SAP cloud ecosystem - but not without architecture!

DSAG is also joining in the song of growing cloud adoption, albeit nowhere near as loudly. With Rise, the Walldorf-based group has committed itself to a strategic vision whose platform is based in principle on cloud technologies. In addition, the offerings of the major hyperscalers Microsoft, Amazon and Google for the operation of SAP systems are also growing. Customer companies are expecting strategic advantages from the transformation of their SAP systems to the cloud. There is no longer any sign of restraint.

Focus on enterprise architecture

With the knowledge of the major cloud competitors, the SAP cloud ecosystem is not a pure universe. Rather, cloud platforms exist, sprout and develop both at SAP and at technological market companions. The multitude of participants - from providers to service providers - enables the realization of the corresponding network effects for all players in the ecosystem. However, due to the high speed of innovation, the cloud ecosystem is changing so rapidly that customers can easily lose track of it all.

But how can SAP customers still benefit from the constantly growing ecosystem as a player? They need to locate their own IT map in a future SAP cloud ecosystem today! Ideally, this is done with defined strategic guard rails and a roadmap - ideally with a view to their own enterprise architecture. Enterprise architecture as a method for holistic management - from a company's business to its technology - is a discipline with a long history and provides the necessary platform integration. Nevertheless, the transformation to an integrated platform is not limited to IT, but must also consider the business. Within the last 20 years, the modeling of the enterprise architecture on the layers business, application and data up to the technology has prevailed.

From practice

The example of the SAP S/4Utilities industry solution can be used to illustrate the benefits of such platform integration with the help of the enterprise architecture accordingly. SAP customers in the utilities industry are facing the challenge of the transformation to S/4Utilities and the associated steps into the SAP cloud ecosystem. 

The first step is to look at the business layer. Which processes will be handled by the future integrated platform? Starting with product design in the sales process, through the start of delivery, to termination or product change, everything is covered in the future S/4Utilities. For other processes, there is usually recourse to established non-SAP solutions that want to be suitably integrated. And for market communication? Here there is SAP technology from the cloud, the Market Communication Cloud (MaCo Cloud).

Once the functional scope of the future utility platform has been defined, the next step is to design the corresponding application architecture. Derived from the requirements, S/4Utilities must be planned with the associated NetWeaver stack, the Hana database and the Fiori components. This also includes the corresponding business intelligence components, BW/4Hana and the SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC). Not to forget the MaCo Cloud and the multitude of existing non-SAP applications.

A good match

With the target architecture defined in the application layer, the technological components, the lowest layer of platform integration, can now be designed. Specific tools are required for the administration of the SAP architecture alone. With the help of subnets, the corresponding network areas are separated from each other and monitored using Azure Firewall. The Cloud Connector is used to connect the SAP cloud apps SAC and MaCo Cloud. Even more classic SAP technologies such as the SAP Router and the Web Dispatcher are necessary and must be mapped in the corresponding architecture. In addition to the necessary SAP technologies, there are also a large number of corresponding Azure services. For example, Azure Storage must be used to provide the corresponding data exchange directories for interfaces. At the end of the conceptualized platform integration of SAP applications and cloud apps, Microsoft Azure services and the non-SAP applications from existing infrastructures, the only question that remains to be answered is who will implement.