Wednesday, May 20, 2009

SAP NETWEAVER BUSINESS WAREHOUSE

Timely access to relevant information has always been critical to business success. Now, with the widespread use of the Internet, wired and wireless data collection technologies such as RFID, and the subsequent increase in new data sources, it's even more important.

SAP NetWeaver Business Warehouse (SAP NetWeaver BW) paints a complete picture of your business to satisfy the diverse needs of end users, IT professionals, and senior management. It brings together a powerful business intelligence infrastructure, a comprehensive set of tools, planning and simulation capabilities, and data-warehousing functionality – delivered through enterprise portal technology.

With SAP NetWeaver BW, you can integrate data from across the enterprise and beyond, and then transform it into practical, timely information to drive sound decision-making, targeted action, and solid business results. It supports:

  • Data warehousing – Data warehouse management; business modeling; and extraction, transformation, and loading enable you to build data warehouses, model information architecture according to business structure, and manage data from multiple sources.
  • Business intelligence – Online analytical processing, data mining, and alerts provide a foundation for accessing and presenting data, searching for patterns, and identifying exceptions.
  • Business planning – A BI planning framework with secure workflow capabilities supports Microsoft Excel or Web-based planning and budgeting based on consolidated corporate data for bottom-up or top-down planning.
  • Business insights – Query design, reporting and analysis, and Web application design allow you to create analysis reports, support decisions at every level, and present business intelligence applications on the Web.
  • Measurement and management – Business-content management, metadata management, and collaborative business intelligence monitor progress, provide reporting templates, ensure consistent data, and help decision-makers work together.
  • Open hub services – Open hub services features enable the delivery of high-quality, audited enterprise information through Web services to applications. Bulk data exchange, change data capture (CDC), and modeling features streamline deployment and enable cost-effective operations.
  • Information broadcasting – Information broadcasting features support the distribution of mass information to large audiences in a personalized and secure manner. You can broadcast information as an offline document or live report through personalized e-mail or the Internet, according to a schedule or based on key events.
  • Accelerated business intelligence – Based on compressions, parallel in-memory processing, and search technologies, the SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator functionality improves the performance of queries, reduces administration tasks, and shortens batch processes. Developed as an appliance on Intel processors, the accelerator provides consistently fast response times, even as data volumes, number of users, and analytics increase.

SAP NetWeaver BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE

Timely access to relevant information has always been critical to business success. Now, with the widespread use of the Internet, wired and wireless data collection technologies such as RFID, and the subsequent increase in new data sources, it's even more important.

SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence (SAP NetWeaver BI) paints a complete picture of your business to satisfy the diverse needs of end users, IT professionals, and senior management. It brings together a powerful business intelligence infrastructure, a comprehensive set of tools, planning and simulation capabilities, and data-warehousing functionality – delivered through enterprise portal technology.

With SAP NetWeaver BI, you can integrate data from across the enterprise and beyond, and then transform it into practical, timely information to drive sound decision-making, targeted action, and solid business results. It supports:

  • Data warehousing – Data warehouse management; business modeling; and extraction, transformation, and loading enable you to build data warehouses, model information architecture according to business structure, and manage data from multiple sources.
  • Business intelligence – Online analytical processing, data mining, and alerts provide a foundation for accessing and presenting data, searching for patterns, and identifying exceptions.
  • Business planning – A BI planning framework with secure workflow capabilities supports Microsoft Excel or Web-based planning and budgeting based on consolidated corporate data for bottom-up or top-down planning.
  • Business insights – Query design, reporting and analysis, and Web application design allow you to create analysis reports, support decisions at every level, and present business intelligence applications on the Web.
  • Measurement and management – Business-content management, metadata management, and collaborative business intelligence monitor progress, provide reporting templates, ensure consistent data, and help decision-makers work together.
  • Open hub services – Open hub services features enable the delivery of high-quality, audited enterprise information through Web services to applications. Bulk data exchange, change data capture (CDC), and modeling features streamline deployment and enable cost-effective operations.
  • Information broadcasting – Information broadcasting features support the distribution of mass information to large audiences in a personalized and secure manner. You can broadcast information as an offline document or live report through personalized e-mail or the Internet, according to a schedule or based on key events.
  • Accelerated business intelligence – Based on compressions, parallel in-memory processing, and search technologies, the SAP NetWeaver BI Accelerator functionality improves the performance of queries, reduces administration tasks, and shortens batch processes. Developed as an appliance on Intel processors, the accelerator provides consistently fast response times, even as data volumes, number of users, and analytics increase.

SAP NETWEAVER APPLICATION

SAP NetWeaver Application Server brings together a proven infrastructure with the interoperability and flexibility of Web services technology. With this component of SAP NetWeaver, you get support for platform-independent Web services, business applications, and standards-based development.

SAP NetWeaver Application Server provides an open and reliable infrastructure for deploying highly scalable Web applications and Web services. Features and functions include:

  • Development – SAP NetWeaver Application Server provides an Eclipse-based interactive development environment, called SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio. As a starting point for all Java development tools and the integration basis for all infrastructure components, SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio supports efficient development of Web Dynpro, Web services, and Java/J2EE business applications. It supports the development of Java projects on a large-scale basis for both SAP technologies and standard technologies such as Web services and J2EE.
  • User interface development – Web Dynpro, part of SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio, allows you to develop professional user interfaces for business applications. Based on a powerful and flexible model-view-controller architecture, it provides a clear separation of user interfaces with back-end services to ensure fast responses for highly interactive user interfaces.
  • Security – SAP NetWeaver Application Server supports state-of-the-art Internet security standards such as HTTPS, Secure Sockets Layer (SSL), and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP). It provides secure communication between all client and server components, authentication and single sign-on capabilities, central user administration, digital certificates, digital signatures, and auditing capabilities.
  • Persistence layer support – With SAP NetWeaver Application Server, you receive support for platform-independent Web services and business applications. You also receive support for standards-based development built on technologies such as J2EE and ABAP. SAP NetWeaver Application Server works with all open technology platforms – including the leading hardware, operating systems, and databases – based on open standards. Open SQL for Java allows developers to access a relational database in a portable and efficient manner.
  • Deployment – SAP NetWeaver Application Server includes integrated deployment capabilities to run applications and a repository to manage versions. It also provides a file storage medium that combines flexible use of the local file system with secure and efficient storage of a relational database on a central server.
  • Scalability, performance, and high availability – SAP NetWeaver Application Server enables scalable, high-performance business processes, primarily through sophisticated, business-driven caching and dispatching techniques. High performance is provided by the component's architecture, along with SAP's proven transaction capabilities in a distributed environment. High availability is ensured by automatic distribution of requests to other SAP NetWeaver Application Server instances, should one server be unavailable.
  • Software logistics and life-cycle management – Sophisticated change management and transport services support not only the first implementation of an application, but also the continuous changes that result from business or organizational changes, or the implementation of additional functions. Comprehensive software logistics for the development, test, and production landscape are prerequisites for continuous enterprise operations.

Monday, May 18, 2009

THE BUSINESS CASE FOR SUSTAINABILITY

DRIVING SHORT- AND LONG-TERM PROFITABILITY

Over the last couple of years, the business environment has fundamentally shifted. Organizations are operating more and more in global business networks and are now facing an economic crisis that is forcing them to focus on profitability and cash flow.

As the current global environmental and social climate worsens, businesses need to take control of increased risks and seize new, hidden opportunities for profitability:

  • Regulations on the local, regional, and global level are proliferating.
    Managing regulation compliance is notoriously error-prone, cumbersome, and expensive. However, once automated, these compliance processes can be leveraged to reduce cost and risk, while creating competitive differentiation never before seen.
  • Brand reputation, market share, and stakeholder value depend on sustainable operations.
    Customers and stakeholders alike are demanding accountability and transparency over business practices and sustainable operations. By leveraging technology and best practices from sustainability thought leaders, you can measure, model, and analyze your sustainability performance – enhancing your brand and market share now and for years to come.
  • Energy and natural resource efficiency is more important now than ever before.
    Natural resources continue to become increasingly scarce and expensive. Take control of your processes to optimize energy and natural resource consumption of all your operations (even your IT data centers), protecting your profitability in light of volatility.

Deliver Business Processes that Improve Sustainability

The need for comprehensive, unified solutions around sustainability topics is considerable. Solutions need to support data collection, analysis, and management in an automated, standardized, and cost-efficient way with all relevant information linked into existing systems for procurement, finance, controlling, supply chain management, or delivery.

SAP solutions and services provide the easiest way for companies to holistically manage sustainable operations and to achieve new levels of business process excellence. SAP is the only technology provider that:

  • Offers industry-specific solutions for sustainability that can be integrated company-wide
  • Enables visibility into data in one source, accurate and timely reporting, and easier overall compliance – no matter whether you manage people, emissions, products, or materials
  • Delivers sustainability capabilities that can be embedded across all analytical and operational processes

Learn more about SAP's solutions for sustainability.

SAP Solutions: making your business A Best – run business

SAP provides a comprehensive range of enterprise software applications and business solutions – designed for global operations and supported with globalization services – to empower every aspect of your business.

You gain the visibility to pinpoint inefficiencies – and the capabilities to transform them into competitive advantage. The foresight to identify new opportunities – and the agility to respond. The functionality to optimize your operations – and resources to extend best practices to your entire value chain.

SAP SOLUTIONS FOR SUSTAINABILITY

Holistically manage risks and opportunities for improved profitability

Today, the current business climate has evolved into an environment where:

  • Regulations on the local, regional, and global level are proliferating.
  • Brand reputation, market share, and stakeholder value depend on sustainable operations.
  • Energy and natural resource efficiency is more important now than ever before.

Long recognized as a leader in sustainability by the Dow Jones Sustainability Index since its inception in 1999, SAP believes that sustainability is based on the recognition that economic, social, and environmental challenges are increasingly connected and requires a holistic management approach. SAP also believes that this management approach leads to increased profitability as it significantly reduces the risk and cost of operations, while creating new opportunities for competitive differentiation and market share.

As a continuation of our commitment to sustainability, SAP is collaborating and co-innovating with our ecosystem of customers, partners and stakeholders to expand the reach and impact of business solutions for sustainability to companies worldwide.

SAP Solutions for Sustainability

Whether starting a sustainability plan or adjusting a strategy that is already in place, sustainability requires businesses to reconsider their practices and consider a whole new set of risks and opportunities concerning socio-economic, environmental, safety, and health issues.

SAP can make it easy to holistically manage your sustainability strategy and achieve new levels of business excellence. Discover how SAP can help you on your journey to sustainability:

  • Understand the business case for sustainability
  • Turn sustainability strategy into execution
  • Reduce the footprint of your data center