Capacity planning is not a trivial task. Choose your hardware vendor and equipment carefully, and upgrades will pose few problems. Choose the wrong vendor-model combination, and you will be forced to make extensive changes to your hardware and operating system that will entail extensive planning and testing, and could ultimately require all new equipment. So how do you, as a customer, set yourself up for a successful collaboration with your hardware vendor - one that ensures the final system design meets your current requirements and adequately scales over time? This article describes the capacity planning process, some basic tools and techniques employed by the vendors, and how you can ensure all of these items work in your favor as you attempt to size your SAP R/3 system.
Kurt Bishop
Kurt Bishop is a retired member of SAP America’s Technical Consulting Team. He has experience in both application and technical support of the R/3 system, where he provided a variety of consulting and support services for customers and colleagues. Kurt started his seven-year career with SAP in 1994 providing project management consultation for customers with a specialization in technical project management. After two
years in this position, he began concentrating on performance and tuning. By popular demand from customers and SAP employees throughout North America, he then concentrated his skills on capacity planning services, where he worked to standardize and improve the process for both customers and vendors.
Prior to joining SAP, Kurt spent seven years as a management consultant for one of the “Big Six” consulting firms. In this capacity, he was involved in both management and information systems consulting for a broad range of firms and industries. He spent considerable time developing strategic systems plans for some of the nation’s most prestigious firms, as well as assisting many clients in reengineering their business practices
and related support systems. He also has eight years of experience “in the trenches” of information systems for the oil and gas industry, including positions from programmer analyst to project manager, where he developed the skills that prepared him for consulting. His skills are also augmented with four years in manufacturing and materials management, where he served as production manager.
You may contact the author at
kurtbishop@aol.com.
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