Business Suite is dead, long live the Business Suite

The SAP Business Suite is perhaps an exception here: as the term has special nuances in the SAP ecosystem. With the revival of the Business Suite, however, we should take a closer look under the hood.

Breaking with SAP conventions

I think what SAP is doing is right and important - SAP is breaking with some conventions from the past (opening up the systems, platform strategy, process flow) and thus creating a foundation for customers to interlink their software even better. Ideally, it doesn't matter which system you use, the main thing is that the process runs and the results are right.

Intelligent Enterprise

The basis for this is what SAP has often marketed in recent years as the Intelligent Enterprise - a concept based on a smart data strategy, low-touch and automation for true end-to-end processes (very broken down, admittedly). Connecting systems in different areas such as procurement, HR, ERP, sales and analytics so that processes run through them to make intelligent, data-driven decisions.

When it comes to manually repetitive tasks, these can ideally be supported by AI - be it RPA, ML or even with the new agents. Isn't that the dream of every enterprise architect (and user)? But what needs to happen for this to happen? Systems need to be able to communicate with each other - they need to speak the same language, figuratively speaking. If they don't, the gaps become clear and end-to-end remains a pipe dream. This is precisely the point at which many companies find themselves: The vision is there, after all.

First comes the tidying up

From a technical perspective, however, this is often still a long way off. Not necessarily in the distant future, but before tackling such scenarios, many companies first need to tidy up: establish release capability, clean up and standardize data, (re)evaluate relevant processes and bring them into line with the standard. This is all homework that is tangible, but will not be completed overnight. However, they are all the more essential in order to realize the vision of "real" end-to-end.

The name Business Suite

And this is exactly what describes the Business Suite in principle as the new go-to-market tool from Walldorf. But a few important questions remain: Is the Business Suite the new Intelligent Enterprise? Certainly in parts. Does the Business Suite (new) refer to the Business Suite 7.0? No. That is an undesirable coincidence. We can argue about the naming. Does the Business Suite (new, see above) describe the vision? Yes. Could a different name have been chosen for good reasons to avoid confusion? Yes. Because the fact remains: ECC and Business Suite 7.0 are discontinued models.

Go-to-Market

Is the Business Suite (new) a technical or a commercial model? So far, the Business Suite is primarily a go-to-market. We may know what commercial tricks are coming in May, when SAP will certainly reveal more about this at the Sapphires.

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