Figure 1: Source: SAP
This was the quarterly askSAP community call this week.
Figure 2: Source: SAP
Anything in the future is subject to change
Poll results
Figure 4: Source: SAP
Single destination – SAC
Machine intelligence
Artificial insights
Bring together, make more confident decisions
SAC is strategic direction for analytics
In market for 4 years – BI, planning and predictive
Analytics is a significant focus of SAP’s strategy
Commitment to embed into SAP’s cloud suite – S/4HANA Cloud, Concur, SF, Fieldglass and more
It does not mean ceasing to invest in BusinessObjects; continue to invest in BusinessObjects – release BI4.3 next year, in beta today
Invest in interop between products (SAC and BusinessObjects) – evolve to include reporting and distribution
Figure 5: Source: SAP
Confusion, uncertainty, how get to destination; keep as a living document, do not expect to change often. Link to Statement of Direction is here
Figure 6: Source: SAP
Simplicity, offer as SaaS, combine use cases, full suite of what is required to run on one platform
What is happening, why happening
Tell users why things are happening using automated insight techniques and what do next
Combine planning and BI – workflows, simulations, what if analysis – make data as interactive as possible; with predictive, where business goes next
Powering intelligent enterprise suite is a big investment – connect the data, out of the box, consistent experience, already connect to critical systems; S/4HANA/SF in slow roll out for the rest of the year
Augmented analytics – SAC offers automated insights, powerful dashboard creation, prediction, key influencers to understand business better; not have full understanding of analytics – investing in conversational AI – everyone to have access to information
Enterprise BI platform – expanded to Analytics Design, Mobile, Digital Boardroom – more enterprise BI platform – beta for scheduling PDF’s to email, so users can distribute more effectively (next year)
Invest in reporting, security, lifecycle management – ensure that SAC is “enterprise ready”
Building on hybrid analytics; not all data is in cloud – SAC connects live to variety of different sources to take advantage of existing investments – universe, BW, S/4HANA, HANA
Figure 7: Source: SAP
Continue to invest in BusinessObjects
Timeline, updating BI4.2, working BI4.3 (GA next year)
SAP policy – commitment of time – when release BI4.3, extend maintenance timeline until at least 2027 – create a plan around the timeline
Figure 8: source: SAP
Invest in modern user experience
Reduce total cost
Invest hybrid capability – BI with SAC
Figure 9: Source: SAP
Make admin easy; using 2 different products - synchronize users and content
Take advantage of innovations with existing investments – Live Universe Connector, available today
Use conversational AI on top of BusinessObjects install
Figure 10: Source: SAP
Extension policy; SAP wants feedback
Other pricing and package options
Q&A
Q: Have several customers BI4.2 – heavy users of WebI and Explorer – what are the options?
A: Explorer – end of maintenance for Flash is soon; recommendation to move exploration use cases to SAC; Explorer interface – consistent look and feel
WebI – offers diverse set of use cases – continue use WebI – evaluate some of the predictive and augmented use cases, and use them together
Q: appreciate SOD, when have feature parity between SAC and BOBJ?
A: Today look at use case parity – look to fulfill those needs first
Features relevant to you now
Not expect 100% feature parity; aggressive offering more features over the next few years
Q: Is SAP planning to release versions beyond BI4.3?
A: Have not decided – TBD
Dependent on feedback
Encourage everyone to upgrade to BI4.2 and check BI4.3 beta
BI4.3
Figure 11: Source: SAP
Areas of BI4.3
Figure 12: Source: SAP
BI4.3 releases new launchpad
Figure 13: Source: SAP
Consume Web Intelligence data models in SAP Analytics Cloud and re-use existing documents (Source:SAP)
Figure 14: Source: SAP
Reports HTML5 – compatible with mobile app
Figure 15: Source: SAP
With BI4.3 – build stories in SAC using WebI data model
“With Live Universe connector 3.0, your data never leaves your network” – Source: SAP
Figure 16: Source: SAP
BI4.3 – beta call December 17
1500+ BI4.3 customers are planning GA in 2020 (source: SAP)
Q&A
Q: Will existing WebI reports have to go through some conversion?
A: BI4.3 is an update of BI4.2
Q: What about Fiori user interface – has it been dropped from the product?
A: Launchpad will have only the Fiori
Figure 17: Source: SAP
Enable hybrid environment using SAC + BusinessObjects; researched with partners
Figure 18: source: SAP
New on-premise licenses with reduced functionality; how to adopt hybrid analytics in 3 steps
WebI only has more price reductions so you pay for only the maintenance need
Right size both on premise functionality and quantity to core products in use, then down covert to free up maintenance and redirect to SAC (source: SAP)
Apply cloud extension policy to allow partial termination of on premise maintenance when replaced by cloud subscription (source: SAP). More details are in the slides here.
Q&A (Analytics Designer)
Q: Analytics Designer samples?
A: Yes, analytics designer samples is available within content network under Samples.
In this demo the bookmark feature is used. If you use the global bookmark, then a group of people's view can be affected. If you save that as private bookmark, then only user specific view will be saved. So it depends on how you implement it.
Q: Is Data Analyzer same as Bex Analyzer behind the scenes?
A: Yes
Q: Is Script in Design mode close to what is available in Lumira?
A: yes, subset of JavaScript language
Q: Dashboard alternatives?
A: New version of Lumira will be available after BI4.3 release
Q: When will App Design support BW live variable API support?
A: Planned for Q1/2020
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This was the last askSAP call of the year
The slides are here. Register for the replay here
Final poll:
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