We are writing this blog to show you how SAP Business Technology Platform (f.k.a. SAP Cloud Platform) empowers the “intelligent enterprise”, which means to help organizations become best-run businesses and to make the world run better.
Employees of SAP help our customers to become Intelligent Enterprises. For us humans, intelligence means that we are able to learn from what we experience every day. We turn these experiences into knowledge, and apply that knowledge to solve problems.
SAP's customers are large organizations with usually more than 100 employees. For such organizations, learning is not easy nor automatic. It takes huge efforts to improve existing processes, adapt to external changes and make use of new technologies.
Creating an intelligent enterprise means creating an organization that gathers data about the way it interacts with the world, turns that data into knowledge and apply that knowledge to improve processes. This is what we mean when we say “make the world run better”.
Businesses nowadays make use of an increasing number of software, different departments use different cloud and on premise solutions and harmonizing them to gather consistent data and make use of it has been an increasing headache.
That is why SAP launched a platform-as-a-service where organizations can integrate and extend existing applications, and build new applications, called the SAP Business Technology Platform.
Firstly, it is the most holistic business software integration platform.
Business processes do not run within a single line of business solution, they run across different departments using different solutions.Whether it is lead to cash, workforce management, procure to pay, record to report, these are all going across different solutions, either from SAP or third party providers. As you apply intelligence to these business processes, it becomes even more important to take larger context into consideration and have an integrated view across all of the assets deployed in your environment. This is why we are focusing so much on SAP Business Technology Platform integration services as the one and single integration solution for all SAP to SAP, and SAP to third party integration purposes. Over 5,000 companies worldwide are using that solution already today.
Secondly, SAP Business Technology Platform is the best extension platform for any SAP application, whether on premise or in the cloud.
We have all learned the hard way, what it means to over-customize systems (including ERPs). It tremendously slowed down the ability to keep up with the speed of innovation that we were delivering, and what the market was bringing to life.
We want to be smarter and more intelligent about this in the future, so let’s add extensions to your applications in a side-by-side fashion outside the core system. Let’s keep the core clean so that you can keep innovating with us and bring your specific extensions to the outside world.
Thirdly, it’s a powerful build platform.
Many individuals inside customer organizations come up with formidable ideas to improve the way they run their businesses, and sometimes they come to SAP to make these ideas a reality. But not every scenario can be realized using standard SAP applications. That is why new scenarios can be built on the SAP Business Technology Platform, and make full use of the data gathered in the organization by connecting back into an SAP driven back-end process.
This is what we call a build case. Here is an example: Shell built an airplane fueling application on mobile devices, which replaced a paper driven process and connected that back into S/4HANA for fulfillment purposes, that’s a build case. That’s where SAP Business Technology Platform and innovation services like Machine Learning, Analytics, Big Data or even Internet of Things come together to build powerful new solutions directly in the cloud.
Fourthly, it’s an unique experience platform, intended to connect people and data.
As processes turn into intelligent ones, the way end-users interact with systems is fundamentally changing.
Humans will do much less repetitive tasks, and processes will trigger human interaction.Systems will alert you to exceptional situations in your supply chain. Applications will make recommendations on how to best act in certain situations.The way your customers, your end users or your workforce interact with your particular systems is going to change.
Machine Learning, conversational User Interfaces, chatbots, Fiori, iOS and Android SDK are offered as services that can be used directly on the Cloud Platform to build delightful applications.How you use planning, predictive and analytics capabilities in a holistic solution, how you bring all of those together is changing the way you work with the systems you use every day. It’s an ERP you can talk to, it’s a CRM that you can listen to. That’s how things are going to change!
Last but not least, it’s a platform where speed meets scale. Experimentation meets productization. It’s where your millennial software developer meets Chief Security Officer, Chief Data Protection Officer or Chief Compliance Officer. That’s where Proof of Concept meets production robustness.
Many IT start-ups are able to develop prototypes quickly and bring data science ideas to life in a sandbox environment. However most of these projects fail when they need to be scaled to enterprise size. Indeed when implementing data science at enterprise scales, you need a robust infrastructure able to handle a huge volume of data, a large variety of data, coming in at a high velocity. That is what the SAP Business Technology Platform provides.
Well let us help you with that.
Your first source of content which is available online for free is opensap. There you will find trainings about many SAP solutions and services in the form of videos. The average effort required to complete a course successfully is four to six hours per week which makes it easy for students to combine courses with their other responsibilities. Here you can find all SAP Business Technology Platform related trainings.
Another source of content tailored to Application Developers, Data Analysts and Data Scientists is our own SAP Business Technology Platform YouTube series, aka SAP Hana Academy. All the videos can be found here.
The official SAP Cloud Platform tutorials and resources are also a great to way to get started.
If you cannot find an answer to a question about the BTP in tutorials, all official references are maintaing on the official SAP BTP Help Portal.
When you feel ready to take your learning one step further and want formal classroom training about cloud technologies in general and theSAP Business Technology Platform, the place to go is https://training.sap.com/
There, you will find the official trainings and certifications for SAP software.
The first step to learn how to develop on the SAP Business Technology Platform is the 5 day course CP100. [Edit your region preferences at the bottom of the page to see availabilities in your country/language.]
This course will prepare you to:
○ Understand the SAP Cloud Strategy
○ Understand development in SAP Business Technology Platform
○ Use the various SAP Business Technology Platform services, including integration services and API management
○ Explore the Internet of Things
○ Understand Extensions of SAP Cloud Solutions
This course will prepare you to take the Development Associate certification for SAP Business Technology Platform : C_CP_11 [Edit your region preferences at the bottom of the page to see availabilities in your country/language.]
This certification proves that the holder has an overall understanding and in-depth technical skills to participate as a member of a project team, and it is your first step in the world of Cloud application development.
For any other question regarding SAP Business Technology Platform feel free to ask us either using our emails or through our LinkedIn profiles.
Maxime Simon, maxime.simon@sap.com , Linkedin
Why did SAP create a Platform-as-a-Service ?
Employees of SAP help our customers to become Intelligent Enterprises. For us humans, intelligence means that we are able to learn from what we experience every day. We turn these experiences into knowledge, and apply that knowledge to solve problems.
SAP's customers are large organizations with usually more than 100 employees. For such organizations, learning is not easy nor automatic. It takes huge efforts to improve existing processes, adapt to external changes and make use of new technologies.
Creating an intelligent enterprise means creating an organization that gathers data about the way it interacts with the world, turns that data into knowledge and apply that knowledge to improve processes. This is what we mean when we say “make the world run better”.
Businesses nowadays make use of an increasing number of software, different departments use different cloud and on premise solutions and harmonizing them to gather consistent data and make use of it has been an increasing headache.
That is why SAP launched a platform-as-a-service where organizations can integrate and extend existing applications, and build new applications, called the SAP Business Technology Platform.
What is SAP Business Technology Platform ?
Firstly, it is the most holistic business software integration platform.
Business processes do not run within a single line of business solution, they run across different departments using different solutions.Whether it is lead to cash, workforce management, procure to pay, record to report, these are all going across different solutions, either from SAP or third party providers. As you apply intelligence to these business processes, it becomes even more important to take larger context into consideration and have an integrated view across all of the assets deployed in your environment. This is why we are focusing so much on SAP Business Technology Platform integration services as the one and single integration solution for all SAP to SAP, and SAP to third party integration purposes. Over 5,000 companies worldwide are using that solution already today.
Secondly, SAP Business Technology Platform is the best extension platform for any SAP application, whether on premise or in the cloud.
We have all learned the hard way, what it means to over-customize systems (including ERPs). It tremendously slowed down the ability to keep up with the speed of innovation that we were delivering, and what the market was bringing to life.
We want to be smarter and more intelligent about this in the future, so let’s add extensions to your applications in a side-by-side fashion outside the core system. Let’s keep the core clean so that you can keep innovating with us and bring your specific extensions to the outside world.
Thirdly, it’s a powerful build platform.
Many individuals inside customer organizations come up with formidable ideas to improve the way they run their businesses, and sometimes they come to SAP to make these ideas a reality. But not every scenario can be realized using standard SAP applications. That is why new scenarios can be built on the SAP Business Technology Platform, and make full use of the data gathered in the organization by connecting back into an SAP driven back-end process.
This is what we call a build case. Here is an example: Shell built an airplane fueling application on mobile devices, which replaced a paper driven process and connected that back into S/4HANA for fulfillment purposes, that’s a build case. That’s where SAP Business Technology Platform and innovation services like Machine Learning, Analytics, Big Data or even Internet of Things come together to build powerful new solutions directly in the cloud.
Fourthly, it’s an unique experience platform, intended to connect people and data.
As processes turn into intelligent ones, the way end-users interact with systems is fundamentally changing.
Humans will do much less repetitive tasks, and processes will trigger human interaction.Systems will alert you to exceptional situations in your supply chain. Applications will make recommendations on how to best act in certain situations.The way your customers, your end users or your workforce interact with your particular systems is going to change.
Machine Learning, conversational User Interfaces, chatbots, Fiori, iOS and Android SDK are offered as services that can be used directly on the Cloud Platform to build delightful applications.How you use planning, predictive and analytics capabilities in a holistic solution, how you bring all of those together is changing the way you work with the systems you use every day. It’s an ERP you can talk to, it’s a CRM that you can listen to. That’s how things are going to change!
Last but not least, it’s a platform where speed meets scale. Experimentation meets productization. It’s where your millennial software developer meets Chief Security Officer, Chief Data Protection Officer or Chief Compliance Officer. That’s where Proof of Concept meets production robustness.
Many IT start-ups are able to develop prototypes quickly and bring data science ideas to life in a sandbox environment. However most of these projects fail when they need to be scaled to enterprise size. Indeed when implementing data science at enterprise scales, you need a robust infrastructure able to handle a huge volume of data, a large variety of data, coming in at a high velocity. That is what the SAP Business Technology Platform provides.
How can you get started?
Well let us help you with that.
Your first source of content which is available online for free is opensap. There you will find trainings about many SAP solutions and services in the form of videos. The average effort required to complete a course successfully is four to six hours per week which makes it easy for students to combine courses with their other responsibilities. Here you can find all SAP Business Technology Platform related trainings.
Another source of content tailored to Application Developers, Data Analysts and Data Scientists is our own SAP Business Technology Platform YouTube series, aka SAP Hana Academy. All the videos can be found here.
The official SAP Cloud Platform tutorials and resources are also a great to way to get started.
If you cannot find an answer to a question about the BTP in tutorials, all official references are maintaing on the official SAP BTP Help Portal.
When you feel ready to take your learning one step further and want formal classroom training about cloud technologies in general and theSAP Business Technology Platform, the place to go is https://training.sap.com/
There, you will find the official trainings and certifications for SAP software.
The first step to learn how to develop on the SAP Business Technology Platform is the 5 day course CP100. [Edit your region preferences at the bottom of the page to see availabilities in your country/language.]
This course will prepare you to:
○ Understand the SAP Cloud Strategy
○ Understand development in SAP Business Technology Platform
○ Use the various SAP Business Technology Platform services, including integration services and API management
○ Explore the Internet of Things
○ Understand Extensions of SAP Cloud Solutions
This course will prepare you to take the Development Associate certification for SAP Business Technology Platform : C_CP_11 [Edit your region preferences at the bottom of the page to see availabilities in your country/language.]
This certification proves that the holder has an overall understanding and in-depth technical skills to participate as a member of a project team, and it is your first step in the world of Cloud application development.
For any other question regarding SAP Business Technology Platform feel free to ask us either using our emails or through our LinkedIn profiles.
Maxime Simon, maxime.simon@sap.com , Linkedin
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