Analytics is driven by data and hence even best-of-breed tools like SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) need robust data integration to harness their capabilities fully. Data connection and seamless integration to data sources are critical to building robust data and analytics capabilities and this is something that SAPinsiders have highlighted consistently in our surveys. As evident from our most recent survey for the research report Future of Business Intelligence Benchmark Report, 73 % of respondents place seamless connectivity between analytics applications and data sources as among the top technology requirements that Business Intelligence (BI) tools must-have in the future. These requirements are shown in figure 1.

Figure 1. Top Technology Requirements For Future of Business Intelligence

Source: SAPinsider Future of Business Intelligence Benchmark Report

Data connection types in SAP Analytics Cloud

The good news is that SAP Analytics Cloud supports a plethora of data sources. It offers a variety of connectivity options and can be integrated into an enterprise's existing data and analytics landscape or can be used as a stand-alone enterprise analytics platform. At a high level, these connections can be divided in two broad categories:

• Live data connections
• Import data connections

The explanations of these two types are simple. Live data connections are ones where SAP Analytics Cloud taps directly into the underlying data and reads directly from the data source. Needless to say, as we will see in a subsequent section, SAP Analytics Cloud seamlessly connects live with SAP systems. Import data connections are connection instances where the data moves (gets imported) from an external source into SAP Analytics Cloud for analysis.

Live Data Connections in SAP Analytics Cloud

As mentioned earlier, a live data connection allows SAC to read the data directly from the connection. The data is not duplicated in SAP Analytics Cloud (only metadata for the underlying data is stored in SAC). Some of the data sources that SAP Analytics Cloud can connect live with are:

• SAP HANA
• SAP S/4HANA
• SAP S/4HANA Cloud
• SAP Business Warehouse (BW)
• SAP BW/4HANA
• SAP BusinessObjects Universes
• SAP Cloud Platform
• SAP Data Warehouse Cloud
• Embedded SAP Business Planning and Consolidation

In addition to these, tools like APOS Live Data Gateway provides you with capabilities to connect various additional data sources live. Refer the following link to understand more about how tools like APOS Live Data Gateway can help. https://sapinsider.org/the-critical-role-of-seamless-data-connections-in-building-best-in-class-analytics-capabilities/ https://sapinsider.org/market-insights/video-qa-with-chief-technology-officer-cto-apos-systems-on-importance-of-seamless-data-connections-2/

Import Data Connections in SAP Analytics Cloud

As the name suggests, data is imported into SAC in this type of connection.  So obviously there needs to be a connection first but then the data is imported post the connection. The advantage of this type is that the types of sources that you can connect to are much larger in your portfolio, as compared to a live connection.

• Microsoft Excel files
• Comma Separated Value (csv) files
• Salesforce
• Google drive
• Google sheets
• Google BigQuery
• Java Database Connectivity (JDBC)
• SAP SuccessFactors
• SAP Concur
• SAP Fieldglass
• SAP Cloud for Customers
• SAP ERP
• SAP S/4HANA and SAP S/4HANA Cloud
• SAP BPC
• Partner connectors are offered by the likes of APOS and DataDirect Cloud

What does this mean for SAPinsiders?

Remember that the lists of connections mentioned above for each type of data connection are indicative and SAP is always actively working on expanding these connection capabilities and so are external partners like APOS. SAP official analytics product roadmaps are a good source of information to understand what is the future roadmap of connectivity options for SAC. In general, however, from a practitioner's point of view, some aspects that you should keep in perspective when thinking about data connections in SAC have been highlighted below. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list of all the aspects you may need to consider.

• Purpose of Analysis: This is important since, first of all, it obviously dictates what data sources and data types you will need. That obviously is a critical element in formulating your data connection plan.
• The model being leveraged: Some models are less resource-intense than others. And the type of connection you establish may impact run time performance, among a few other aspects. Hence, the type of model that you plan to leverage is also is a key consideration.
• Data Volume: This associates closely with the above two aspects of purpose and model. Data volume is an important criterion to keep in mind since it will impact the model performance if the type of connection does not align with the volume of data.
• Data Security aspects: This is another requirement that will dictate what type of data connection you need to establish. There may be security requirements that come standard with the application or they may be built-in inherently within the business application you may be trying to connect to.

You can explore data connectivity for SAC more in-depth in SAP community forum under the connectivity topic: SAP Community Discussion Topic on SAC Data Connectivity