The omnipotent Hana

SAP EVP Björn Goerke emphasized several times during his DSAG Technology Days keynote that HCP should not be confused with HEC. The Hana Cloud Platform (HCP) is a kind of meta-framework for developing SAP add-ons and Fiori apps.

HCP offers interfaces to the R/3 and ERP 6.0 data silos as well as publishing mechanisms for iOS and Android applications. Hana Enterprise Cloud (HEC), on the other hand, is ERP as cloud computing based on the Hana database.

In both cases, Hana technology is a key component. E-3 Magazine asked Hana busters Guido Hoepfner and Matthias "SolMan" Kneissl, both from Q-Partners, about the SAP community's perception of Hana.

SAP offers Hana not only as a database, but also as a platform, HEC and HCP. What does Q-Partners primarily focus on and what is currently and in future in demand from existing customers?

Matthias Kneissl: At the moment, existing customers are asking for Hana as a database, in conjunction with BW, ERP or as an S/4 solution. HEC and HCP are more marginal topics, especially in the German market and in SMEs.

With Hana, SAP not only wants to establish a new database model for BW and ERP, but also create a new platform and redesign app development. Do you also see this approach and, from Q-Partners' perspective, how do you rate this strategy?

Guido Hoepfner: It is definitely an interesting strategy to expand the platform for app development. In general, it is always the case that customers implement their own advantages in the business processes individually in an SAP solution in order to secure a market advantage. It might be difficult to find apps for this in an app store.

Kneissl: The business of customization and individualization will remain. A platform for app development and an app store live from the apps. We are still sceptical about the extent to which apps can be programmed and provided in a standardized way and then integrated into the customer's system.

A central place for Hana app development should be the Hana Cloud Platform (HCP), is that how you see it?

Kneissl: With the Hana Cloud Platform, SAP provides a powerful tool. Nevertheless, an SAP system is not comparable to the complexity of a smartphone, for which you simply install new applications from an app store and pay for them by direct debit.

Hoepfner: The complexity is significantly higher and the business processes are usually individualized by the customer. Apps can only close the gap where SAP has functional weaknesses, but these are generic and affect a majority of users - regardless of their processes. As a result, there will still be customer-specific solutions that are implemented locally in the customer systems.

At the moment, SAP seems to have more answers than questions: Do you have a clear view of which tools can be used to solve which problems? When do you use the NetWeaver stack, CAL (Cloud Application Library), Hana PAL (Predictive Analysis Library), HEC or HCP?

Hoepfner: It is always an individual decision of a customer requirement as to what is best used for what. To this end, we also support customers in workshops to determine the right technological basis. But we agree with you - the many technological possibilities make it very complex and difficult for the customer to maintain an overview. Especially because new "answers" are regularly provided by SAP, which the user must first understand in order to be able to assess their advantages and disadvantages.

Kneissl: In most cases, however, the customer is first concerned with the first step of converting the NetWeaver stack to Hana. The CAL is a good solution to quickly obtain demo systems from SAP that are fully customized and to take a first look at the new technologies with regard to processes. Hana PAL is always only the second step after the technological changeover.

Q-Partners is regarded as the leading system house for SolMan, among other things. How do you rate the new version? What surprised you? What is still missing?

Kneissl: A lot has happened in the new version, and for the better. The Solution Manager has grown more and more in terms of functionality over the past few years.

No wonder - especially as the management of complex landscapes must also be controlled accordingly by IT tools. Overall, the Swiss army knife is now much thicker, but individual tools can no longer be operated separately from each other.

The requirement - no great surprise to us - to document all company processes in Solution Manager has always been there, but the technology was still in need of optimization in some areas. As far as process documentation is concerned - in our opinion the flagship of Release 7.2 - a lot has changed.

Hoepfner: The big question is whether users will accept and really use the new features. Documentation is and always has been a problem in the IT sector, and convincing customers to invest in their process documentation in a meaningful way has not been easy.

The topic has only been accepted hesitantly. Now the tools have improved significantly, the only question is whether they will be used. I think that in an environment in which SAP is a minority, it will continue to be difficult to establish Solution Manager as a "single source of truth" and to convince the specialist departments and IT to use this tool.

Is the new SolMan already Hana-ready in practice?

Kneissl: The new SolMan is already Hana-ready, and not just with 7.2. 7.1 was already available as a Hana version. Integration in monitoring for Hana systems was also a given.

However, this always involved a strong focus on on-premise installations. There was no support for change management for Ariba or SuccessFactors here.

And for the hybrid cloud?

Kneissl: The Solution Manager is also suitable for the hybrid cloud. Of course, there are always new requirements that are certainly not yet fully integrated in 7.2.

What is much more important, however, is that it makes no sense to use tools other than Solution Manager to efficiently and effectively operate the monitoring or lifecycle management of an SAP landscape.

SAP is trying to offer a seamless offering for cloud computing and Hana. Theoretically, Hana could also be operated in other cloud environments - does that make sense?

Kneissl: The operation of Hana in other cloud environments depends solely on the use cases. Theoretically, of course, the database itself can be available everywhere as a cloud solution and this is certainly an exciting proposition.

However, the question arises as to who will have to switch from their previous environment to a Hana environment and therefore may also have to make massive adjustments to the application. All users are currently still very cautious here, so it is questionable whether such an offer will be successful in the medium term.

Do you have hands-on experience with Hana in the two leading cloud offerings, AWS and Azure?

Kneissl: We have already used both providers as a proof of concept to set up SAP systems, including of course the operation of Hana systems. The Azure concept is so good that we will now also move our own internal systems, which we use for training and demo purposes, to Microsoft Azure in the cloud.

Amazon also has a very good concept, but was initially comparatively expensive. While you can currently at least opt for hosting in Europe with Azure, this is not possible with AWS. In addition, support and sales are also very impersonal there.

What are the decision criteria for Hana on premise or Hana in the cloud?

Kneissl: With this question, we are not talking about whether we want to operate Hana on premise in outsourcing, but whether we really want to go into HEC. To answer this question, we first need to look at the extent to which our own environment has been customized.

As already described in the April E-3 cover story on S/4 Hana, the transition to HEC with the various add-ons that are available is tricky when many in-house developments are in use. An in-house versus outsourcing operating concept is then more of a commercial issue.

From Q-Partners' point of view, who else besides SAP could distinguish themselves in the future with Hana services as a Hana cloud in the sense of HEC or HCP and why?

Kneissl: In terms of cloud operation as pay-per-use, Microsoft Azure offers very good starting points. The only thing we encounter time and again here in Germany, of course, is concerns about data protection.

As Microsoft is now planning its own Azure data center in Germany, these concerns should then be a thing of the past. Scaling effects can certainly only be expected from global players and not from smaller providers.

Amazon could also become interesting if sales support and assistance are intensified. The concept itself is very good. I think there will also be a lot of development in this area in the direction of T-Systems.

Mr. Hoepfner, Mr. Kneissl, thank you for the interview.