Learning from Successful Projects: BI Brunch Focused on SAC
In September, it was that time again: The 8th BI Brunch attracted numerous visitors to us. Alongside good vibes and delicious food, there were insights from the world of Business Intelligence focusing on SAC and the upcoming BW transition.
At the end of September, it was that time again: The 8th BI Brunch attracted numerous visitors to the SRB premises. Alongside good vibes and delicious food: insights from the world of Business Intelligence focusing on SAC and the upcoming BW transition.
It started right away with a familiar name: MAM. The baby product manufacturer is a loyal SRB customer and has enriched our sessionsmore than oncewith its success stories. This was also the case at the eighth edition of the BI Brunch. This time with a new topic: Sales & Operations Planning in SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC).
Zoltán Lakatos, Team Lead Controlling Development at MAM Baby AG, and SRB Solution Architect BW Rudolf Ehn jointly demonstrated the central role this production-critical planning plays for MAM. It integrates data from SAP S/4HANA through a modern planning interface and feeds it back for further production planning. For evaluations, the data is transferred to Datasphere and is thus available, combined with other tables, for extensive reporting in SAC.
Marko Cencic, P&T Senior Presales for SAC Planning for CEE Region at SAP,also praised the solution:
“It is great to see and learn from our customers in how many ways they are using our solutions to improve BI and corporate planning.”
Tips & Tricks with SAC
The next presentation dealt with AI in SAC. Arnold Knor, Team Leader EAP at SRB, impressively demonstrated how easily a time series forecast can be set up in an existing planning model with data. He did this not only on slides but live, directly in the SRB SAC test system.
And Arnold was precise: He forecasted the data for past years to compare it with the existing real data. The result: The precision of SAC was met with some “Ahs” and “Ohs” from the audience. I believe I also heard a “Why didn’t we do this already” from a guest.
Also causing some astonished faces was what Julia Arany-Toth, Senior Consultant at SRB, Arnold, and I demonstrated during the subsequent break: On the one hand, the possibility for custom widgets in SAC, and on the other hand, the approach model for SAC and Datasphere.
Especially the custom widgets generated great interest, as they allow SAC to be tailored even more precisely to specific customer requirements. Best practices, reusability, and integration into existing stories were particularly important points.
BW Before Transition – Time to Act
Aha moments were also guaranteed during the presentation on “2027 BW Transition.” Reiner Eberhard, BTP Expert at SRB, Lorenz Juen, a member of the management at SRB, and I presented the hard facts aboutSAP BW 7.x: Mainstream maintenance ends on 31.12.2027. Now is a good time to think about the future. Depending on the components used in data warehousing, such as planning, consolidation, and reporting, there are several options. Besides Datasphere, SAP BW/4HANA is one of them.
“With BW/4HANA, you push the decision to 2040. SAP's strategic product for data warehousing is clearly Datasphere.”
With these words, Lorenz explained SAP's position. Which step companies should take next must be answered individually. Lorenz recommends starting with an analysis of the existing BW system and then determining the appropriate measures. A small survey in the room also revealed that many local companies still have planning or action needs here.
Querying Data with Language
The conclusion of the informative BI Brunch was reserved for Marko Cencic. The SAP professional demonstrated the possibilities of querying data in SAC using natural language and also having it presented graphically. His tool of choice: Generative AI with Joule.
What was particularly interesting was the look behind the SAP scenes. AI technologies are a focus at SAP and are continuously being expanded and refined. The goal is to make it easier for casual users to obtain and work with the data they seek. For example, Marko further showed how widgets can be embedded and updated in PowerPoint.
Also new: In the future, there will also be CO2 content for SAC, and the storage of SAC planning data in Datasphere will be made possible by 2025. Additionally, individual widgets of a story can be embedded in S/4 Fiori tiles, which previously only worked with an entire story. In short: SAC and AI belong to the future. The buffet at the end of this inspiring day, however, belonged to the guests.
