As Microsoft is so ubiquitous in the IT world it stands to reason that most organisations that use SAP also use Microsoft products as part of their technology mix but few are aware of just how much they can use both technologies together.
I have read an excellent blog on the Microsoft site (http://blogs.msdn.com/jbasilico/archive/2008/07/08/using-sap-data-with-microsoft-s-bi-tools.aspx) that explains what options are available and how they can do it. Of course knowing that you can do it and being able to do it are two different things entirely but luckily here at Altius we are a Microsoft Gold Partner and have worked on many large, global SAP BI projects and are perfectly positioned to implement the various options available.
So what options do you have?
- Extracting data directly from SAP R/3 or SAP BI for later reporting and analysis
- This is useful if you want to combine SAP data with other sources in Microsoft Analysis Services (SSAS) to later surface in a reporting environment such as Reporting Services.
- Extracting data from SAP BI 7.0 is going to get a whole lot easier if you use SQL Server 2008 as the latest version of Integration Services will include direct support for SAP Open Hub Services.
- Reporting directly off SAP BI data with Microsoft Reporting Services
- If you already use Microsoft Reporting Services you can build reports directly on SAP BI 7.0 data without staging it in SSAS first.
- Ability to leverage Excel directly against SAP BI 7.0 without BEx Analyzer
- I have successfully used BEx on many project and it is a powerful tool however it does have some drawbacks:
- As a separate Excel add-in it must be installed on every machine in addition to Excel causing a maintenance headache, especially when;
- The latest patch number is 18 so at times I have seen it crash quite frequently although it has been much improved recently.
- You cannot hide the design tools from pure reporting users so they sometimes get inquisitive and subsequently confuse themselves.
- Using a pure Excel environment will be much more familiar and more than capable for large sets of lightweight reporting issues.
In addition other integration opportunities include displaying SAP data on SharePoint and also embedding SAP into Microsoft Office using Duet. It is fast becoming the case that nearly any type of integration is possible as long as you have the right skills, Microsoft are really improving the collaboration options with each new release and that can only be positive for their customers.