Tight chains broken

The swan song for SAP's Business One solution for small and medium-sized businesses has already been sung many times. But it is a well-known fact that the dead live longest.

In the slipstream of the perhaps more prominent solutions Business Suite (BS) or the All-in-One midmarket solutions (AiO) based on it, Business One, B1 for short, has developed quite splendidly.

About two years ago, SAP already cited 30,000 B1 installations. It must be taken into account that Business One is not only used by small mid-sized companies, but also by a steadily increasing number of internationally active mid-sized companies and large corporations.

And especially in their foreign branches or subsidiaries - usually with a connection to a central SAP system (BS or AiO). B1 is now available in no less than 40 national languages!

SAP, but different

On the architecture side, B1 is not based on the Business Suite or on the classic 3-tier architecture; it is - if you like - a simpler 2-tier structure.

The ERP solution, which is aimed at small and medium-sized businesses or subsidiaries, always comes with the MS Windows operating system and the MS SQL Server database.

However, times are changing, and the all-too-tight chains are being broken. More freedom of choice is the order of the day. Hana makes it possible. B1 users are already able to benefit from the fast in-memory database, for example through FI/CO simulations - in conjunction with Suse Linux, the only operating system platform certified by SAP to date in conjunction with Hana.

What to do

B1 customers who are flirting with Hana and Suse Linux need support to master the architecture change without major unrounding and to quickly use the possibilities of in-memory with an innovative operating system platform to their advantage.

As a rule, the established B1 partner can help here, provided he has Hana, Linux and integration know-how or cooperates with a partner whose offering complements his own.

As in the case of B1 SAP partner Versino and Fujitsu partner Ines' infrastructure and integration expert. Among other things, Ines is able to carry out the configuration of network interfaces and hardware-side server monitoring for automatic notification in the event of hardware component failure, as well as the adaptation of various Linux configuration files as specified by SAP - to ensure optimum interaction of a Hana solution in an existing customer network.

The actual B1 implementation partner thus finds a platform to adapt the SAP application solution to the respective customer requirements as needed or to tailor it for the go-live.

In any case, there are Hana B1 solutions that meet the needs of the target group. Fujitsu, for example, supports Hana with SAP-certified infrastructure solutions and services.

The Hana solutions for B1 are pre-installed and tested with the Suse Linux operating system on request and are delivered with the complete Hana software stack.

In addition, with targeted initiatives, Fujitsu and Suse offer B1 partners or SAP solution houses the opportunity to upgrade in terms of Hana and Linux know-how.

After all, customers have had few points of contact with both in-memory and Linux, which has practically become a matter of course in larger or large companies. The company B1-Systems, for example, is active as a Suse Linux training provider in the B1 environment.

New beneficial applications

You don't have to be a prophet - Hana will also make its way in the Business One environment, and with it the use of Linux. As with the Business Suite and All-in-One, the first step will be side-by-side solutions in the form of SAP Business One Analytics.

The fact that the Business Suite can be used exclusively with Hana (for OLTP and OLAP applications) - precisely without the classic relational databases - is already a reality. It is also a fact, as announced by SAP, that the All-in-One solutions will follow. All that's really missing is Business One.