De Nederlandse BI Podcast: SAP TechEd 2023

We’re back!! 😉

SAP TechEd 2023 is inmiddels weer achter de rug. Wat is er allemaal aangekondigd? Wat viel op tijdens de keynote? Wat is er nieuw in SAC en Datasphere? Dit en meer in een splinternieuwe aflevering van De Nederlandse BI Podcast!

[Sorry, Dutch only, but maybe some AI tool can translate the podcast! 😀]

SAP TechEd 2020 – Running SAP Data Warehouse Cloud in a Live Environment [CM103]

SAP TechEd 2020 was a completely virtual event and we (the Interdobs DWC team) were given the opportunity to host session CM103 to talk a bit about our experiences with SAP Data Warehouse Cloud (and SAP Analytics Cloud) in a live environment.

Obviously it always better to be in Las Vegas for TechEd, but I must say that this virtual studio event was very well setup and executed by SAP. And, the best thing about virtual events is that you can watch specific content on demand whenever you want. So check the replay of our session below.

Running SAP Data Warehouse Cloud in a Live Environment [CM103]
Explore best practices for running the SAP Data Warehouse Cloud solution in a complex environment with multiple data sources.

SAP TechEd 2019 Highlights

I went to Las Vegas SAP TechEd 2019 a couple of weeks ago, of course focussing on all the new stuff for SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) and the brand new SAP Data Warehouse Cloud (DWC). Let’s go through some highlights.

Embedded Analytics

Announced a long time ago already, but now shown for the first time: SAC as a completely integrated reporting and analysis solution with SAP cloud applications. With this it is instantly possible to use SAC on top of the data from the particular tool, with a live connectivity! For example: when using SAP Fieldglass, you can start up the built-in SAC instance and create a model on top of the Fieldglass tables to get data into a story. This new features will be part of the existing license for the cloud application, but only gives access to the BI features of SAC. In case you want to combine data from different sources or use predictive and planning features, you’ll need to switch to the “standalone” version of SAC. The goal is to have live connectors towards all the SAP cloud applications in the standalone SAC, although there were no timelines provided. The cloud offerings that will contain an embedded SAC first are SAP Fieldglass , SAP SuccessFactors and SAP Data Warehouse Cloud.

SAP Analytics Cloud Mobile

The mobile solution for SAC is still lagging far behind the web version. There still is no Android app available (promised for end of 2019), there is no proper integration with the SAP Analytics Hub (Q2 2020) and the Analytics Designer apps don’t work (Q2 2020). On short, we can expect improvements in the areas of live prompts and SSO (no more double logins). SAP has a lot of work to do to catch up, especially as the mobile team has a lot of interesting ideas for future direction: there will be more emphasis on use cases and workflows where the users use the app to answer very specific questions (eventually via speech), instead of just loading and interacting with predefined reports. The vision is that the app would learn form this behavior and offer a timeline and push messages to provide information and insights in a more pro-active way.

SAP Data Warehouse Cloud

TechEd 2019 had a lot of attention for the new DWC, as it was mentioned in almost all sessions, including the keynote. I get the enthusiasm, especially when you combine the potential of this solution with “embedded SAC”, as this could give power users a complete toolset to setup their own mini data warehouse within a governed SAC ecosystem. With its direct (live) connectors to SAP and non-SAP source, a fully web-based cloud environment which is easily maintainable and scalable, and the reporting and analysis feature set of SAC this could be a serious alternative for all those local MS Excel/Access solutions that we still see a lot. The creation of a model in DWC is pretty simple (drag & drop) and does not require SQL knowledge. So in concept it looks great, but also here a lot of work still needs to be done before they can bring this to market.

In conclusion, this was pretty interesting convention and it is absolutely clear that the position of SAC within the full SAP ecosystem is only getting stronger.

SAP BI TechEd 2014 recap video

Why waste your precious time and thousands of euros on going to the SAP TechEd event if you can get just watch a video covering all the key subjects for SAP BI?

Sven and Ronald did a quick 45 minutes SAP BI TechEd 2014 recap in Google Hangout last week. No marketing slides and no old or basic stuff we normally have to sit through each SAP presentation. Fast and very to the point. Good stuff guys!

So this is must see TV if you care about what’s happening in the the world of SAP BI and if you didn’t visit TechEd or SitNL yourself this year. Check it out in the video below or use the podcast stream for on the road listening/watching. Slides are here.

Edit: Sorry forgot to mention: The video is all Dutch… (maybe somebody can write the subtitles?)

De Nederlandse BI Podcast – episode 5 Live TechEd edition

We recorded a very special live broadcast of De Nederlandse BI Podcast today, recorded live from the SAP TechEd 2013 in Amsterdam as sessions EXP10052  and EXP10053. In this edition we invited the audience to participate in the discussions. And, as a one time only exception: This podcast is in English! Have fun!

As always you can check it in iTunes, on our website or just use the Podcast player below.

Pictures by @SjoerdM and @RamonHutters