Efficient Optimization for License Management with Xiting
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Key Takeaways
⇨ SAP S/4HANA has transformed license management, shifting from transaction-based licensing to user-permission-based licensing, which complicates the licensing landscape with new metrics and usage-based licenses.
⇨ Organizations must maintain a comprehensive and organized authorization concept to adapt to evolving SAP licensing requirements, emphasizing careful role design and continuous tracking to avoid unexpected costs.
⇨ Xiting’s Authorizations Management Suite (XAMS) offers strategic tools like the Role Profiler and Role Designer for efficient license management, allowing organizations to analyze and simulate license requirements effectively to ensure compliance and cost-effectiveness.
S/4HANA has changed how SAP licenses are managed. Traditionally, SAP licenses were based on the transactions a user completed, however, the permissions users now determine these. Additionally, managing SAP licenses have become more complex due to new metrics, usage-based licenses, and digitization’s growing role.
Although SAP provides certain standards for improving transparency, this is in an Excel format, which makes it challenging for companies to analyze user roles and license types efficiently. Considering SAP’s authorization framework is evolving, even minor role changes can change license requirements and lead to unexpected costs. This necessitates consistent, and continuous tracking by organizations and also requires them to design roles carefully, using the “least privilege” approach to avoid extra costs.
It is also imperative to have a clear and organized authorization concept especially due to the changes affecting SAP S/4HANA licenses. Optimizing license assignments requires a comprehensive approach. Focusing only on license costs might save money in the short term but could lead to a fragmented and hard-to-manage authorization structure, increasing costs eventually. Any organization’s authorization concept should also include compliance factors like segregation of duties (SoD), proper technical configurations like SU24, and clear role definitions, such as who can read, write, or manage master data. A well-rounded authorization concept ensures your system remains efficient, easy to maintain, and ready for the future.
To manage these challenges, a strategic solution like Xiting’s Authorizations Management Suite (XAMS) helps efficiently manage licenses and user authorizations, ensuring smooth and cost-effective license management. XAMS offers solutions for authorization projects, role redesigns and maintenance, vulnerability analysis of customer-specific ABAP code and the creation of SAP security concepts with the help of different modules.
XAMS emphasizes two key modules for license management: the Role Profiler and Role Designer. The Role Profiler provides a detailed view of user licenses and the impact of role assignments, helping organizations monitor changes and avoid unnecessary costs. The Role Designer allows organizations to simulate license requirements in a virtual environment during the role creation process and establishes a comprehensive approach to authorization management.
Regular updates to the SAP license framework within XAMS are essential, as changes to the framework may occur between support package releases. The Role Profiler enables easy analysis of roles and users, highlighting any shifts in license types due to role modifications. Together, these tools offer a transparent and strategic approach to SAP user and license management, ensuring efficient and cost-effective handling of licenses. XAMS not only integrates SAP’s official licensing framework to enhance transparency and accuracy in license determination through the Role Profiler. Paired with the Role Designer, this system automatically checks licenses during role creation, ensuring the correct license types for roles and users are identified early in the design process, which adds significant value by simplifying license management.
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