As on-premise, so in the public cloud

SAP user companies are increasingly setting out to use cloud computing. This development is of course no coincidence, but is linked to SAP's intensive activities in recent years in terms of IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service), PaaS (Platform as a Service) or SaaS (Software as a Service).

Many existing SAP customers are currently focusing on SAP hybrid cloud deployment with the use of various IaaS application scenarios (use cases) including public cloud services. To a large extent, the projects are based on recognizably reduced operating costs.

Another part sees it as an opportunity to quickly and cost-effectively drive innovations against the backdrop of digitization or to free up their backs to implement new digital transformation projects in the first place.

As is well known, data management in the application infrastructure ensemble, consisting of server(s), database(s), network, operating system platform and system management, plays a prominent role in every SAP deployment.

In both SAP Classic (NetWeaver with Any DBs as the basis) and SAP Hana and SAP Hana-based application solutions, NetApp takes the position of a kind of Data Authority and has steadily turned the innovation wheel a bit further, very often in cooperation with SAP.

With this in mind, it is clear that NetApp is bringing the proven benefits that benefit enterprises worldwide to hyperscale public cloud environments.

This includes, for example, compression, data deduplication, cloning or integrated data protection with continuous availability and high availability including storage-based backup, high-end performance and maximum scaling with the Clustered Data Ontap operating system up to the SaaS variant Cloud Volumes Ontap.

What's more, in the case of Microsoft Azure, cloud volumes services are also provided as enterprise-class shared file systems (Azure NetApp Files in Azure Portal), with the well-known high and proven performance as well as the recognized broad NetApp features.

The basis for this is the so-called Data Fabric platform and a portfolio of data services that ensure end-to-end connectivity in on-premises and cloud environments with overlapping functions.

This makes data management in the connected environments significantly simpler and more transparent. As a result, digital transformation projects, for example, can be realized more quickly.

In principle, SAP customers book cloud services with the corresponding public service provider or hyperscaler: Hana services, operating system services or data services. And all these services are placed in a cloud.

Amazon AWS, the Google Cloud Platform or Microsoft Azure. The public cloud providers provide corresponding SLAs or are responsible for them. All public cloud service providers are characterized by the fact that they either constantly optimize or continuously expand their offerings. And they do so at a high rate of innovation and change.

Nevertheless, it should be noted that no public cloud provider provides too many insights or does not disclose its intellectual property or specific technical features in detail.

For example, how hypervisors were optimized, which latency times exist when and where, how the networks in a data center are designed with which bandwidths and which data throughput.

In the case of "Azure NetApp Files", it is a native high-performance and stable Azure service. This means that physical NetApp systems are operated in Azure.

And with all relevant NetApp features. Whereby Microsoft provides simple and easy-to-use provisioning models or subscription classes: They allow to provision NetApp capacities or resources in a few minutes, depending on the selected features.

There are two models for billing, time-based billing including all license costs or, in the case of Cloud Volumes Ontap, also the option of purchasing the Ontap license directly from NetApp and only billing the use of the infrastructure with cloud service providers according to the procedures customary there.

The same ontap is used for the cloud solutions that is also used by on-premise customers. Only in a form optimized specifically for the cloud consumer.

This provides the customer with an NFS that has been hardened over the years specifically for SAP operation and can access ontap features such as SnapShot and cloning, thereby creating fast and application-consistent backups as well as SAP system clones.

Furthermore, an SAP NetApp customer can realize snapshot backups for his application directly from Azure, or restore and recovery integrated into the SAP tools. It is also possible to move data to object stores for long-term archiving.

It is also possible to easily set up or operate a highly available NFS with a distinctive functionality for mission-critical SAP use, even with large data volumes. The Azure file system with sizes of up to 100 TB can currently be used as part of an Azure NetApp file share.

SAP Hana large instances in the form of bare metal systems are also offered on Azure. NetApp bare metal support is possible in principle. Azure bare metal sizes for Hana DBs start at 1 TB.

Points with homogeneity

SAP customers who use NetApp on-premise and implement a hybrid cloud approach with the public cloud deployment NetApp on Azure naturally benefit in an ideal way from a usable NetApp technology and functionality commonality or homogeneity.

They can also draw on similar or identical management functionalities. For example, SAP Lama (SAP Landscape Manager). After all, NetApp and SAP Lama have long been closely intertwined.

Speaking of homogeneity. Of relevance in this context is that when using a hybrid approach based on NetApp, not only a simple copying of data can be carried out, but also a secure and efficient data move or an advantageous data synchronization.

Switch with Cloud Sync

For users who have been running data management and storage systems from other vendors in their on-premise landscape and prefer NetApp on Azure, NetApp offers tried-and-true transfer solutions, such as those called NetApp Cloud Sync.

Through the partnership with SAP, NetApp is able to serve virtually all existing customers, all IT infrastructure landscapes, and all operational concepts with high-performance and validated system solutions including NetApp features such as snapshot-based backup, system copies at the push of a button, and efficient storage replication - in on-premise landscapes, as well as in private cloud environments with open stack, and in hyperscaler public cloud operating environments.

Integrated hybrid cloud data services provide data visibility, access and control, backup, and security. SAP customers are ready for SAP hybrid cloud computing with NetApp.