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May 18, 2016

SAP Announces Range of New Features and Capabilities in Analytics Solutions Portfolio

ORLANDO, Fla.May 18 — As the industry leader for enterprise analytics, SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) today announced a range of new features and capabilities in its analytics solutions portfolio. The updated and streamlined offerings include SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, formerly known as SAP Cloud for Analytics, which combines analytics capabilities into one software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution, and SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise, a next-generation on-premise offering that addresses the needs of companies transforming into a digital enterprise. This announcement was made at the 28th annual SAPPHIRE NOW conference.

SAP BusinessObjects solutions continue to represent the de facto standard in business intelligence (BI) for the enterprise. Going forward, all analytics solutions from SAP will fall under the SAP BusinessObjects portfolio. The portfolio aims to deliver a comprehensive set of modern analytics capabilities, on premise and in the cloud, that work together to analyze data wherever it resides, help users better understand their business, simplify the enterprise and transform in the digital age. By adding new mobile, predictive, data visualization and Big Data analytics capabilities, as well as streamlined packaging and promotions, SAP continues its leadership and track-record of offering customers the analytics solutions that deliver business value and innovation throughout an organization.

The SAP Digital Boardroom solution built on SAP BusinessObjects Cloud delivers a framework for industry-specific content and enhancements for live meetings and collaboration, instantly connecting an entire organization with the information that matters most. There are also new line-of-business use cases and industry-specific examples available for finance, human resources, manufacturing, telecommunications, retail, life sciences, mining, federal, automotive, healthcare, oil and gas, and chemicals.

“SAP is enabling companies to lead in the digital economy by significantly simplifying the platform, providing best-in-class analytics and a superior user experience,” said Stefan Sigg, senior vice president for SAP Analytics. “SAP BusinessObjects remains the most relevant analytics in the industry — and we offer the best end-to-end capabilities both on premise and in the cloud in the market today.”

SAP BusinessObjects Cloud Innovations

With new capabilities available now, SAP BusinessObjects Cloud provides the most complete and integrated cloud-based analytics offering that is purpose-built for SaaS deployments. Enhanced BI capabilities include new visualizations and storytelling, data wrangling and blending, geospatial, trend analysis, custom filters, linked stories, notifications and chat. Expanded planning features include bidirectional integration with the SAP BusinessObjects Planning and Consolidation application, new aggregation methods, enhanced allocations and distribution, expanded versions and privacy controls.

Enhancements to SAP BusinessObjects Cloud allow customers to easily connect and blend existing data sources such as the SAP ERP and SAP Business Warehouse applications, SAP BusinessObjects universes, SAP BusinessObjects Lumira software models, SAP BusinessObjects Planning and Consolidation, SAP SuccessFactors solutions, Salesforce, and Google Drive. Online connection support for the SAP HANA platform allows users to perform analytics without having to move data into the cloud environment. This innovative feature enables organizations to leverage the power of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud while reducing security concerns and avoid the cost and delay of moving data into the cloud.

Predictive analytics capabilities for business users have been added to the SAP BusinessObjects Cloud offering, which already includes SaaS-based BI and planning capabilities. With the new predictive capabilities, business users can use an intuitive graphical user interface to investigate business scenarios by leveraging powerful built-in algorithmic models. For example, users can perform financial projections with time series forecasts, automatically identify key influencers of operational performance, and determine factors impacting employee performance with guided machine discovery.

Red Bull chose SAP BusinessObjects Cloud because of the attractive and intuitive user interface that will enable our business users to quickly respond to evolving requirements,” said Christian Stoxreiter, head of business applications for Red Bull. “The functionality provides powerful analytics in one flexible platform that will enable us to efficiently deliver meaningful insights into the hands of our business users.”

“Mahindra & Mahindra worked to bring together the 18 industries we serve and our 200,000 employees on one harmonized SAP HANA platform, and we see value in using SAP BusinessObjects Cloud to provide agile visualization and analytics to our users in sales, finance and procurement,” said Richard Dsouza, VP of IT for Mahindra & Mahindra. “Bristlecone, an SAP partner, is helping us build solutions on SAP BusinessObjects Cloud and SAP HANA Cloud Platform as the next-generation analytics platform across our organization. SAP and Bristlecone will enable us to have a harmonized, trusted view across the enterprise to help us transform with the digital economy.”

New Mobile Capabilities Available 

The SAP BusinessObjects Roambi mobile app is now available in the United States as a new offering in the SAP BusinessObjects portfolio. It can deliver visualizations instantly to mobile devices so data consumers can intuitively understand and explore data, and share information across the enterprise. As part of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, it can help transform data from diverse sources into rich, interactive visualizations for users, enabling the publication of reports, dashboards and analytics for data consumers – anytime and anywhere.

SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise for On-Premise Analytics

SAP’s on-premise analytics offerings are now available in three new editions, making it easier for organizations to choose the offering that best suits their needs, including:

  • SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise, premium edition, a complete analytics offering of BI, mobile and predictive capabilities plus key enhancements in Big Data analytics that make it Internet of Things–ready, with the addition of a 4-node starter package of the SAP HANA Vora engine to help analyze distributed Big Data across enterprise and Hadoop systems
  • SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise, professional edition, which delivers a modern BI suite with reporting, visualization and discovery capabilities to enable users to easily uncover insights and make better decisions
  • SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise, standard edition, which provides a set of ad hoc reporting tools to offer immediate answers to all users through the Web, desktop or mobile devices

New BI features within SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise deliver further innovation to simplify the platform and enhance user experience. Key benefits and features include:

  • Simple upgrade process with a user-friendly install and configuration wizard for quick deployments
  • A scalable and open platform with support for over 200 data sources including direct access to Big Data including Hadoop and SAP HANA, and SAP BusinessObjects universe integration with Hadoop, SAP HANA and SAP BusinessObjects Cloud
  • Self-service, governed data with Big Data enhancements to SAP BusinessObjects Lumira for agile data access, trust and scale

Predictive analytics features that aim to help analysts easily deliver predictive insights across an enterprise’s business processes and applications are planned for availability in the near term. With planned automated techniques and predictive factory, analysts and data scientists can create and deploy thousands of models and maintain each at peak performance in a fraction of time needed with other techniques. Planned innovations include:

  • Automated predictive analysis of Big Data with native Spark modeling in Hadoop environments
  • Enhancements for SAP HANA including in-database social network analysis and embedding expert model chains
  • A new simplified user interface for the predictive factory and automated generation of segmented forecast models
  • Integration of third-party tools and external processes into predictive factory workflows
  • The ability to create and manage customized models that detect complex fraud patterns for the SAP Fraud Management analytic application

New Promotions Help Customers Get Started Now

SAPPHIRE NOW attendees and SAP customers can take advantage of limited time analytics promotional offers for SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise, SAP BusinessObjects Cloud and SAP Digital Boardroom. To learn more, visit www.sap.com/reimagineanalytics.

About SAP

As market leader in enterprise application software, SAP (NYSE: SAP) helps companies of all sizes and industries run better. From back office to boardroom, warehouse to storefront, desktop to mobile device – SAP empowers people and organizations to work together more efficiently and use business insight more effectively to stay ahead of the competition. SAP applications and services enable approximately 310,000 business and public sector customers to operate profitably, adapt continuously, and grow sustainably. For more information, visit www.sap.com.


Source: SAP

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