Data Warehousing with SAP Datashpere, SAP BW/4HANA & SAP HANA SQL

Data Warehouse as the central component of a powerful business analytics infrastructure

To get a complete view of your business processes, you first need a powerful business analytics infrastructure as a basis.

In addition to a modern and user-oriented portal technology with access to numerous tools for reporting, planning and consolidation, the SAP Business Warehouse (SAP BW), as a central data repository for data from SAP and non-SAP sources is the core building block of most customers’ analytics infrastructure.

In the business warehouse, data is extracted from a wide variety of operational systems and databases, transformed, consolidated and made available in the cloud and on-prem in a uniform manner for reporting and analysis purposes.

The business intelligence solution SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) allows you to visualize a BW’s data in the cloud. In the on-prem variant, the front ends of the BO server (BusinessObjects), such as Lumira, are available.

SAP offers three different technologies for data warehousing as part of the SAP Business Technology Platform: SAP Datasphere (previously SAP Data Warehouse Cloud [DWC]), SAP BW/4HANA and SAP HANA SQL Data Warehouse.

SAP Datasphere (DSP) is a data warehouse solution in the cloud (SaaS) that maps the entire data warehousing process using the latest technologies. It is characterized by its open system environment, as a large number of ready-made adapters and APIs enable simple data integration. Whether SAP or non-SAP, on-premise or cloud data sources - everything is possible. As it is a SaaS solution, SAP Datasphere can be flexibly deployed in your company and scaled according to your growing requirements.

SAP Datasphere also gives users from the business departments simplified access to the company's data. Thanks to intuitive user interfaces (e.g. graphical views), they are able to create data models independently (or in collaboration with IT) in a controlled environment (Spaces). This also eliminates the need to store their own data copies in local systems. Modern scripting languages such as SQL and Python can also be used to implement complex business logic. The advantages are obvious: the business department benefits from the increased flexibility and agility in analysis and the IT department does not have to worry about the security of company data.

If your company already uses a business warehouse system, you might find SAP BW Bridge a useful option. SAP BW Bridge makes it possible to transfer existing developments to the cloud environment, meaning that your existing BW investments are maintained as you transition to SAP Datasphere.

Another key feature is SAP Datasphere Data Marketplace, which allows you to use internal and external data products (some free, others purchasable) and also gives you the option of sharing data with other users.

Are you looking to make your reporting as efficient as possible? SAP Datasphere and SAP Analytics Cloud work seamlessly together, allowing you to take full advantage of both systems.

As can be seen from the SAP Datasphere architecture, data from different sources (cloud, on-premise, API) can be integrated, managed and used. DSP is divided into several areas: integration (e.g. in-memory, replication), management (e.g. space management, security), administration (e.g. data modeling, catalog) and use (e.g. SAP Analytics Cloud). SAP Datasphere offers you a trusted, secure and controlled environment to flexibly build your data landscape according to your own ideas:

Take a look at our success story and / or watch the project video for a quick insight!

SAP BW/4HANA is the logical further development of SAP BW on HANA and BW 7.5. This data warehouse is the central development platform for reporting, planning and consolidation applications in the on-prem environment.

Since BW/4HANA was developed specifically for the HANA in-memory database, all of HANA’s functional and performance advantages can be optimally utilized.

By storing data in RAM, column-oriented organization and HANA-optimized data models are guaranteed extremely fast response times, even with huge amounts of data (Big Data). As well as analytical performance, you benefit from SAP HANA during the ETL process too. ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) is a process of unifying data from multiple, differently structured data sources into a target database. Various actions in the ETL process are outsourced to SAP HANA to improve performance. This eliminates the need for data exchange between SAP HANA and the ABAP stack.

The proven tools SAP Analytics Cloud, SAP Analysis for Office and SAP Lumira are available for evaluating and visualizing your BW/4HANA data. What’s more, SAP Digital Boardroom enables executives to perform ad-hoc reporting, conduct “what if” analyses and have real-time access to contextual information.

SAP BW/4HANA is available to you both as a cloud solution and in the on-prem variant. Provisioning takes place using the managed cloud service SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud, Microsoft Azure or Amazon Web Services (AWS).

The graphic below illustrates the architecture of SAP BW/4HANA:

SAP HANA is a powerful in-memory database that enables you to make fast and sound decisions. HANA enables real-time access to all the operational applications’ data and business information, as well as its immediate further processing and evaluation.

Rapid response times even for the largest data volumes thanks to SAP HANA

HANA is a flexible, versatile solution consisting of SAP software and customized hardware. This makes it possible to evaluate business transactions at different aggregation levels at any time. Whether business metrics are operational or consolidated, HANA lets you intuitively create the right analytics.

In interaction with the analytics tools from the SAP BusinessObjects portfolio, companies benefit particularly greatly from the in-memory database that the data warehouse solution features. Users gain comprehensive insights and analysis capabilities for all the supported systems.

SAP HANA has supported SQL Data Warehousing for years. SAP HANA for SQL Data Warehousing is a solution that uses open SQL standards. It allows customers to combine any tool or technology to create a customized “best-of-breed” data warehousing solution.

SQL DW requires the universal programming language SQL, which is the solution’s real strength. This makes SQL DW very flexible and enables (almost) unlimited system openness.

ORBIS offers customers holistic support when it comes to modernizing their reporting operations. From classic on-prem data warehouse projects to current cloud solutions, like SAP Analytics Cloud, ORBIS is your partner for success.

With our more than 15 years of consulting expertise in the SAP BW environment and the resulting project experience, we adapt your IT infrastructure to suit your individual requirements: from smaller Business Warehouse installations to data storage with several terabytes and lots of source connections.