How companies using SAP can prepare for cloud-based solutions and Hana

"Simplify and Optimize", under this motto SAP CEO Bill McDermott started something

that Luka Mucic, SAP’s CFO calls, "the greatest transformation in the company's

history." In addition to the traditional SAP business, the sale of software licenses, SAP

will in future increasingly rent SAP Hana software operated in the cloud. Customers can

pay a low tariff regularly to use this compared to the high license fees when buying

software.

For SAP the transformation is on the one hand a major challenge. On the other hand SAP feels well

prepared to compete for customers in the cloud with its Hana database technology. With it, very

large amounts of data - Big Data - will be processed in a short time by managing data in main

memory. This promises the use of Hana to accelerate business processes, but also provides the

basis for completely new applications such as the timely evaluation and treatment of incidental

quasi real-time data in many areas:

POS data in retail stores.

Data about the click behaviour of customers in online trading.

Data from manufacturing systems in manufacturing plants.

Data from smart metering for energy and water supply.

Data from trading systems at banks and stock exchanges.

While Hana has been acquired and partially used by large companies, for mid-size organisations it

is less likely to be an option due to high licensing fees and additional hardware costs.

Hana-based cloud solutions for small and medium-sized enterprises.

The new SAP strategy responds by providing Hana-based solutions in the cloud. These are

affordable for small and medium-sized enterprises because high initial investments in software

licenses and hardware can be bypassed. Customers do not have to relocate all SAP supported

business processes to the cloud in a single step, but may start with smaller, less critical sub-

processes and functions such as travel expenses.

Cloud Solutions will eventually prevail

Compared for example to the United States there is some scepticism in Europe about cloud

solutions amongst SMEs as well as large enterprises. Managers in companies are therefore reticent

about moving to the cloud. As a result, in the near future, most companies may have a mixture of

cloud solutions and those that operate in their own data centres. It is expected that the proportion

of cloud solutions amongst medium sized organisations will gradually increase over time.

How can companies using SAP prepare to use cloud-based solutions and Hana?

Apart from certain settings made via Customizing, SAP Cloud Solutions can only be used as

provided by the SAP. Major changes in the sense of "modifications" are not possible or are not

recommended to avoid losing the cost advantages of the cloud solution. In addition the interfaces

offered by the SAP cloud solution must be used if it is to be integrated with self-developed

solutions.

Firstly, in order to streamline the cloud solution, it is important to re-standardise functions and

sub-processes back standard SAP as much as possible to ensure a quick and easy transferability to

the SAP cloud. This is not overly complex. As with functions and sub-processes that remain in

house, it makes sense to streamline interfaces between sub-processes in the cloud and those

remaining sub-processes created in house, by converting back to SAP standard as far as possible.

And lastly, despite various security mechanisms, the interface to a cloud solution is always

accompanied by additional exposure of the IT infrastructure to the Internet. The SAP systems

should therefore also be tested for vulnerabilities in the role and authorisation structure.

Prior to the cloud comes the analysis

Before the move to the cloud it is important to facilitate the transfer and shorten it. Companies

such as West Trax extract usage data stored in a SAP system logs without accessing the system. It

analyses the data offline to establish which sub-processes and process steps the organisation

supports using SAP standard functionality. Additionally West Trax identifies where unused custom

code programs are present, which of them are rarely used and where re-standardisation may be a

possibility; as well as what jobs were run on the system, who initiated the jobs and much

more. The comprehensive final report of the analysis makes transparent specific opportunities for

streamlining and re-standardising the analysed system. Simplification and optimisation

opportunities are included with tangible recommendations.

Jochen Siegle, Head of IT Corporate Services at LANTIQ, a supplier of chips and software for

broadband access and home networking, has had a good experience with the analysis: "A standard

system such as SAP can only be operated cost-effectively, when the default is used. For years we

had questioned how close to standard our SAP system was. However, we could not find a suitable

reference model to measure the degree of standardisation, let alone get comparative figures for

the industry. The results of a West Trax analysis have confirmed to us that at LANTIQ we are

fundamentally on the right track with our standardisation efforts in the SAP environment. "

Close to standard?

In addition to the potential for streamlining and re-standardising West Trax also provides clients

with transparency of paid but previously unused standard SAP functionality and the untapped

potential for modernisation and development of their business processes.

If, in addition to the SAP system logs, the client has information available on roles and permissions

analysts can identify analyse this data to identify vulnerabilities and risks due to critical

combinations of permissions.

When a SAP customer is planning to port SAP Business Suite or part of SAP Business Suite to

Hana, it is possible to determine in advance which business processes would already benefit from

the move. This can be done by investigating which business processes are supported by standard

transactions and standard reports and which of these standard functions could be automated by

scheduling or process management software. These are the only business processes that require

little or no manual intervention by the customer to readily provide benefit from acceleration by

Hana.

"Simplify and Optimize" - So it’s not just a slogan under which the SAP reinvents itself.

Simplification and optimisation is the goal sought by many SAP customers. Cloud and / or Hana-

based solutions used judiciously can reduce operating costs, increase productivity of SAP systems,

accelerate business processes and enable applications previously considered unfeasible.

An analysis is a valuable way to create transparency and for SAP customers to lead the way.

www.westtrax.com

Source: http://www.it-director.de/themen/business-software/big-data/in-memory-

technologie/a/analyse-des-sap-systems.html

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