Sap Hana Crash Course

Understanding SAP
HANA



Page 2 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


SAP high-performance analytic appliance (HANA) is
a data warehouse appliance for processing high volumes of
operational and transactional data in real time. Developed as
a replacement for disk-based relational database
management systems, SAP has said that it considers HANA
and in-memory technology the centerpiece of its IT strategy
going forward, and that it will eventually power all SAP
applications. Read this E-Guide to understand the evolving
role of SAP HANA, and discover this platform is helping
businesses handle upcoming challenges such as big data and
mobility.

HANA’s Promises of Speed and Simpler Landscapes have
Customers Listening
By: Todd Morrison, News and Features Editor

Ever since SAP first introduced its new in-memory appliance at the
company’s annual SapphireNow conference last year, it has sought to
convince users of the technology’s ability to simplify IT landscapes and
process massive amounts of data in seconds.

SAP high-performance analytic appliance (HANA) is a data warehouse
appliance for processing high volumes of operational and transactional data
in real time. HANA uses in-memory analytics, an approach that queries data
stored in random-access memory (RAM) instead of on hard disk or flash
storage in order to reduce the latency time for bringing data to a processor.

While some customers have balked at being told they need to once again
spend money for faster analytics when they already have spent money on
things like SAP Business Warehouse Accelerator (BWA), others, like Mridula
Sharma have listened.

In-memory analytics could help Sharma’s employer, a public utility in
Snohomish, Wash., process reams of data on subscribers’ usage patterns so

Page 3 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


that they better plan for peak demand periods, she said. At the same time, it
could help them greatly simplify their operations, she said.

“The business warehouse is based on traditional technology, where we take
the data from the main core systems and take it into the business
warehouse,” she said, after which the date is then kept in data containers
called InfoCubes.

“You can actually bypass all of those steps [since] in-memory computing
takes data right from your legacy systems and puts the summarized strategic
reports right out there. The development time is reduced by quite a bit. That
is definitely interesting,” Sharma said.

“Not having to store five years of duplicated data in the cubes,” she added,
“means we can save quite a bit on space.”

Early beginnings
While a lot of attention has been paid to SAP HANA and high-speed
analytics, it’s worth remembering that in-memory technology isn’t new,
according to Rita Sallam, an analyst with Gartner Inc. SAP is the first
company to make it feasible for large enterprises, she said.

That changed thanks to two factors, according to Sallam. The cost of RAM
fell significantly, making in-memory cost effective. Hardware vendors have
also moved to a 64-bit architecture.

“The 32-bit architectures didn’t really support broad of use of in-memory for
enterprise use cases,” she said.

Both factors led to smaller vendors introducing in-memory applications that
were suitable for small and midsize businesses or workgroups, Sallam said.
For example, one of the applications combined in-memory capabilities for
faster performance, along with easy-to-use BI authoring tools and interactive
analysis, she said. Users were able to associate different dimensions and
models without having to build aggregates like with traditional online

Page 4 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


analytical processing models, one of the key advantages of in-memory
computing.

Columns and rows
Within HANA, data is organized in both columns and rows in order for the
data to be retrieved as efficiently as possible, according to SAP.

While row storage provides advantages in metadata storage and logging
used in transactional type workload, according to the company, columnar
data storage is considered “key” to efficient in-memory computing in that it
has the ability to significantly compress data and that with columnar storage,
only data that is directly relevant to execution is accessed.

SAP BusinessObjects and in-memory applications
Developed as a replacement for disk-based relational database management
systems, SAP has said that it considers HANA and in-memory technology
the centerpiece of its IT strategy going forward, and that it will eventually
power all SAP applications.

While SAP equates HANA with being the “engine” that churns and processes
the data, business intelligence (BI) software has to sit on top of HANA to
interpret the data. Although other BI tools will work, SAP says HANA was
built to work and integrate closely with SAP BusinessObjects.

“That is probably the most common use case in terms of having some kind of
analytical tool sit on top of HANA. That’s because everything is in the family,
we’ve optimized the SAP business intelligence suite, to take advantage of
and gain access to HANA,” according to Dan Kearnan, director of SAP
business intelligence.

“So, if you want to design a report, get some analysis, build a dashboard,
and you want to make sure that you’re getting the data you need to from
HANA, you can do that through the suite of SAP BusinessObjects business
intelligence.”


Page 5 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


SAP is also in the process of rolling out a line of prebuilt in-memory
applications for HANA, some of which are completely new and some of
which are in-memory versions of existing applications. Those applications
are designed for a specific need in mind.

“It can be for an industry, for a gap, retail or CPG [consumer packaged
goods] sector. It can be for a line of business, for an HR manager. It’s
whatever are the top KPIs [key performance indicators] that they need to
measure and understand on a day-to-day basis,” Kearnan said.

So far, SAP has generally released two in-memory applications, including
SAP BusinessObjects Strategic Workforce Planning, which lets companies
simulate organizational changes in real time and then see how the changes
will affect business. With the application, personnel executives see how their
companies’ acquisitions and entrances into new markets will affect
organizational structure, according to SAP.

SAP has also released two more in-memory applications, including Smart
Meter Analytics for utility companies and a profitability analysis accelerator,
or CO-PA, for companies processing inordinate amounts of financial data.
SAP is in the process of introducing in-memory applications for cash and
liquidity management, trade promotion management and sales and
operations planning, among others.

SAP HANA’s Long Road to Near-Real-Time Analysis of ERP
Data
By: Laura B. Smith, Contributor

Enterprise customers eager for the fast in-memory technology of SAP HANA
for ERP data analysis will have to be patient, according to one SAP official.
That particular milestone isn’t planned until 2014.

“We’re trying to manage disruption,” said Mike Eacrett, vice president of
product management for SAP HANA at SAP Labs in Palo Alto, Calif. “It’s the

Page 6 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


innovator’s dilemma,” Eacrett said, “figuring out how to take advantage of
new opportunities while managing change.”

Yet Eacrett predicted that SAP will deliver on customer demand for in-
memory analysis of the full ERP within 24 months. “At the end of next year,
we’ll have ERP running on HANA,” he said. “We’re already doing it in-house.”

First described in the spring last year, SAP HANA 1.0 is based on long-held
SAP technology such as the MaxDB database and TREX search engine,
according to Eacrett. SAP delivers the SAP HANA computational engine on
hardware from partners, with pricing based on the amount of data being
loaded into memory, he said.

While currently optimized for querying data in SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0,
the SAP HANA platform has become a magnetic pole to which fragments of
SAP applications are attracted. The roadmap features numerous signposts,
from new in-memory applications designed to run on SAP HANA, to
accelerators for existing applications, to standalone applications that also run
on SAP HANA.

SAP released the first in-memory application to run on SAP HANA, SAP
BusinessObjects Strategic Workforce Planning, in March. The program
allows personnel managers to view existing workforce demographics and
distribution and skills, and model potential changes in real time to simulate
costs.

New SAP HANA solutions to manage big data
Two new technologies, SAP Smart Meter Analytics and SAP CO-PA
Accelerator, allow enterprises to leverage big data for analysis, forecasting
and planning, according to SAP.

Utility companies, inundated by data collected from smart grid systems, can
use the Smart Analytics program to load forecasts, tailor offerings and
improve fraud detection, SAP suggested, while their customers can adopt
more sustainable energy-use practices. “They can bring in weather data to

Page 7 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


plan power consumption,” Eacrett said, “and look at not having to buy on-the-
spot market. It’s all about yield management.”

The CO-PA Accelerator (for costing-based profitability analysis) is designed
to improve the speed and depth of working with large volumes of financial
data, especially in profitability cycles and month-end closing processes,
according to SAP.

In trying to manage disruption to enterprise customers who typically tweak
their ERP systems to optimize performance, SAP plans to release numerous
similar accelerators over the next year to 18 months, according to Eacrett.
He said accelerators are coming for financial and pricing applications that are
very data intensive but provide more real-time insights.

“You can think of the accelerators as sidecars to the ERP,” running specific
queries alongside the larger database, Eacrett said. “We haven’t announced
them all.”

Industry observers expect a standalone application due out soon, Sales &
Operations Planning (S&OP), to be a killer app for SAP HANA.

“A consumer package company may look at data for the last few months and
forecast for the next 10 months, making pricing decisions for the whole
company,” said David Simchi-Levi, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., who is familiar with SAP HANA and
teaches graduate level courses on supply chains.

By performing S&OP on SAP HANA, businesses can instantly evaluate the
production level at a plant, and decide, for example, whether to move
production closer to the customer to cut freight costs, Simchi-Levi said.

The next milestone in the roadmap is a service pack that will enable SAP
NetWeaver BW to run on SAP HANA, Eacrett said. At that point, customers
who are using the SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator to improve performance
can use SAP HANA instead, he said.


Page 8 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


That said, SAP will continue to develop SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator,
according to Eacrett. “The plan is that next year we’ll offer a new version of
SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator, enhanced with some of the HANA
technology, such as simplified administration.”

The goal for SAP is not just to deliver full ERP data analysis with HANA, but
to provide access to users of mobile devices.

With a mobile device connected to an SAP HANA engine, for example, a
salesperson could sit with a customer and offer a discount on a product
based on whether a certain truck, according to the latest SAP HANA
analysis, has left the warehouse, Eacrett said.




Page 9 of 9 Sponsored by
Understanding SAPA HANA

Contents
HANA’s Promises of
Speed and Simpler
Landscapes have
Customers Listening
SAP HANA’s Long Road
to Near-Real-Time
Analysis of ERP Data


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