Solution Manager Update – SAP S/4HANA: The Next Generation

The big news this month was the historic announcement of SAP S/4HANA (see replay of launch event here). This is the successor to SAP R/3 which was launched on July 6^th 1992 and helped kicked off the ERP era that has dominated the application marketplace for the last 23 years. Now according to Gartner we are entering the “Postmodern ERP World”. Due to the increased need for businesses to support digital process transformation, enterprises are moving to a hybrid environment of on premise and cloud based applications. This hybrid approach enables business to retain value from their existing IT investment while expanding into the on-line digital world characterized by social, mobile and analytics.

So how does this “Postmodern ERP World” impact SAP customers? SAP has committed to its HANA platform as the future for its innovation roadmap arguing that the next generation business processes require an in-memory platform to order to simplify existing landscapes and provide real time data processing and analytics. As Hasso Plattner (SAP Chairman) mentioned at the launch, “If this doesn’t work, we’re dead. Flat-out dead. It’s that simple”.

This means that if you are looking to adopt SAP’s new innovations, such as SAP Simple Finance, you will have to upgrade your core ECC systems to SAP S/4HANA which requires an upgrade to EHP6 and a migration from your existing database to HANA. This will also require a plan on how to deploy the new environment while retaining value of your existing infrastructure. Lastly you will have adapt your support processes and skills to manage this new environment which may include cloud based applications.

In order to evaluate your future strategy the next step is to perform a detailed impact analysis to help answer the following questions:

• What are the key areas of business value? Simplification, Finance, Analytics, User Experience, Mobile etc
• How much of my existing infrastructure can I re-use? Existing servers, storage, LAN vs Cloud
• What will be required to support the future state architecture? Upgrades, integration, user access, monitoring etc

Having a strategic roadmap will help your business navigate its way to value in this new “Postmodern ERP World”.

EGI’s – North America Schedule for March 2015:

To view Online schedule for Expert Guided Implementation sessions  select all delivery methods and use the “Region” search filter to refine the search results:

• Basic Configuration of SAP Solution Manager 7.1 – 9 to 13 Mar
• Business Intelligence Monitoring & Troubleshooting – 23 to 25 Mar
• Change Control Management III: Change Request Mgmt – 24 to 27 Mar
• Custom Code Quality and Clones – 9 to 11 Mar
• Data Volume Management (DVM) – 9 to 13 Mar
• Performance Optimization (PERF) – 2 to 6 Mar – Booked
• SAP HANA (2 of 6) – Database Administration and Operations – 9 to 13 Mar
• SAP HANA (4 of 6) – Make your Custom Code Ready – 2 to 4 Mar – Booked
• SAP HANA (5 of 6) – Data Modelling – 23 to 27 Mar
• SAP HANA (6 of 6) – Profitability Analysis – 9 to 13 Mar
• SAP Mobile: Enterprise Mobility Management – 2 to 4 Mar – Booked
• SAP Solution Manager 7.1 Roadmap – 10 to 11, 25 to 26 Mar
• SAP Solution Manager 7.1 configuration SAP BusinessObjects BI 4 – 23 to 27 Mar
• SAP Solution Manager for SAP Mobile Platform – 23 to 25 Mar
• Solution Documentation I: Basic, Initial Upload,Verification – 10 to 13 Mar
• System Monitoring & Reporting – 16 to 20 Mar
• Tool & Process Setup: Technical Upgrade of SAP Solution Manager to 7.1 – 23 to 27 Mar

  Meet the Expert (1 hour presentation):

• Shop Floor Dispatching and Monitoring Tool
• Solution Manager 7.2 Demo: Solution Documentation
• Android Clients: Debug, Logging, and Troubleshooting the Connection – 19 Mar
• SAP Business ByDesign for LE Subsidiaries: Hybrid Cloud Integration – 26 Mar
• SAP BusinessObjects BI Platform 4.1 Integration with SAP Jam – 17 Mar

North America Schedule for April 2015:

• Basic Configuration of SAP Solution Manager 7.1 – 20 to 24 Apr
• Business Intelligence Monitoring & Troubleshooting – 13 to 15 Apr
• Change Control Management II: Quality Gate Management – 28 to 30 Apr
• Configuration Validation – 21 to 23 Apr
• Data Volume Management (DVM) – 27 to 30 Apr
• Job Scheduling Management – 20 to 24 Apr
• Performance Optimization (PERF) – 27 to 30 Apr
• SAP HANA (3 of 6) – Advanced Database Monitoring – 13 to 17 Apr
• SAP HANA (4 of 6) – Make your Custom Code Ready – 27 to 29 Apr
• SAP Solution Manager 7.1 configuration SAP BusinessObjects BI 4 – 6 to 10 Apr
• SAP User Experience: SAP Fiori – 20 to 23 Apr
• Test Management III: Test Automation Framework with HP QTP – 20 to 22 Apr