qlikview sap

STRATEGY PARTNERS INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT 2005

Chasa Ursa Major

CH-7550 Scuol

Switzerland

QlikView for SAP-Users

Whitepaper - Version E 1.0

November 2005

Helmuth Gümbel - Managing Partner

Strategy Partners International

Chasa Ursa Major

CH-7550 Scuol

[email protected]

Text and Illustrations were compiled with utmost of care. However, the author will not take responsibility or be held liable for any possible remaining incorrect information and the resulting consequences thereof.

This piece of work is protected through copyright. All rights concerning the translation, reprinting, the use of illustrations, radio broadcasting, the reproduction through photgraphic or any other means, as well the storage in dataprocessing facilities, even if only excerpts are utilized, are therefore reserved.

SAP, R/3, mySAP and NetWeaver are brands and trademarks of SAP. QlikView and QlikTech are brands of QlikTech International AB.



Table of Contents

Goal of this White Paper ............................................................................1

Management Summary .............................................................................2

The Special Situation of SAP-Customers ..............................................3

What does an SAP-User want?..................................................................5

QlikView – a Solution................................................................................6

How Compatible is QlikView with the SAP-Architecture?...................11

When is QlikView interesting for the SAP-User? ..................................11

When is QlikView a less sensible choice? ..............................................12

Bottom Line ..............................................................................................13

Index of Illustrations.................................................................................14

Strategy Partners InternationalS


Goal of this White Paper

We want to help CIOs making investment decisions for complimentary

software in an SAP environment by supplying important background

information. In particular, readers will receive information on when to select

QlikView and how to position such an investment in the light of SAP’s

NetWeaver strategy, as NetWeaver contains business analytics in addition to a

broad range of middleware functions.


STRATEGY PARTNERS INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT 2005 2S

Management Summary

In a time where information needs are constantly changing, where there is an

abundance of data, yet a lack of information, interest in analytical tools is

growing day by day. Unfortunately it is difficult, complicated and expensive

to get to quick and easy to understand information. Data compiled often

originates from very different systems and even if a company has standardized

on a single applications vendor such as SAP the environment can be very

heterogeneous due to different software release levels.

Part of SAP’s product line is a business intelligence product. Users found the

product to be quite useful in a number of analytical roles and well suited for

the construction of complex data warehouses, but they also were quick to

recognize that is requires lengthy and expensive preparations.. QlikView is an

attractive alternative, when quick data analysis without the building a complex

Data Warehouse or Data Mart is called for. As one user put it: “Using

QlickView it took us a day and a half to fulfill 80% of requirements that we

had not been able to satisfy in year and a half using SAP BW “.

QlikView uses patented technology, which is able to process large amounts of

data at a very high speed.

Apart from offering important Cost-of-Ownership advantages QlickView also

gives you more architectural flexibility:

• QlikView neither forces you to follow SAP’s proposed migration

strategy to NetWeaver

• nor does QlikView constitute an obstacle when implementing

NetWeaver.

• Choosing QlikView does not constitute a predisposition towards

any middleware stack.

Choosing QlikView can free your business analytics decisions from strategic

ballast as low cost allows for quick amortization. Hence, we recommend

using QlikView whenever only analytics are required, data warehousing is not

(yet) an issue and high performance as well as flexibility are desired. Of

course, QlikView can be used in a Data Warehouse environment.



The Special Situation of SAP-Customers

At the Sapphire 2005 in Boston SAPs CEO America, Bill McDermott

declared: "Clients have made their choice. Best of breed is gone." This

statement, though referring to CRM competitor Siebel, bought recently by

Oracle, is meant to say that SAP believes it can handle all requirements with

its broad set of applications.

In reality, it is very difficult to find SAP installations using exclusively SAP

software even in functional areas, where SAP excels. At this time, SAP has

only about 50% functional penetration in its customer base. The rest is a

whole plethora of other applications.

Though there are many reasons for this, they all point in the same direction:

users always choose the solution that, after having deliberated all the criteria,

is the most suitable for them at that moment.

SAP Versions Installed 5/2005

5%

6%

7%

8%

58%

14%2%

3.1i4.0B4.5B4.6B4.6C4.7 CoremySAP ERP

Source: Strategy Partners International

On the other hand, SAP has sold mySAP-software-suites to a great number of

customers. Even though over 50% of the SAP customers have such licenses

the overwhelming majority of them still use older versions. SAP wants to

leverage the termination of regular maintenance at the end of 2006 to make

Figure 1: Old SAP versions prevail



customers migrate but many customers will continue to first look at their own

business before evaluating software vendor proposals for migration.

Over 80% of SAP’s customers are expected to continue having heterogeneous

software environments. SAP customers running several installations often use

different versions that cannot be upgraded easily and cost effectively. Old

applications are still in use due to practical and financial reasons, and though

they still function adequately, they do not meet the need for a uniform

technological concept, as postulated by SAP. Corporate mergers and

acquisitions and the increasingly important cross-enterprise collaborations

continue to add new elements into the application portfolio.

Users want to establish a uniform view on their corporate data quickly and

without hassles. Migrating the applications to a uniform platform, however, is

difficult, risky, time consuming, and expensive.

A migration like that would also increase the dependency on one vendor, his

weight and the speed of his technology development.. This is a discomforting

prospect for many users.

The ever increasing demand for fast data analysis is accompanied with the

growing inability to consolidate all data into one system..

What are the requirements SAP users have for a modern business analytics??



What does an SAP-User want?

Most SAP-Installations already have a wide spectrum of analytical tools, such

as Microsoft Excel, where the basics are easily learnt, but whose boundaries

are quickly reached when more complicated demands arise. In addition, the

once praised freedom of choice has often turned into a hard to control chaos.

Today, many companies are unable to say how the data that they “only” use

for decision support was created and what tools were used.

Most users want:

• a tool, that is easy to learn and that will produce results within a few days. Simple and user-friendly, it should allow an intuitive way of working without requiring data modeling knowledge

• short implementation times allowing them to experience success quickly

• a solution, that does not require waiting for the outcome of a multi year SAP migration and upgrade plan

• the flexibility to choose freely from a plethora of data sources, including older SAP versions Without having to worry about unexpected or hidden costs

• to be able to introduce SAP BW at a later stage without having to re-architect the system or the need to buy a different business analysis tool

• a high speed of analysis that is sustainable even in the light of rapidly growing data

• a solution with low infrastructure requirements that is database independent.

• business analytics that can be implemented quickly and easily without lengthy preparations

• transparent analysis with reproducible results. The majority of analysis is used for decision making. There is a general trend towards improved trackability on all levels of the decision making process (either enforced by law as in the case of Sarbanes-Oxley or mandated by quality assurance standards as in the cases of Six Sigma and ISO), and users increasingly want transparent analysis processes.

• independence from a vendor’s technology stack (NetWeaver, WebSphere, .NET…)

• a vendor focusing totally on business analysis rather than using BI as a tool to make users buy additional applications.

• a solution that is affordable, has low costs of operation, and can be budgeted predictably today and for the foreseeable future.



QlikView – a Solution

Most companies have heterogeneous data and a plethora of applications.

Notwithstanding all attempts to consolidate, we view this state of

heterogeneity as permanent. By definition heterogeneity is not constant and it

is very hard to predict how it will evolve in detail. This makes business

analysis tools that are data and application independent very attractive. They

do not require uniform environments at all. SAP, as an applications

manufacturer, has a great interest to migrate customers to newer versions. To

keep migration pressure high, newer SAP solutions have very limited

backwards compatibility and it is difficult or even impossible to integrate

them with older SAP software versions.

That problem doesn’t exist for an independent manufacturer like QlikTech.

All data systems and applications are the same for them – and they support

what is needed by the customer. The QlikTech product QlikView will adapt

itself – it has integrated data extraction tools, which can not only access SAP

systems, but will also allow access to SAP’s Business Warehouse. In addition,

many other application systems are supported and, of course, extracts can be

made from data of custom made applications.

How does QlikView meet the demands detailed above?

Quick learning. QlikView has a three level user- and role concept. General

users, called “analyzers” by QlikView need only a few minutes to become

familiar with QlikView. Professional users building analysis need about two

days’ training. The IT expert, covering all technical aspects, is called

Enterprise User, needs to have an understanding of the underlying data model

as a prerequisite. Two days of training are sufficient to cover all aspects of his

role. Easy to learn, QlikView is also very easy to use: analytical displays,

called “Sheets”, allow for more profound analysis (“drill-down“) at any time.

Changing the view on the data, slicing and dicing it differently, can be done

any time without starting the analytical process from its beginning. Users can

fully concentrate on the analysis without being sidetracked by procedural

aspects (such as pre-defined drill down paths).



Short implementation times: the highway to quick success. Typically,

QlikView is implemented and fully operational within a few days. Users are

delighted to see results quickly. They can almost instantaneously start learning

from their results and refine their analysis.

Independence of SAP migration and upgrade plans. There is no

dependence on migration or upgrade planning as QlikView is not tied to the

SAP infrastructure. For instance , you do not have to wait until a Business

Warehouse has been implemented or for a mySAP ERP introduction. On the

other hand, QlikView does not get into the way with such plans. Thus, a lot of

pressure is taken out of the planning.

Free choice of data sources. QlikView is essentially suitable for any kind of

data source. Most all data types and databases can be retrieved via ODBC or

OLE DB connections. QlikView can also get to data from any other structured

source such text-, Excel- or XML-files. Data from various ERP applications

from vendors such as SAP, Intentia/Lawson, Oracle or Microsoft can be

integrated. QlikView doesn’t have any hidden costs or unpleasant surprises

either, because there are no data volume dependent fees nor are there any

vendor audits. Unlike with SAP’s BW, where you need an expensive

OpenHub when exchanging data with other systems, there are no such

restrictions with QlikView. Using QlikView’s salient openness and data

integration capabilities is free from additional license costs.

No architectural restrictions. QlikView can directly access SAP data

through using an interface that is also used by many ABAP programs.

Alternatively, an ODBC driver may be used. Installations using SAP BW

now, or that are planning to do so in the future, can use QlikView as well.

BW can be used as a data source by QlikView, too. Thus, a BW-strategy

remains always an option - organizations do not have to give up such plans.

High speed of analysis. QlikView uses patented technology employing main

memory instead of a database. This technology offers not only extreme

speed, but also allows for quasi associative data access resulting in unique

flexibility when designing and changing analysis. Users can construct their

data views without being restricted by a schema – in fact, they do not even

have to know such schemata. Data is extremely compressed when loaded into



memory. As shown in a practical case, 200 million records from a 15TB Data

Warehouse took only 4 GB of main memory. This high performance

technology allows sustainable advantages even for large and rapidly growing

data. In some situations, this technology has proven to be the only alternative

to get to analysis results within an acceptable time frame.

Low infrastructure requirements. QlikView is very modest in its

infrastructure requirements. Depending on what product is used (QlikView,

QlikView Server or Publisher) all that is required is a well equipped PC and a

large amount of memory, which is not very expensive anymore. There is no

need for a database as QlikView does all its analysis in main memory. If many

users access the same data sources one or several QlikView server can be

configured reducing requirements for clients further. There are no

administration- and backup costs nor are there any costs for upgrading the

database software as QlikView does not use a database system for its analysis.

You only have to buy enough main memory and then you can safely forget

about administration or maintenance.

No lengthy preparations. QlikView needs hardly any infrastructure at all and

the necessary know how is quickly acquired. You license what you need.

Different from other systems that limit the number of information users to a

low percentage of the total user population, QlikView does not impose such

restrictions. Applications can be developed quickly as the user interface is

easy to understand. Using Multidimensional functions does not require

knowledge of the original data structures. Due to the patented in-memory

technology of QlikView, there is no need to know data warehouse structures

as all data appears “structureless”. QlikView can also use Visual Basic or Java

macros and thus can leverage widely spread programming knowledge if extra

functionality is required.

Trackable, transparent, and reproducible analysis. QlikView supports the

concept of ‘bookmarks’ concept to make analysis transparent and

reproducible. These bookmarks can also be shared by several different users.

The ‘bookmark’ concept is also instrumental to generate reports allowing for

the generation of routine reports with a standard layout using a recurring

process.



Independence from technology stack vendors (NetWeaver, WebSphere,

.NET…). A struggle for market shares has evolved between the larger

manufacturers of these stacks. With no end in sight, this fight is anything but

productive for users. For the users, flexibility and independence are key as

they want to configure any way they need it. QlikView can be used to collect

data, from and in all of these environments.

Key focus on business intelligence as a core business. Applications vendors

try to make their applications more attractive by offering business intelligence

functions as a part of their portfolio. Sometimes, BI is even offered, free of

charge, as an integrated part of the application package. However, the vendor

can change his price model any time even for already installed software and

he also will attempt to keep users within the bounds of his application

portfolio. On the other hand, a “pure play“ BI-vendor like QlikTech will

always concentrate on his core competency. The more different applications

and data sources of all kinds are integrated, the more it is possible for a “pure

play” vendor to show the convincing power of his integration concept. Lock-

in into a certain applications portfolio is not even in a “pure play“ vendor’s

interest. This makes his intentions and his business model transparent and free

from hidden agendas.



Data Warehousing can be quite expensive. Around two thirds of the costs of

an SAP BW come from implementation, upgrades and end user support. Even

experienced SAP partners, who have already completed a number of

successful BW implementations, estimate the costs of an analysis ‘cube’ at

around 50,000 Euros. Based on our five years’ comprehensive cost of

ownership model, a 100 user SAP BW configuration can be expected to cost

around 1000 US-$ per user and month. Most data warehouses are

implemented for business analytics only. QlikView can fulfill this task for

much lower cost on all levels, be it licenses, implementation, maintenance or

ongoing operation.

You can start reasonable QlikView projects with budgets as low as 25000 US-

$ whereas a typical initial budget for a SAP BW project is beyond the 500000

US-$ mark. One or two weeks after starting QlikView users can enjoy the

benefits of their first key applications. Installing the SAP-connector takes

about half a day.

• Figure 2: Cost structure over a five year period based on the SPI cost model (average of 10 SAP BW customers, source: SPI)

DWH Cost Structure

Hardware and Communications

13%

DWH-Software13%

Other Software0%

Implementation and ongoing upgrades

28%

End-User Costs35%

Rest2%Operation/Administration

9%



How Compatible is QlikView with the SAP-Architecture?

QlikView can be used with multiple various connector solutions available on

the commercial market, many of which SAP customers may already have, or

it uses QlikView’s own QlikView SAP Connector, which is based on an RFC

and transfers SAP Data with ODBC to QlikView. No data is written back to

the SAP database.

These are the only two interfaces QlikView uses to interact with the SAP

software. No part of NetWeaver is required.

Nor is SAP BW, a NetWeaver component, a QlikView prerequisite. At the

same time, BW does not present any obstacles – QlikView can be added to a

BW environment at anytime.

QlikView is compatible with the SAP R/3 environment as well as with the

mySAP ERP or the mySAP Business Suite. If SAP should be forced to

change their data model, QlikView would be affected – but no more so than

hundreds of thousands of SAP applications.

When is QlikView interesting for the SAP-User?

QlikView is ideally suited for SAP users that need fast, uncomplicated,

affordable business analytics. As QlikView can work with all SAP releases on

the market from version 4.6C on due to its low interface requirements,

QlikView implementation is in no way contingent on the sometimes quite

complicated and tricky plans SAP users have for their application roadmap.

QlikView lets you leave your options open regarding future SAP BW

deployment and you preserve the freedom to select your middleware stack of

choice. QlikView neither necessitates nor does it preclude implementation of

NetWeaver.



When is QlikView a less sensible choice?

There are also situations, where using QlikView might be less indicated.

These fall into three basic categories.

1. Analytical results have to be written back into the ERP database. If the

application requires that the results of a business analysis have to be used

as input for an application then QlikView is not suitable. Of course,

reports made with QlikView can be distributed via portals. The SAP

portal also suitable for this purpose.

2. An Enterprise Data Warehouse or Data Mart is to be constructed.

QlikView is not suitable for such an application, as data ware houses

require the usage of a database system. QlikView does entirely without

database management software. Instead it uses patented in-memory

technology for its analysis making it fast and easy to use. You can,

however, use QlikView on top of the SAP Business Warehouse and, if a

Data Warehouse is absolutely required, users do not have to give up the

advantages of QlikView.

3. The application or the application vendor mandate a different product. It’s

obvious that, for instance, SAP will always gear analytical functions to

their own products, because SAP has a vested business interest to spread

its own products. Applications that were written for a specific analytical

target environment will only function in such a configuration. QlikView

has been optimized for the analytical end user requiring a fundamentally

different design.

But even in this situation one doesn’t have to sacrifice QlikView, because

QlikView can be used in parallel or on top of SAP BW.



Bottom Line

QlikView should be as considered an attractive alternative any time users are

looking for fast, uncomplicated, and affordable analytics and when easy (and,

in the long run, cheaper) handling is of tantamount importance. The

independence from the SAP strategy is an advantage. It has only two

interfaces with SAP giving users the option to become independent of the

migration pressures of the application vendor. The option to run QlikView in

an SAP BW environment is reassuring. You can use BW but you do not have

to. Such flexibility is a rare asset these days.



Index of Illustrations

Figure 1: Old SAP versions prevail...................................................................................................................................... 3 Figure 2: Cost structure over a five year period based on the SPI cost model (average of 10 SAP BW customers,

source: SPI) ........................................................................................................................................................... 10

qlikview sap

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