sit together with us as Solution Advisor to review their situation to find their individual best strategy. So far I can say, Hybris is a fantastic opportunity for all of us. It brings a lots of additional capabilities on the table. It was not optimized for SAP usage so far, but the attention of the SAP Web-Channel Community (=us) is now in place and our unique know-ledge will secure, that Hybris will let grow the SAP Web-Channel beyond our imagination. Working within the Web-Channel area will become temporary more challanging, but it will stay exciting! Regards- AndreasLike (3)

Ingo Woesner Aug 20, 2013 2:56 PM (in response to Andreas Halbig)Hi Andreas, I couldn't agree more to what you are saying. for sharing your thoughts and visions with great expertise on all levels. Thank you very much for your strong engagement in the SCN Web Channel Commmunity. You are without doubt a driving factor when it comes to (any) SAP E-Commerce/Multi Channel/Omni Channel business strategy.  In a time dominated by change and (hence) uncertainty you are looking beyond the Ice Age and carve out the benefits of the new solution. Great to have you with us! All the best,Ingo 

Dr. Ingo Woesner Product Management - Retail and Multi Channel

Application Innovation

SAP AG

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Rajeev Bhardwaj Feb 7, 2014 3:17 PMHi Andreas, Is there any compatibility between Hybris and SAP MDM? Any package solution provided by SAP for this integration? Regards,RajeevLike (0)

oIngo Woesner Feb 24, 2014 12:31 PM (in response to Rajeev Bhardwaj)

Hi Rajeev, No, there is no package solution or any integration content whatsoever available orplanned to connect MDM with any hybris module. MDM was used with WCEM, hybris Product Content Management is used along with a hybris based web shop. hybris is very open and flexible to attach 3rd party tools to the hybris commerce suite, so technically it is probably possible, but still, no standard integration content or migration is offered. Best regards,IngoLike (1)

Deep Maheshwari Mar 31, 2014 7:56 PMWe are in the process of integration b/w ECC 6 and Hybris ,so wanted to know the middle ware options available and which one is better . 1  SAP PI ( REST or SOAP ) ?2  webMethod ?3  B2B accelarator ?4  SAP BODS /EIS5  No middleware required ?? Is Hybris compatible of providing or consuming WSDL     ( ECC6  web service) Thanks in advanceDeepLike (0)

oDaniel Ruiz Apr 10, 2014 3:24 AM (in response to Deep Maheshwari)Hi, 

I reckon a good alternative would be using Spring RestTemplate in addition to a customized REST Application in ECC. Case you don't have the 'srest package' (it's a very rudimentary approach to jsr-311 in abap), just download a newer abap version (trial version) and extract the classes using something like saplink and you will be able to create RESTful services in your ECC system. After that, it's rather straight forward.. you just hand-code everything you need that abap can provide, and whenever abap slows down (or does not have power to output quick enough to Hybris) you should consider 'not doing live', but rather code some sort of synchronization service and keep all the data in the j2ee stack in solr for instance. Another alternative case you are running Hybris on a netweaver instance, would be the ability to setup a JRA Factory, and you can use the EE spec (jsr 322) directly (...well, it will still use the problematic jco underneath, but its either that or icf which is also not super great, and it's SAP and everybody should know the caveats of such) - you would end up consuming 'function modules' pretty much like other Applications do, which is sort of primitive (procedural) but still reasonably accepted in 'abap world'.  Last but not least, I'd strongly recommend you avoid 'hitting abap' at all costs since abap does not have a reliable speed for 'consumer grade' stuff... this is my personal take of course, and whenever in future I see myself on the same boat as you are (deciding what to do), the answer is rather simple: sync service all over, having Hybris 'disconnected' from abap 100% - never, absolutely NEVER hit abap in any sort of online scenario.   Cheers,D.Like (0)

Sam Bayer Apr 15, 2014 4:37 PM (in response to Daniel Ruiz)Hi Daniel, While I appreciate your perspective on "never, absolutely NEVER hit abap in any sort of online scenario" I do think that it's NEVER quite that simple is it? In the B2B scenario, where synchronization of data and rules between SAP and any other platform...like hybris...can become quite complex (think pricing rules, inventory and available to promise, credit limits and checks etc.) I believe one becomes a bit more tolerant to the performance constraints (such as they are) of accessing SAP directly. We process millions of real time SAP transactions per year and the vast majority of them return quite acceptable response times (<0.5 sec per line item).  To be sure there are the outliers, but users have come to calibrate the longer response times of the larger shopping carts (think hundreds of line items) against the even longer manual processing times of yesterday. 

There is nothing inherently bad about abap.  Like anything else though, it can be misappropriated. In the end, we much prefer the architectural simplicity of letting SAP run the business and providing a browser based window into its workings than recreating (and maintaining) all of that logic and data in two places.  I believe users would much prefer to wait a bit longer to get accurate data than to get bad data quickly.  At least I know this to be 100% true in the more complicated B2B world.  In the B2C world where pricing, shipping and payments are much simpler, I can easily agree with you about the role that SAP should play in the user experience. SamLike (0)

Daniel Ruiz Apr 15, 2014 10:52 PM (in response to Sam Bayer)Hi Sam, As far I can see, other lines of business like Amazon for instance can easily return a lot more than 200 items in less than 0.5 "in total" - business like Google can also return data very quickly, and that's the sort of scenario most people expects online. While you think 'SAP does a lot' - I think SAP doesn't do much at all and what it does it's usually slow due poor code in its guts - so not sure what's too bad of re-writing such in J2EE for instance to actually squeeze performance -- but I do understand the process is costly, not because 'a business needs to rewrite whole ecc or whole crm' but rather because there is no real separation or layers or responsibilities in SAP core design, so the small parts one would need to re-write are directly coupled with parts one wouldn't need.. so yeah, pretty hard.  And the whole thing is: you sit down with your functional and technical team, look into a use case (Product Pricing) and ask them - ' I want to know all steps SAP does in this use case. " - they should be able to point to you each step and every single bit that the software (SAP) does, and if they cant.. well, you have a much bigger problem as you run a software people just don't fully understand, and in my perspective this is not a wise move.  After some analysis, you will end up with a number of use cases you need coverage for a B2B to run, and even with Hybris not all customer will use 100% of it's functionality -- you only do what you must do, not more not less. ... and I understand your perspective, the question asked in the first place was "options available and which one is better" -- the word better is very subjective, and cost wise I agree, re-write for performance improvement is not the right move.  

Cheers,D.Like (0)

Andreas Halbig Apr 21, 2014 5:16 PM (in response to Daniel Ruiz)

Daniel Ruiz wrote: As far I can see, other lines of business like Amazon for instance can easily return a lot more than 200 items in less than 0.5 "in total"

 Good point. The question is what Amazon is done to get those quick response times especially if we consider the millions of articles they sell their . They have a huge landscape behind their web-shop, that makes this possible and this is a completely custom developed solution as well. Those response times you will also get with SAP or Hybris for sure, but you have to make the right decisions. Starts from how to maintain your catalogue structure, business processes , choice of the right hardware, sizing, using HANA or another Database and in the end the question, when and where to perform the time-consuming business processes you will face e.g. when processing the actual order in the back-end. 

Daniel Ruiz wrote: not because 'a business needs to rewrite whole ecc or whole crm' but rather because there is no real separation or layers or responsibilities in SAP core design

 Almost everything in SAP is separated and there are endless layers, there is no need to rewrite it! There are endless possibilities of combining scenarios, but you have to make the right decisions. If you come in with the expectation, that a company which hasn´t done yet e-commerce / e-business can simply start with e-commerce, then you will run into issues with any ECC solution sooner or later. The problem is more likely, that existing business processes are not ready for a e-Business scenario and many companies struggle to change those - they all try to squeeze everything and are wondering thereafter, which e.g. pricing is running so slow. Not because the pricing engine could not handle it theoretically, it´s more because at previous days there was no need to work out a pricing scheme, that supports a foundation to handle 10.000 times more request today as required once before .Like (0)

Andreas Halbig Apr 21, 2014 4:52 PM (in response to Sam Bayer)

Sam Bayer wrote: I believe users would much prefer to wait a bit longer to get accurate data than to get bad data quickly

 That´s a to simplified statement. If I am sitting in a call-centre and need for each call   twice or ten times longer, because I have to wait for the system to respond, then the cost of my call-centre are easily twice to ten times higher, because I need more resources to cover amount of incoming calls. Beside the fact, that the service quality will be also negative, because I cannot provide additional information in time that possibly could be relevant as well.... Sure, data always has to be accurate otherwise the solution would be useless. The key question, do I want to enable a new service using a relatively low budget as of low integration costs using a simple approach or do i have to invest a reasonable higher amount to provide a more advanced approach e.g. Hybris. For a small company where the solution is used just once in a while, hence a low resource impact to the central ECC system is taking place, i do not have to recommend a solution that needs ten times more budget to implement. There is one more element which needs to be considered as well, even if a system is processing millions of records in a year then the resource requirements will increase. So you either slow down any other processes or you have to increase the system resources accordingly. Depending on your licence agreement with SAP, your database provider and any other software / hardware provider involved, this will very likely force you to pay far more licence costs... we are talking quickly about 6 to 7-digits numbers. Next element that needs to be considered, because any direct connection makes your system vulnerable and does increase the risks. If you allow a web-frontend to talk to SAP directly, then it needs to be 100% bullet proof otherwise a simple bot-script can bring down your business - not just your web-shop, I am talking about any department in your company from customer service to field works!  Like (0)

oAndreas Halbig Apr 21, 2014 4:28 PM (in response to Deep Maheshwari)Hello Deep, Hybris itself has only a asynchronous  connection to SAP as of todays situation. There is only a third party connector available between SAP and Hybris. There is no real-time connection provided out of the box, so Hybris is a stand-alone system which runs completely independent from SAP and only once in a while the data is synchronized  with SAP using batch processes (mainly the orders) - actually a pretty simple process and only covers the absolute basics. 

Anything else is custom development in case of you want to have any real-time connection to perform specific activities like availability checks in SAP. This was the part, which made the project expensive in the past. So far this is kind of the "old" world... SAP is currently working on the official SAP integration, which will give you all options from full integration to the disconnected approach as of today (but far more advanced). As this is integration product is still in development I cannot provide you detailed information. So you have the choice to do everything using a custom development today or you wait until SAP has released the integration product, which gives you a lots of options and flexibility .... this however will take a few months and I assume you won´t have the time to wait so long... So if you start working on your custom integration to SAP, try to keep as much as possible asynchronous. In this case performance issues are not so critical. The discussion of using or avoiding SOAP, RFC/Jco or any other protocol is something I often cannot follow. The choice of the protocol does not make the actual call slower or faster. If you execute a full order process in SAP, it is slow because of all the thousand business processes, which are performed behind and not because I choose using JCo as connection. Why actually B2B2Dot0 is brought up (again)? This has nothing in common with Hybris as it is a different platform and especially not relevant for a discussion about which Integration Types are available between Hybris and SAP.Like (0)

Sam Bayer Apr 21, 2014 4:56 PM (in response to Andreas Halbig)"Why actually B2B2Dot0 is brought up (again)? This has nothing in common with Hybris as it is a different platform and especially not relevant for a discussion about which Integration Types are available between Hybris and SAP." From an SAP perspective, hybris (like Magento) can be viewed as a standalone eCommerce platform requiring asynchronous data integration with SAP or as a functionally rich content management platform that uses the Corevist (formerly known as B2B2dot0) shopping cart to integrate with SAP in real time for Order Management (pricing, availability, credit check etc.). That indeed is a very viable "integration type" as you put it. SamLike (0)

Andreas Halbig Apr 21, 2014 8:36 PM (in response to Sam Bayer)Not sure if you can call it viable, but it has no relationship to SAP´s Web-Channel  or Hybris products. However, you are welcome to share technical details of your integration approach, so that the Web Channel community can use your experience to solve potential

integration challenges to Hybris - unfortunately you still speaking in the voice of a sales person to sale a product that has no relevance to Hybris or SAP Web-Channel at all. Promoting your solution would be probably more suitable in this community, if it actually does enable a integration scenario for Hybris or any other SAP product from the SAP Web-Channel.Like (0)

Sam Bayer Apr 21, 2014 8:52 PM (in response to Andreas Halbig)I guess my posts have been deemed too threatening to this Forum and have been banned by the moderators.  So much for fostering a diverse and open dialogue.  I will respectfully decline your invitation to participate further in this forum because it appears to be a place to discuss too narrow an agenda for my purposes.  I prefer to help businesses who have made the astute choice of implementing SAP ERP find ways to capitalize on those investments as they navigate the complex world of eCommerce.  This is at odds to your agenda (as supported by your moderator colleagues here) which is to promote only "invented here" solutions.Like (0)

Andreas Halbig Apr 21, 2014 10:02 PM (in response to Sam

Bayer)Sam, your posts are not threatening anyone and you are like everyone invited to share experiences - but not like "everything is bullshit, so buy my product" approach. You might have to read the "Terms of Use", which you have violated before complaining. This forum / community is exclusively about the SAPWeb-Channel (including Hybris in connection to SAP) and not about any other product, but you use any opportunity to promote your product independent of how much relevance it actually does have rather then participating in a knowledge exchange. If somebody does ask about which options for engines you have for a Porsche, he does not want to hear about the engines you can have for a Ford Civic even if both cars are running on 4-wheels. Personally i would not mind, but you are confusing the people, who are looking for answers and i think it is absolutely valid that moderators starting to filter out those off-topic discussions in the interest of any reader... In the same way as wrong positioned SAP topics are also moved into the more suitable SCN forum. I assume this also will be the case if somebody tries to discuss Hybris topics, which do not have any relationship to the SAP background at all as even for those topics you have a different forum.

 However, I think nobody minds if you highlight disadvantages of the SAP products and all troubles you had using it, but in a way that shows at least some indications that you are trying to contribute something that might help to improve the product or help other people to find a work around. All developers from SAP are reading this forum and highly interested to get those feedback as well. So again, you are welcome to share your expertise. Btw. i am not the moderatorLike (0)

Ingo Woesner Apr 22, 2014 10:35 AM (in response to Sam

Bayer)Hi Sam, I can assure you are not banned in this forum. On the contrary - this forum is open for constructive and controversial discussions, and I am sure all appreciate your valuable contributions.As moderator I had to delete one of contributions several months ago because you transgressed against a forum rule not to use/misuse the SCN for promoting own solutions. I know it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between a cmparision of solutions/benefits and marketing, but this is the policy I have to follow. Best regards,Ingo

Evolution of SAP's E-Commerce solutionsPosted by Ingo Woesner in SAP CRM: Web Channel   on Apr 20, 2012 3:54:27 PM

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Dear community members, SAP Web Channel Experience Management (WCEM) is an Multi Channel E-Commerce olution by SAP successingInternet Sales/SAP E-Commerce/Web Channel Enablement. The E-Business processes are well integrated in SAP ERP and SAP CRM and are configurable. In August 2013, after the acquisition of hybris, the hybris OmniCommerce   solution is SAP's new flagship Omni Channel solution with a large footprint in the B2C E-Commerce domain.    Implementing a powerful E-Business solution or switching from an existing one should be well thought and analysed before a decision is made. 

Therefore in this blog I would like to provide you a journey through the evolution of SAP's E-Commerce solutions, from the SAP Online Store back in the 90's via the Internet Sales/SAP E-Commerce/Web Channel Enablement solutions to the new SAP Web Channel Experience Management. I have seen all these solutions and their product catalogs behind it and implemented some of them for customers as a consulting expert and later as a project manager. None of them impressed or convinced me in a way the new WCEM solution does, and I mean it from a customer benefit and end user perspective, not an SAP licensing point of view... Without doubt the former web shop solutions all have their strengths and key areas where they truly excel in their time. Web technology evolves fast, and so does E-Business. More than ever before user demands a great user experience across all sales and information channels. Latest web technologies, an appealing pixel perfect UI, deep integration with backend systems and last but not least the extensibility with 3rd party solutions like a Web Content Management solution, Web Analytics, carrier tracking, knowledge bases etc., not only in B2C businesses, but also in B2B. In the light of the recent hybris acquisition, the hybris OmniCommerce solution is a new option for SAP and non-SAP customers as a key market leader in B2C OmniCommerce. In this blog I compile first hand knowledge and expertise about the evolution of SAP's E-Commerce solutions, outlining the purpose, capabilities, strengths and weaknesses of each solution, with a special view on SAP Web Channel Experience Management.   

Online Store (~1996 to 2003 or so) Back in the good old times of SAP R/3, the Online Store was SAP's first E-Commerce solution and offered just one shopping (B2C) scenario. With an early login it could be used for B2B as well. Starting with R/3 3.0F the Online Store was a SAPgui based transaction (WW20), which was translated into HTML by the so called Internet Transaction Server (ITS) using templates. This made it very easy for SAP developers to debug and to extend functionality. But it used a proprietary SAP UI and interface technology, which made it hard for web design companies to change the look and feel without having SAP ABAP coding knowledge. Another backside of the Online Store was the direct access from the internet users to the ERP system causing an unpredictable load from the webshop users to the productive enterprise system. Well, don't smile about it, it was 1996 and Amazon was still a startup. The Online Store used the R/3 Product Catalog (transaction wwm1/wwm2) as a catalog basis with its (static) hierarchy and reliable but poor functionality. In these days the consulting solution CatMan was born and has been continuously improved ever since. Today the CatMan Suite is a comprehensive extension of the R/3 Product Catalog and a MUST for all companies who use the R/3 ERP product catalog. While the Online Store functionality was simple but OK for these early days, the solution had the big SAP advantage to show realtime information, especially customer specific prices - a killer criteria in B2B businesses. It even supported the Retail Generic Article (showing selectable attributes like color, size), a feature that was missing in the upcoming Internet Sales times and that was recently re-introduced in the new SAP Web Channel Experience Management. I loved the Online Store and the Product Catalog when I was a young consultant. Especially retailers have been very open-minded in trying out new channels and markets. Streamline.com in Boston/MA was selling food, even fresh and frozen food, combined with a weekly delivery to business members (see Fig.1) by unsing the Online Store - in my opinion the most beautiful and functional Online Store implementation ever.Woolworths PLC in the UK was feeding a Digital Interactive TV shopping platform with data from the R/3 product catalog - great for elder people to buy books and stuff at a time when using the Internet wasn't as easy as it is today (see Fig.2).

I was also part of a team who implemented the Online Store for a famous Champions League soccer club selling fan articles worldwide, where SAP's multi language support was key. Vobis computers sold IT equipment with it.A great time, which moved forward very fast. 

Fig.1: SAP's Online Store for streamline.com, extended to meet the requirements for a fresh food E-Business with delivery service 

Fig.2: Woolworths PLC in UK, Digital Interactive TV platform "OPEN...", fed by SAP R/3 product catalog data (screenshot taken from a TV)   

   

SAP Internet Sales / SAP E-Commerce / SAP CRM Web Channel / Web Channel Enablement Management (~2002 to 2010)  SAP Internet Sales 2.0x Around the millenium SAP's first CRM solution was released and was designed to cover all interactions with customers. Some even believed it would replace SD. A CRM of course had to cover the ever growing demand for a web channel solution. Therefore SAP created the "Internet Sales" solution and version 2.0b was the first official release. Internet Sales 2.0x still used the ITS with it's rendering technique and ran against the SAP CRM Sales Order and used the CRM product catalog. In CRM based Product Master records more product and marketing related information can be managed than in ERP. CRM Interaction Center could be used to process orders from the web. The Internet Sales 2.0x offered a B2B and a B2C scenario, both deployed independently from each other. By using the CRM backend first E-Marketing features like Top N product recommendations, proposed cross/up/down selling products etc. were possible. Another advantage of using the CRM system for customer interactions was the reduced load on the productive ERP system. The Internet Pricing Configurator (IPC) was introduced as a new component to perform the real time pricing and also the product configuration. The ITS was still used to translate the business logic into HTML, but as an evolution to the Online Store no SAPGui transactions were required anymore. Instead an ITS based "flowlogic" was introduced, a SAP proprietary set of commands to retrieve information form the CRM backend. This made it hard for web designers to change the UI and look& feel without the support of an SAP skilled flowlogic developer. Also SAP developers faced restrictions due to the limited programming freedom. Nevertheless, some great web shop used Internet Sales 2.0x, like COOP in Switzerland, to run their first version of the food delivery web shop. I have seen some food webshops being stopped during implementation, or closing their business when the internet hype was over, but COOP successfully survived this time and is still running their current COOP web shop   with a new version of SAP's Internet Sales, offering a delivery service, in-store pickup, and much more including a mobile app for iOS and Android. A shining beacon for the Internet Sales success story and fresh food webshops - well done!   SAP Internet Sales 3.0 With time, SAP CRM quickly became a backend of almost equal importance than ERP for many businesses. Internet Sales 2.0x was causing direct and unpredictable load to the CRM. Therefore Internet Sales 3.0 brought a paradigm change as it was developed as an independent Java J2EE solution outside the SAP CRM system.CRM and it's product catalog were still used as backend, but most of the business logic was now running on the Java solution, even the shopping basket was held in Java and not as a CRM Sales Order anymore. With the introduction of Java the UI technology changed from ITS based FlowLogic to Java Server Pages (JSP). At this time both ISA 3.0 B2C and B2B scenarios were based on frames.   SAP Internet Sales 4.0 

Many customers, most of them B2B businesses, have not been willing to run a CRM just for a webshop, and those customers who had not been willing to implement and run a CRM for their entire customer channels asked for an alternative.Therefore with Internet Sales 4.0 the SAP ERP system was again supported as backend as an alternative to SAP CRM. This webshop solution without CRM was called "SAP E-Commerce". Of course CRM based features like E-Marketing, cross/up/down selling, product alternatives, product recommendations etc.  have not been supported with an ERP backend, but for many customers, most of them B2B businesses, this was not the highest priority. Key for them were the realtime customer specific prices (considering discounts, contracts etc.) and stock-availability. With Internet Sales 4.0 the whole B2C scenario UI was redeveloped to get rid of the frames technology. B2B kept their frames until today, but was extended towards Partner Channel Management. In addition the E-Service solution has been released as a separate deployment. So with 4.0 the three pillars E-Commerce, E-Marketing and E-Service had been available, but have been independent ever since from each other. Therefore they have to be deployed and managed separately. An interaction between these pillars or reuse of components in a mixed scenario had to be implemented on project basis. A true disadvantage, especially in today's Multi Channel interaction times. 

 Name changes of Internet Sales solutions Around CRM 5.0 Internet Sales has been renamed into "SAP CRM Web Channel" or simply "Web Channel". However, the term "Internet Sales" or just "ISA" is still used in many publications and SAP notes. The term "Web Channel Enablement Management" is also used sometimes. All these expressions a SAP CRM backend. The Internet Sales solution that uses SAP ERP as backend has been renamed into "SAP E-Commerce" or simply "E-Commerce".   SAP Internet Sales 5.0

SAP CRM Web Channel 5.0 brought a major extension in the E-Service scenario, complex complaints and spare parts business for parts dealers and carriers. Also campaign integration and newsletter subscription were introduced.  

SAP CRM Web Channel 6.0/7.0

The release 6.0 focused mainly on the specific scenario for the Telecommunication industry. With this functionality selling of packed, complex products has been enabled in the solution. SAP Internet Sales 7.0 brought Loyalty Management. Thus the catalog and order processes were extended for support of earning and redeeming “points” as typical form of customer retention.    Internet Sales Summary SAP's Internet Sales solution in all it's names and scenarios is no doubt a very successful solution that is used by many hundreds, maybe even more than a thousand of companies, many in the B2B space. It provides realtime customer specific prices and stock availability information, a conditio sine qua non in B2B businesses. All the data shown in the webshop comes from a "single source of truth" for the entire enterprise system - no redundancies. Internet Sales is reliable, mature, is used by companies of all sizes throughout the world and supports all possible languages. It can be used with a CRM and an ERP backend. A true SAP quality product, which latest release 7.0x is supported by 2020 by standard maintenance. However, no further release of Internet Sales will be released because of the successor solution (see below). The B2B scenarios in Internet Sales are well perfected and provide advanced features for companies of all sizes. One example is the delegate admin, a superuser role for large enterprises, who is able to create webshop users on behalf of the webshop company for his colleagues. Contracts, configuration, complex complaints, customer specific prices - you name it: Internet Sales is optimized for B2B. The B2B scenario is still frame based, not nice, but acceptable. The B2C side however was never a killer app. Retailers grumbled about the missing Generic Article (which was never an issue from a technical perspective...), but I believe the most important reasons were 

The basic CRM Product Catalog functionality with its static folder structure

Lack of a great search engine with facetted display of results showing the results structured by attribute like price $1-9, $10-29, $30-49, color a,b,c... in the left hand navigation bar, as we know it from amazon, eBay, yahoo, ...

The inflexible technology base causing high efforts to mix components of different scenarios in a true multi channel scenario, e.g. a webshop with E-Marketing features plus E-Service for FAQ, complaints, service tickets and returns management.

 After almost a decade it was time for a new Web Channel solution with up-to-date technology and features.    

SAP Web Channel Experience Management (WCEM) Whatever was complained in the Internet Sales solutions by B2C companies: the SAP Web Channel Experience Management has it:

A great user experience with a pixel perfect UI, with a UI technology based on the latest web standards like Web 2.0, AJAX, Java Server Faces etc. which allows non-SAP experienced web designers to pull out all the stops for a great customer styled web presentation. Of course no frames.

Scenarios are now simply configured by non-IT staff (e.g. Marketing department) with many many options with a web tool "Web Channel Builder". All available modules from E-Sales, E-Marketing and E-Service can be used in a scenario without disruption. And you can have as many scenarios as you want to. Test new scenarios and UI variants upfront on your local PC, and schedule the release time of new scenarios.

A great search and navigation experience (when using the Multi Channel Catalog based on SAP MDM)

State-of-the-Art E-Commerce and E-Marketing features like advanced realtime product recommendations based on BI data, gift cards and wish lists, loyalty management (collect and redeem bonus points), ...

Integrated E-Service features like a “My Support” Home Page, ticket based service management, installed base management, contract determination, contact users, Guided Flows, Community Management, Knowledge Management (with eGain)

Multi channel features like physical store integration with a graphical map-based Store Locator, In-Store Availability, In-Store Pickup and (new with release 3.0) In-Store Delivery for online orders.

Generic Article support for SAP Retail customers, structured article, sets, lots, etc.

Enhanced Payment Methods (e.g. PayPal), Quick Check Out (with WCEM 2.0) and others which can be easily implemented via the Payment module.

A powerful, well described and easy applicable extension concept (see WCEM WIKI section "Development and Extensions") to build partner and/or customer extensions based on standard shop modules or to create your own modules. The modularization concept is designed to use ALL modules and their extensions in any scenario without additional project effort, just by configuration in a new web tool called "Web Channel Builder".

Simple integration of 3rd party solutions like a Content Management system, knowledge management, web analytics, image server, PIM, Social Media platforms, ... by leveraging the new extension concept.

The full set of features and a lot more can be found in the WCEM WIKI.  You can find more information about SAP Web Channel Experience Management in the (public!) WCEM WIKI and theExpert Blog Index. The evaluation and consulting study by De Villiers Walton, which gives a good comparision of WCEM with Internet Sales and ICSS, is also well recommended.  SAP Web Channel Experience Management is designed as a multi channel platform and optimized for modularization and easy extensibility.

 

The modules inside are separate entities decoupled from other modules, and can be extended on top of SAP standard. The good thing is: the extensions are modification free and survive the update of the particular module. 

 Within an individual module the UI part, business logic and backend implementation are separated from each other:

 

These parts can be changed and extended in different namespaces, which allows and update of the individual namespaces separately from each other. So whenever a WCEM patch overwrites a module it only overwrites the namespace part of SAP, and not the others. Your extensions and changes are safe. This allows partners and customers to develop their own module extensions and even own modules without changing the SAP standard. And all this of course without modifications. 

   WCEM Release 1.0 While the predecessor solution Internet Sales was focussed on B2B, the first release of SAP Web CHannel Experience Management was focussed on consumer businesses (B2C). Therefore a complete new framework was required.  The UI of WCEM 1.0 is based on Java Server Faces 1.2 and allows a pixel perfect UI, that can be created by non-SAP skilled web designers to pull out all the stops for a great customer styled web presentation. The Web Channel UI is rendered on server side in order to allow search engines like Google, Bing etc. to index the webshop pages. For important demos we applied the look&feel of corporate UI's or major customers, some in graphical simplicity, some vibrant. While this was done with limited effort, the result looked AWSOME, like real. In the new releases great enhancements - bothfunction wise and technology wise - have been made. This blog describes how to upgrade from WCEM 1.0 to 2.0/3.0.    WCEM Release 2.0 (globally available) WCEM 2.0 was clearly the to-go release over 1.0, no matter what. There are so many killer features in 2.0 that using the 1.0 version would only make sense for B2C customers have a running 1.0 solution

and are happy with it. This is also the result of the evaluation and consulting study by De Villiers Walton. Watch the WCEM webinar recordings.   

  And a very nice UI example for Sapphire realized in just 4 days (thanks to using web themes for the whole shop, not just the entry page here): 

  Important features have been added to 2.0, to enhance both the user experience and the functional scope of the solution. See the WCEM 2.0 feature list for details. In addition to the features a Rapid Deployment Solution is available for WCEM 2.0 to speed up implementation of a B2B scenario in an ERP/TREX environment significantly at a fixed price. WCEM 2.0 leverages the advanced features of Java Server Faces 2.1 plus template extensions, see the corresponding blog. You can find out details about what's new in WCEM 2.0 in the special chapter of the application help.     WCEM Release 3.0 While the First Release of SAP Web Channel Experience Management was focused purely on B2C businesses, Release 2.0 introduced native B2B capabilities in addition to many B2C enhancements.    Now, the new Release 3.0 offers advanced B2B and B2C features like 

Product comparison

o Customer specific product views / catalog views

o Enhanced sorting and filtering

E-Commerce

o Shopping templates

o Quotations

o Order download and item upload

o Product configuration

o In-store delivery

User Management

o Self-registration in the contact scenario

o Delegated administrator

o Enhanced authorization concept

 See

WCEM 3.0 Feature List WCEM 3.0 Customer Presentation WCEM 3.0 Expert Blogs WCEM 3.0 Application Help  > see chapter "What's new in Release 3.0" WCEM 3.0 Release Information Note 1734331  for system requirements NEW WCEM 3.0 Live Expert Sessions in April 2013 - Mark your calendar NEW - Read "A short walk from WCEM 1.0 to 3.0" from the SAP partner DeVilliers Walton.

    

WCEM Release 3.0 Support Package 01 (Globally available since Oct 21, 2013) On Oct 21, 2013, WCEM 3.0 SP01 was released, providing new functionality and improvements: 

Standard Web services and Web service functions   that are based on Open Data Protocol (OData) allowing to create applications, for example, mobile applications

Plug-Ins in SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio (NWDS)

o Module Wizard

o Web Service Wizard

o Web Services functions wizard

The user interface now uses JavaServer Faces™ 2 (JSF), version 2.1.10 (see SAP Note 1859344) Business event capturing   captures actions of Web shop customers by means of predefined business

events, such as logon, view product, add to cart, and place order Enhancements with Product Variants Improved response time of the catalog by caching prices   and asynchronous pricing Display of invoices in PDF format  from the Order Details Extended User Interface  (optional)

o Displaying price columns "unit price" and "total price"

o Price Analysis at item level

o Improved display about product availability and product delivery

o Web shop customers can change product units

o Quick order entry - Web shop customers can enter product IDs directly for each item (line item or row)

  You find all related information and documentation about WCEM 3.0 SP01 here:

 

Application Help (also known as SAP Library Documentation or KW Documentation) on SAP Help Portal:

o English

o German Or use SAP Help Portal alias http://help.sap.com/wec > SAP Web Channel Experience Management 3.0 SP01 > Application Help  

Guides on SAP Service Marketplace:o Master Guide o Installation Guide o Application Operation Guide o Security Guide o Development and Extension Guide: Generic Information o Development and Extension Guide: Appendix o Development and Extension Guide: Application-Specific Information o Web Content Management Guide

             Single point of entry for all assets: http://help.sap.com/wec > SAP Web Channel Experience Management 3.0 SP01 or http://help.sap.com/wec301

  Many topics of interest are also explained in detail in WCEM expert blogs - see the WCEM blog INDEX for an overview. Please also visit our WCEM WIKI - THE   key info source for WCEM . In case of questions the FAQ blog   might already provide an answer.  Best regards, Dr. Ingo WoesnerProduct Manager - Multi ChannelSuite Development Application InnovationSAP AG33006 ViewsTopics: java Tags: erp, mdm, product_catalog, e-commerce, webchannel, ecommerce, catalog, web_channel,web_channel_experience_management, wec, wcem, e-marketing, emarketing, e-service, eservice, shop, webshop, web_shop, jsf,web_channel_ui, web_channel_experience_management_framework

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15   Comments

Stephen Johannes Apr 20, 2012 10:59 PMActually you are wrong.  The online store did support configurable products in 4.6C, if I remember correctly.  If you were a clever developer then configurable products could also be

done in the online store with some magic on lower releases  . 

 Man those streamline.com screenshots is like a blast from the past for me.  Almost makes me want to find an old IDES system and make a copy of WW20 and start cranking away(just joking).  Never thought I see an online store flashback article on SCN. Appreciate the blog, especially being an old-school online store developer who had the pleasure of working on several customer projects before Internet Sales was launched. Take care, StephenLike (0)

oIngo Woesner Apr 23, 2012 9:41 AM (in response to Stephen Johannes)Hi Stephen, thank you very much for your feedback. I couldhave sworn the Online Store didn't support configurable products, but good to learn it could. I will change the text immediately. Stay tuned for updates of the article. I will add infos about the internet sales and Web Channel Experience Management today and during the week. My blog is part of a big launch initiative for the new eCommecre Solution SAP Web Channel Experience Management 2.0, which is in rampup from today. Please check the blog INDEX if you like.http://scn.sap.com/community/crm/web-channel/blog/2012/04/23/sap-web-channel-experience-management--blog-index All the best,IngoLike (0)

Jie Zhao May 14, 2012 12:28 PMHi,  We are currently looking at a potential WCEM 1.0 implementation. We have a couple of questions  1. It is stated the real time ATP check is a new feature in 2.0 in your blog. According to 1.0 feature list - ATP check in 1.0 is usingstandard backend ATP check during the check out process so we had assumed thatthis is real time. If this isn’t the case, can you please clarify what exactly do we get from ATP check in 1.0 and what's new in 2.0. 

2. Product catalogue search - we would like to use the same search engine for both website content and catalogue search. Can you please point me to the documentation on how this can be achieved? 3. Anything in 2.0 specific on mobile channel – how to configure mobile friendly webshop? Or is is a purely UI development/configuration exercise through NetWeaver developer Studio mobile themes development. 4. Is there a standard services repository which lists all the web services avaliable from the WECM? Thanks JieLike (0)

oIngo Woesner May 14, 2012 1:21 PM (in response to Jie Zhao)Hi Jie, thank you for your questions: ad 1) We have to distinguish several thnings:In 1.0 the real time ATP check is only done in the checkout (Java Basket) or in the shooping basked + checkout (backend basket)In 2.0 the real time ATP check is available even in the product catalog details (if configured), in the basket and checkout  ad 2) The search framework orchestrates the different solutions Product catalog and content management, witch have own search engines. 3) it depends.Option 1: first of all if you want to create an mobile specific html UI this can be created with an own style sheet. However you typically also want to change the structure and process flow of the solution, which you can also achieve. Option 2 is to use native apps for which you would need web services (see below). 4) it is possible to generate web services needed with enterprise java beans. We don't have web services yet, but it's on the roadmap for a future release. Best regards,IngoLike (0)

Jie Zhao May 31, 2012 11:02 AM (in response to Ingo Woesner)Hi Ingo, Thanks for the reply. On ATP check for 1.0, i have been trying to locate config settings for the "staged" ATP check on the catalogue level, however, I can't

seem to locate this in help or web channel builder. Can you please shed some lights before I go down the OSS route? thanks JieLike (0)

Ingo Woesner May 31, 2012 11:22 AM (in response to Jie Zhao)

Hi Jie, Please create an OSS ticket. I am not familiar in depth with the web channel builder, and with the OSS ticket you are directly connected with the person who knows the answer. Best regards,IngoLike (0)

Jie Zhao Jun 26, 2012 11:11 AM (in response to Ingo Woesner)Hi Ingo, Another question on web analytics. Is there any predelivered business content in BI for this? if so what type of content? any example reports? If you can also point me to some documentation in this area, it would be much appreciated. Many thanks JieLike (0)

Ingo Woesner Jun 26, 2012 12:50 PM (in response to Jie

Zhao)Hi Jie, I have published the answer in the FAQ blog under 3rd party solutions:http://scn.sap.com/community/crm/web-channel/blog/2012/05/10/sap-web-channel-experience-management--faq#3rd Best regards,IngoLike (0)

Joel Beck May 30, 2013 8:28 PM (in response to Ingo Woesner)When you put in OSS note you will be told this is a "consulting issue". Have fun with that one.Like (0)

Timothy Green May 15, 2012 1:08 PMI am currently looking into possible solutions for a client They really like the functionality of WCEM 2.0 for an internal B2B scenario and would like to do something fairly quickly.  The suggestion at the moment is to install on ECC (their CRM is only 5.0 and is not extensively used), ECC is currently at EHP4. Hence I am looking at suggesting we implement 1.0 then along with upgrading the back end we implement 2.0 when it is available on general release? Is the upgrade capability from 1.0 to 2.0 ok, we are assuming a fairly vanilla install, perhaps 1 enhancement to validate cost centre for posting costs since the orders will be internal. Then upgrade to 2.0 with any other addtional enhancements.Like (0)

oIngo Woesner May 15, 2012 1:46 PM (in response to Timothy Green)Hi Tim, nice to hear back from you again! I have replied you via email. Best regards,IngoLike (0)

Prashil Wasnik Dec 24, 2012 8:34 AMHi Ingo, How easy will it be to transport our custom enhancements if we already have WC enablement running and if we decide to move the WCEM 3.0. We had developing lots of custom enhancment over past 2-3 year and WCEM seems to be written right from scratch. I agree on the Business Object and Backend Interaction Layer we could compromise some efforts but UI and presentation seems to be big challenge. How do you think the approach for it. regardsPrashilLike (2)

oIngo Woesner Jan 17, 2013 3:34 PM (in response to Prashil Wasnik)Hi Prashil, there is no dedicated migration path from Internet Sales/Web Channel Enablement to WCEM. However, I got these answers from a leading WCEM architect:: 1) Is it possible to incorporate existing JSP changes in ISA to new WCEM frontend UI (Java Server Faces, JSF)?

You won't be able to take over your changes only by copy & paste, but it's still Java-based solution and the Facelet technology used by JSF brings a comfortable and modern way of UI programming. In general, WCEM provides at least the same flexibility of UI modification feasibilities as you know from Internet Sales. Read the UI Technology blog   for technical details. 2) Is it possible to incorporate the customized ISA logic of Action, BO, etc. in new implementation of WCEM?WCEM (& JSF) don't use Struts Actions. In WCEM you'll find "View Component Handler" which will be probably the right place to implement logic which you've currently in the Struts Actions.The Architecture of WCEM Business Objects layer is very similar to the one used in Internet Sales.  Maybe you won't be able to take over your changes directly, but this part shouldn't be a big deal. Read the UI Technology blog   for technical details. In case you have questions please post it in the UI technology blog. Best regards,IngoLike (1)

Heber Olivar Silva Feb 15, 2013 5:54 PMHi Ingo Woesner, how are you? I've been looking for if WCEM is compatible with SAP AFS where customers can choose specific product's characteristics such as color and size for clothes and foots. I already read that SAP Retail specific "Generic Articles" are only supported with CRM backend with MDM catalog, but it's not clear for me if SAP AFS is covered by this scenario as well. Could you guide me with this doubt? I'd like to propose this solution for a big customer that already runs SAP AFS. 

   Regards,Heber OlivarLike (0)

oIngo Woesner Jun 3, 2013 9:57 AM (in response to Heber Olivar Silva)Hi Heber Olivar, please check the FAQ document where I have provided a comprehensive answer to this question. Best regards,Ingo