Friday, November 11
SAP Business Intelligence
This post is an introduction to SAP business intelligence. Lets talk about the issues the business intelligence looks to solve, the origins of these problems, and the need to use business intelligence and the reasons why it is used and an overview as to how SAP has implemented this as an architecture.
Lets start now. For years companies have been gathering data using many software products. They have been using different data processing systems, ERP which stands for Enterprise Resource Planning and also CRM systems. So anything that has to do with data entry will have data capture. Several Bytes of data has been gathered. Companies have been archiving that data where it has not been retrieved anymore.
Another issue that is faced by the companies is that information is globally distributed. Companies have data which has been collected globally. All types of data is on different types of systems, databases, operating systems, and platforms. This will represent another challenge for companies.
Also when you look at the amount of data that has been amassed over the years, this will only continue to grow. This can be seen as a positive or a negative aspect. But to the business analyst, historical data will always seem to be very useful and is seen as a positive factor. Another factor in this stage is that the companies need to stay ahead in competition and to do so they need to be able to make strategic decisions.
So today we see a lot of asking questions companies ask like- what kind of products are maing us the most profits? , how are our sales doing compared to last year? , how can I predict turnover for the coming year? You can see that these questions are specific to the sales part. But if you made an analogy, for example human resources, then the questions asked can be like which companies have led as compared to last year, how many new things do we have?
What are the various possible solutions? First of all it tries to aggregate data into a place from where it can be accessed. This increases the performance of the data for which the report we have made. It also tries to take up all the business processes into consideration, from human resources to sales, marketing, development. It combines it all into an accessible to create reports and help to chart the companies to make quick decisions., the information that is needed to create these reports. Which in turn helps the components to make decisions.
So how does SAP Business intelligence do this. First of all it provides with data warehouse, where you can retrieve data from. It retrieves data from different source systems and aggregates all into one congregation. The second step is the business intelligence platform, which cleanses the data and then duplicates and transforms so that it can be used later.
And on top of that we have the analysis tools that will be used to speed up reports for the data in the business intelligence platform. This will raise a question- whose job is this? You of course. You will be responsible for implementing these solutions as a business intelligence consultant. You will help the organization be more competitive, help to increase revenue. In this way you will provide value to the company. In turn the company sees you as an asset.
The SAP business intelligence components would be the data warehouse, business intelligence platform, and the business explorer.
First of all the data warehouse extracts data from multiple sources and provides a single source of access to the data. We can extract data from all of the databases and web services and files like excel files. And hence we can access data from one single source.
Next is the business intelligence platform. This is the analytical engine, the brain behind the scene. The main aggregation takes place, slicing and dicing of the data takes place here and it provides data for the reports to be made.
The last part of the system is the business explorer. This is different form others. This is the part that everyone sees. It displays reports charts and graphs. It shows the statistics. It shows a couple of tools available in the SAP like the Bex analyzer, Bex web analyzer, Bex query designer, etc.
SAP is the provider for solutions like other companies like COGNOS and MICROSOFT. SAP business objects was recently acquired by the SAP to help directly compete with all the other providers. This shows that SAP regards business intelligence as of core importance, and it would be a good field to start a career in.
Lets start now. For years companies have been gathering data using many software products. They have been using different data processing systems, ERP which stands for Enterprise Resource Planning and also CRM systems. So anything that has to do with data entry will have data capture. Several Bytes of data has been gathered. Companies have been archiving that data where it has not been retrieved anymore.
Another issue that is faced by the companies is that information is globally distributed. Companies have data which has been collected globally. All types of data is on different types of systems, databases, operating systems, and platforms. This will represent another challenge for companies.
Also when you look at the amount of data that has been amassed over the years, this will only continue to grow. This can be seen as a positive or a negative aspect. But to the business analyst, historical data will always seem to be very useful and is seen as a positive factor. Another factor in this stage is that the companies need to stay ahead in competition and to do so they need to be able to make strategic decisions.
So today we see a lot of asking questions companies ask like- what kind of products are maing us the most profits? , how are our sales doing compared to last year? , how can I predict turnover for the coming year? You can see that these questions are specific to the sales part. But if you made an analogy, for example human resources, then the questions asked can be like which companies have led as compared to last year, how many new things do we have?
What are the various possible solutions? First of all it tries to aggregate data into a place from where it can be accessed. This increases the performance of the data for which the report we have made. It also tries to take up all the business processes into consideration, from human resources to sales, marketing, development. It combines it all into an accessible to create reports and help to chart the companies to make quick decisions., the information that is needed to create these reports. Which in turn helps the components to make decisions.
So how does SAP Business intelligence do this. First of all it provides with data warehouse, where you can retrieve data from. It retrieves data from different source systems and aggregates all into one congregation. The second step is the business intelligence platform, which cleanses the data and then duplicates and transforms so that it can be used later.
And on top of that we have the analysis tools that will be used to speed up reports for the data in the business intelligence platform. This will raise a question- whose job is this? You of course. You will be responsible for implementing these solutions as a business intelligence consultant. You will help the organization be more competitive, help to increase revenue. In this way you will provide value to the company. In turn the company sees you as an asset.
The SAP business intelligence components would be the data warehouse, business intelligence platform, and the business explorer.
First of all the data warehouse extracts data from multiple sources and provides a single source of access to the data. We can extract data from all of the databases and web services and files like excel files. And hence we can access data from one single source.
Next is the business intelligence platform. This is the analytical engine, the brain behind the scene. The main aggregation takes place, slicing and dicing of the data takes place here and it provides data for the reports to be made.
The last part of the system is the business explorer. This is different form others. This is the part that everyone sees. It displays reports charts and graphs. It shows the statistics. It shows a couple of tools available in the SAP like the Bex analyzer, Bex web analyzer, Bex query designer, etc.
SAP is the provider for solutions like other companies like COGNOS and MICROSOFT. SAP business objects was recently acquired by the SAP to help directly compete with all the other providers. This shows that SAP regards business intelligence as of core importance, and it would be a good field to start a career in.
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