Mar 31, 2022
•1 minute read
SAP Analytics
SAP Analytics focuses on how organizations use enterprise data to generate insight, support better decisions, and automate parts of day-to-day decision-making across SAP environments. The topic spans business intelligence, machine learning, artificial intelligence, SAP HANA, the Predictive Analytics Library, SAP Data Intelligence, SAP Analytics Cloud, and SAP AI offerings embedded across business processes.
Analytics connects business users, data scientists, ML engineers, finance leaders, supply chain teams, and IT organizations around a shared goal: turning SAP data into operational insight, predictive capability, and business process intelligence.
What is SAP Analytics?
SAP Analytics is the use of SAP data, analytics platforms, and embedded intelligence to understand business performance, identify patterns, predict outcomes, and guide decisions inside enterprise processes. It includes descriptive analytics through BI, advanced machine learning models that learn from changing data, and AI capabilities that support problem-solving and decision-making.
SAP Analytics focuses on how organizations use enterprise data to generate insight, support better decisions, and automate parts of day-to-day decision-making across SAP environments. The topic spans business intelligence, machine learning, artificial intelligence, SAP HANA, the Predictive Analytics Library, SAP Data Intelligence, SAP Analytics Cloud, and SAP AI offerings embedded across business processes.
Analytics connects business users, data scientists, ML engineers, finance leaders, supply chain teams, and IT organizations around a shared goal: turning SAP data into operational insight, predictive capability, and business process intelligence.
What is SAP Analytics?
SAP Analytics is the use of SAP data, analytics platforms, and embedded intelligence to understand business performance, identify patterns, predict outcomes, and guide decisions inside enterprise processes. It includes descriptive analytics through BI, advanced machine learning models that learn from changing data, and AI capabilities that support problem-solving and decision-making.
The end-to-end process of BI involves analyzing the data generated by businesses, transforming the data into insights, and leveraging those insights to make optimal decisions. BI tools primarily leverage “descriptive analytics,” because these tools traditionally focus on analyzing current and historical performance based on data generated by the enterprise.
In practice, SAP Analytics helps organizations use tools such as SAP Analytics Cloud, SAP HANA, SAP Data Intelligence, and SAP AI capabilities to support reporting, planning, predictive analytics, automation, and business process improvement.
What are some SAP Analytics use cases?
Business intelligence and reporting
Teams use BI tools to analyze current and historical enterprise performance, transform business data into insights, and support decisions based on descriptive analytics.
Predictive analytics
Organizations use machine learning algorithms and SAP HANA’s Predictive Analytics Library to build models that learn from input data and support predictive use cases.
Self-service analytics
SAP Analytics Cloud supports business users with intuitive, AI-guided analytics capabilities, helping functional managers work with analytics without needing to be data scientists or technical managers.
Enterprise planning
SAP Analytics Cloud combines planning, predictive analytics, reporting, and BI, allowing organizations to use it as a collaborative enterprise planning tool.
Business process intelligence
SAP AI offerings are positioned to infuse intelligence into lead to cash, design to operate, source to pay, and recruit to retire processes.
Data science and ML development
SAP applications support data scientists and ML engineers building advanced ML models and solutions, while also helping end users perform advanced analytics with minimal technical proficiency.
What does SAPinsider research say about SAP Analytics?
SAPinsider research shows that analytics maturity increasingly depends on cloud-based platforms, self-service access, and cross-functional data models. SAP Analytics Cloud reflects this shift by combining planning, predictive analytics, reporting, BI, and AI-guided analytics for business users.
The SAP Business Data Cloud benchmark shows that data foundations remain a major constraint. Only 3% of organizations have a unified governed data layer, while 38% remain siloed, limiting progress toward real-time analytics and AI-driven decision-making. Still, investment momentum is building. SAPinsider found analytics modernization was a top SAP BDC driver at 28%, followed by AI and agent-based use cases at 26%.
SAPinsider’s AI maturity research reinforces the importance of trusted analytics foundations. While 91% of respondents report some AI use, 79% cite access to high-quality, trusted data as a requirement for successful AI strategies.
Discussing Payment Fraud Risk Management with ApexThe extensive nature of supply chain networks creates many points of risk. One of such risks is supplier payment fraud within the procure-to-pay space. Some examples of procurement fraud are supplier spoofing, business email compromise, and spoofing an officer of a company. Procurement fraud is becoming more prevalent and is becoming more and more sophisticated. The fraud instances exploit weaknesses that are prevalent due to manual control processes that many organizations still leverage. The need of the hour is to employ smarter and automated solutions instead of manual controls.
To discuss this critical topic, SAPinsider invited Akhilesh Agarwal, COO & EVP, Global Procure to Pay Solutions & Applied Technology at apexanalytix for a discussion.
A Detailed Look at the Latest SAP Analytics Strategy and RoadmapThis session will explore the latest SAP Analytics strategy, how it is set up, and how it aligns to SAP’s corporate strategy and Rise with SAP. You will examine what is in store for SAP Analytics Cloud and how the future direction will impact BI, planning, and augmented analytics. Learn about planned innovations and come away with a solid understanding of the functionalities and features you can expect in coming releases of SAP Analytics Cloud. You will also understand how you can gain greater analytics capabilities by leveraging SAP BusinessObjects BI and SAP Analytics Cloud together.
Key takeaways:
• Understand the strategic directions and areas of investment related to SAP Analytics
• Get an overview of the key capabilities and identify scenarios ideally suited for SAP Analytics Cloud with SAP S/4HANA
• Understand the value of combining modern BI, augmented analytics, and planning capabilities of SAP Analytics Cloud with SAP BusinessObjects BI
Jan 6, 2022
•1 minute read
Technology And Empathy: Creating The LinkDisruption is a norm in the world of technology. We attribute the phenomenon of big companies being disrupted by new entrants to many aspects, like advancements in technology, emerging technologies, agility of new entrants etc. but have we explored deeply the aspect that at the core of disruptions in the world of technology is the ability of the organization, that is getting disrupted, to empathize with its customers? The fact is, a majority of problems in the world of technology can be addressed with the power of empathy- the ability to understand the pain, needs, wants and emotions of other human beings. This article explores the need to integrate technology with empathy.
Oct 28, 2021
•4 minute read
The Imperative of Analytics in the CloudBy Kumar Singh, Research Director, SAPinsider Accelerating Digital Transformation Initiatives Every technology leader knows that the cloud will be a business imperative in the future. The explosion in digitalization, data, and analytics methodologies means that organizations realize that their current on-premises environments are not sustainable from a long-term perspective. And while this contemplation comes from […]
Oct 20, 2021
•7 minute read
The Three Key Ingredients of Business Analytics SolutionsJust like marketers have struggled with the question “what does the customer want?” for eternity, analytics leaders have struggled with the question “how to build a data-driven organization?”. It is very clear at this point that the key is to inculcate the culture of data and analytics in the frontline of the organization, making them a breeding ground for citizen analysts and data scientists. But how to attain that objective has been a challenge. Millions have been invested in tools and technologies to become a “data-driven” organization. Though a majority may not admit it, most organizations are far away from becoming one. Despite investing millions in “best-of-breed” tools. So is it not about tools and technologies? It is about the tool. It is the analytics tool that these frontline workers leverage will determine if they end up embracing those tools as the most important arsenal in their toolchest. While analytics tools become more and more powerful and feature rich, many of them still lack three key ingredients that I believe needs to be embedded in a business analytics solution . These three ingredients are:
Intuitive
Interactive
Integrated
In this article, we will review these three key ingredients an analytics tool needs to have to become a significant contributor in your journey to become a data driven organization.
Aug 13, 2021
•3 minute read
Financial Analytics as a Strategic Business AssetA curiosity is driving finance leaders to learn how automation, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning can elevate the finance function and with it, the company’s entire analytics strategy. At the heart of this desire is data. This article explores how modernization and financial analytics can work together to help the finance department deliver value to the business in new ways and what’s required to unlock opportunities in this space.
Mayank Sinha, Senior Director Solutions & Value Engineering at Qlik, suggests that one of the keys to business acceleration is being able to quickly and easily access data, “and not just SAP data, but SAP data combined with data across the enterprise, such as e-commerce or other Internet of Things (IoT) devices.” By integrating data from multiple systems and sources that support the order-to-cash process, the business can gain a clear view of where to focus, whether it is booking or fulfilling orders faster or receiving customer payments sooner.
With that knowledge coming from the finance function, the company could improve on key measures like days sales outstanding and potentially unlock significant cash, which might be sitting in working capital. According to Sinha, “the best finance leaders are using financial data and analytics to drive business transformation, monetize data for growth, or provide financial governance in the new digital economy.”
Read this article and learn:
- What is shaping the finance function, how finance professionals can enable the business through data-driven insights, and the technologies that support world-class financial analytics.
- How finance leaders are using data and analytics to drive business transformation.
- The importance of employing data analytics and AI to elevate your financial department’s value.
Jul 30, 2021
•9 minute read
Leveraging Data Connection Gateways to Harness Full Value from Analytics InvestmentsBy Kumar Singh, Research Director, Automation & Analytics, SAPinsider The critical role of analytics in digital transformation Organizations today are rapidly evolving into mathematical corporations, driven by analytics and technology. Fueled by an explosion in data, they are making strategic as well as day-to-day decisions based on insights generated by this data. Hence, it […]
Jul 23, 2021
•7 minute read
How SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) aligns with evolving trends in data and analyticsby Kumar Singh, Research Director, Automation & Analytics, SAPinsider With data rapidly becoming the new currency, we have recently seen an explosion in the number of data and analytics tools in the marketplace. Advances in computing technology, availability of open source programming tools and the exponential increase in the data that organizations generate and […]
Jul 23, 2021
•4 minute read
Supply Chain Product Innovation With Data and AnalyticsThe pressure to innovate to launch new products and solutions emerged as a top business imperative in the response to the recent SAPinsider survey on the use of data, analytics and automation in supply chain. The survey results intend to help us formulate our storyline for upcoming February research report, Building Resilient and Agile Supply Chains Leveraging Data, Analytics and Automation. The emergence of this specific business driver highlights that data and analytics in supply chain can not only help organizations streamline their supply chains but in some industries, can help launch innovative or new products and services as well. A good example is the logistics and transportation industry. In this article, we discuss how this industry can use data and analytics beyond building efficient logistics and transportation networks.
Jul 17, 2021
•4 minute read
Automating Monitoring and Control of Warehouse Time Standardsby Kumar Singh, Research Director, Automation & Analytics, Supply Chain Management, SAPinsider Critical role of time standards in Warehouse operations A warehouse manager can use time standards in a variety of applications and in virtually any type of working environment. Some of these applications are explained below: Estimating Labor requirements Scheduling jobs and workflows […]
Jul 15, 2021
•2 minute read
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