SAP HANA Implementation and Useful Scenarios

As we’ve discussed, there are many different ways to use SAP HANA, and it stands to reason that there are also many different implementation scenarios. However, there isn’t a one-to-one correlation between a use case and an implementation scenario.

Rather, for each use case, you need to look at the business problem you are trying to solve, which will typically dictate the most appropriate implementation scenario. If, for example, your use case is for a specific need not addressed by an SAP application, you’ll likely need a custom development project, SAP HANA Implementation, and Useful Scenarios

In contrast, if your business issue is a more common or typical one, then SAP may have already created a new SAP HANA application to meet your needs. For many repeatable business issues, SAP has created SAP Rapid Deployment solutions. These solutions contain preconfigured software, technical content, and implementation services, and they are priced and scoped for rapid implementation.

SAP HANA Implementation Scenarios - Table of Contents

• Rapid-Deployment Solutions
• Custom Development
• SAP Application Deployment
• Packaged Solutions
• Common Scoping Pitfalls to Avoid
• Timelines and Key Activity Considerations

Rapid-Deployment Solutions

Do you have to address an urgent business need? Do you want a fast start with a fixed scope? SAP Rapid Deployment solutions can help you implement SAP HANA using a package of preconfigured software, content, and end-user enablement plus implementation services. Clearly priced and scoped implementation services help you speed up time to value and limit risk.

• The available SAP Rapid Deployment solutions for SAP HANA can help you to find your path to realize a full IT landscape running on SAP HANA — quickly, without risk, and at predictable costs.
• SAP Rapid Deployment Solutions are modular packages that include SAP software, pre-configured content, best practices, and fixed-scope implementation service, resulting in fast and predictable software deployments.
• You can start into SAP HANA as you like — e.g. with a quick win, implementing an accelerator, or with a holistic approach, migrating your SAP Business Suite to SAP Hana.
• If you want to leverage your landscape with SAP HANA step by step, the following approach could fit your wishes:
• Start smart with implementing some accelerators and gain immediate performance improvements without disruption for the end-users, e.g., by implementing the SAP HANA Accelerated Finance and Controlling rapid-deployment solution.
• Then, try out new analytics with the HANA content that is delivered. The SAP HANA CRM analytics rapid-deployment solution could support your CRM users with new reports.

Besides this, you might explore new reporting options with SAP NetWeaver BW powered by SAP HANA by speeding up existing scenarios or by implementing new ones. Rapid-deployment solutions that are based on SAP NetWeaver BW powered by SAP HANA support many different scenarios — e.g. in the area of ERP, CRM, or EPM.

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Also, if you are looking to adopt SAP HANA as a database for your SAP Business Suite, the Rapid Database Migration of SAP Business Suite to SAP HANA package supports the migration of an existing SAP Business Suite installation to the SAP HANA database system without disruption of the existing Business Suite scenarios. Reporting scenarios within the SAP Business Suite can be enhanced as well with the SAP HANA Live rapid-deployment solution. The SAP HANA Live rapid-deployment solution provides pre-built reporting content for easier and faster analysis based on virtual data models with best practices enablement content and fixed-scope and fixed-timeline service offering.

In today’s competitive global economy, businesses must adopt technology solutions that provide an immediate advantage over their competitors, but time-to-value is key.

With the SAP HANA rapid-deployment solutions, customers can benefit from the power of SAP HANA within a few weeks.

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Custom Development

Although there are standard best practices that must be considered when developing custom solutions, there are also many possibilities when it comes to imagining what to build with SAP HANA.

SAP HANA aligns well with several specific requirements and situations. Are you building an enterprise-scale application for a business scenario with high data volumes? Do you need detailed or granular data analysis? Do you have to query large data volumes? Do you require complex algorithmic or statistical calculations, or suffer from latency between transactional recording and reporting? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then SAP HANA is a great choice.

SAP Application Deployment

SAP HANA is available in a variety of deployment options: as a pre-configured on-premise appliance, on your own hardware, in the Cloud, as Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), or as a hybrid model that combines cloud and on-premise instances.

SAP is delivering a new class of solutions on top of the SAP HANA platform — solutions that combine real-time insights into big data with state-of-the-art analysis. These innovative real-time solutions can help organizations transform their business by making smarter and faster decisions, reacting more quickly to events, and unlocking new opportunities. Companies can utilize these solutions to take advantage of new, data-driven business models and processes — options that would be difficult or even impossible with disk-based databases. These solutions include:

• SAP  Sales  Pipeline  Analysis,  powered  by  SAP  HANA  
• SAP BusinessObjects Sales Analysis for Retail, powered by SAP HANA
• SAP Smart Meter Analytics, powered by SAP HANA.

[ Related Article: SAP Hana Interview Questions and Answers ]

Packaged Solutions

Do you have to address an urgent business need? Do you prefer working with a fixed scope? SAP rapid deployment solutions can help you implement SAP HANA using a package of preconfigured software, content, and end-user enablement plus implementation services. Clearly priced and scoped implementation services help you speed up time to value and limit risk.

The available SAP Rapid Deployment Solutions for SAP HANA can help you to find your path to realize a full IT landscape running on SAP HANA — quick, without risk and at predictable costs. You can start into SAP HANA as you like — e.g. with a quick win, implementing an accelerator or with a holistic approach, migrating your SAP Business Suite to SAP HANA. If you want to leverage your landscape with SAP HANA step by step, the following approach could fit to your wishes:

Start smart with implementing some accelerators and gain immediate performance improvements without disruption for the end users, e.g., by implementing the SAP HANA Accelerated Finance and Controlling rapid-deployment solution.

Then, try out new analytics with the HANA content that is delivered. The SAP HANA Operational Reporting rapid-deployment solution could support your ERP users with new reports.

Besides this, you might explore new reporting options with SAP NetWeaver BW powered by SAP HANA by speeding up existing scenarios or by implementing new ones. Rapid-deployment solutions that are based on SAP NetWeaver BW powered by SAP HANA support many different scenarios — in the area of EPM, CRM, or Demand Signal

Also, if you are looking to adopt SAP HANA as a database for your  SAP Business Suite, the Rapid Database Migration of SAP Business Suite to SAP HANA package supports the migration of an existing SAP Business Suite installation to the SAP HANA database system without disruption of the existing Business Suite scenarios. Reporting scenarios within the  SAP Business Suite can be enhanced as well with the SAP HANA Live rapid-deployment solution.

The SAP HANA Live rapid-deployment solution provides pre-built reporting content for easier and faster analysis based on virtual data models with best practices enablement content and fixed-scope and fixed-timeline service offering.

You may be familiar with the traditional ASAP methodology used by SAP — and the fact that a complex ERP implementation can last for months, if not years. Because SAP HANA

is a new technology, to stay on top of its learning curve, you need to work with a solution implementation partner who has a deep understanding of the technology, the capabilities, and best practices for implementation.

To successfully implement SAP HANA, you must follow a structured implementation methodology. Your solution partner should approach the solution with a phased, deliverable-oriented implementation plan based in project and organizational change management. The goals here:  to streamline implementation, minimize risk, and reduce the total costs of implementation.

A robust methodology should include templates, tools, questionnaires, and checklists, including guidebooks and accelerators to support team members and increase project predictability.

There are six basic steps that need to be a part of any SAP HANA implementation. The amount of emphasis you place on each step will be dictated by the type of SAP HANA project you are implementing.

1. Customer education. Education is especially important for an SAP HANA. The technology is new, so the relevant knowledge is not yet widespread. The technology is also rapidly evolving, with new use cases being created almost daily. Both the project team and the executive sponsors must be educated so that they understand what SAP HANA can do and how it works.
2. Use case identification. Workshops can help determine where to apply the power of SAP HANA within the Ask yourself: What are the possible scenarios for SAP HANA, and where might the company make improvements? Where could the technology have the biggest impact on corporate objectives or unlock deeper insights into the reported data? Once you have defined a use case, you should perform a comprehensive requirements gathering to ensure that the end solution addresses all of your company’s needs and maps back to your original use case expectations.
3. Solution approach. The SAP HANA solution must be designed and documented so that if your personnel or solution partners change, the new resources will understand how to support the solution. Most likely, this will be an iterative process, by looking closely at use cases and their supporting. As new information becomes available, the solution approach will evolve into a comprehensive deliverable.
4. Modeling / Development A key task to implement your SAP HANA solution is the creation of the data models and the different views to it. These models are adapted, modified, and enhanced to improve performance. For packaged applications, this content is delivered by SAP, but can be adapted to your specific needs. Custom development projects will include both traditional application development and modeling aspects.
5. QA/testing. This is the final test of all front-end reporting, data quality, data integration, and performance. The production system is up and running, and business processes begin to operate in the new SAP HANA environment. Quality assurance continues, along with end-user training and support.
6. Go live. SAP HANA is delivered as a production.

Common Scoping Pitfalls to Avoid

If changes are required for front-end reports or analytics, then expectations must be managed. Often, as a result of dependencies, even small changes to a report can have a large impact on underlying systems; for instance, a change to a field may require changing a data model.

Because of this factor, it is important to fully define requirements and to ask about any proposed report modifications. Reviewing the original form of a current report can be very helpful because you can see what the business user is accustomed to seeing, as well as how it might be improved. You should also perform a proper data decomposition to document, how the current report is built and how it is working. In addition, identify any custom code within the business rules that may be difficult to replicate inside the SAP HANA modeler. Finally, map the sources from which the data are drawn, and how the data are imported into a formal deliverable for signoff.

The right services partner can provide the needed level of due diligence in this area during planning.

After you’ve outlined a systematic approach to implementation, you need to identify the key timelines and activities for your SAP HANA implementation.

[ Check out SAP HANA Data Modeling Tools ]

Timelines and Key Activity Considerations

Just as there is no one size fits all, there is no single timeline for an SAP HANA project. Each project is different; each has distinctive contributing factors and characteristics. It is the SAP best practice to use a standard project methodology, such as the SAP ASAP implementation methodology, to ensure that a project addresses all of the critical activities, phases, and deliverables that are necessary for success.

The SAP ASAP methodology has been updated to incorporate the SAP HANA activities required for a standard in-memory project. Accelerators, best practices, and implementation tools have also been updated or developed to shorten the project timeline and reduce risk. Methodology, timelines, and key activities vary based on three considerations:

1. Current technical landscape. Depending on the current landscape, the customer may have to consider prerequisites for delivering in-memory solutions. For example, data quality may need to be addressed, or the organization may first need to upgrade some applications that work in conjunction with SAP HANA.
2. Expectations for in-memory functionality. As customers learn more about the capabilities of in-memory solutions, they may want to introduce additional functionality. It is important to manage this need and to consider it during the initial requirements phase.
3. Original requirements per use case(s) identified during assessment. A key component of the successful delivery of SAP HANA is ensuring that the final solution meets the company’s requirements and expectations, as identified in the original use case scenario.

In addition to defining an implementation methodology, you’ll need to identify the key skills required to ensure your implementation of SAP HANA is a success.