Know Your Business
Use only complete, accurate, and accessible data
Get trusted data delivered to you from any data source
Extend your data view with unstructured text data sources
Transform Decision Making
Ensure end-to-end information governance
Take ownership and directly manage your data at every step
Understand the origins of your data for instant data transparency
Achieve Remarkable Results
Enable new business initiatives while minimizing data readiness costs
Accelerate implementation time for business and BI applications
Monitor and assess the quality of data against business metrics
SAP BusinessObjects DQM SDK – Value Propositions
Industry Leading Data Quality Capabilities
Parsing, standardizing, & validating party data
Data de-duplication and relationship identification
Powerful Geocoding capabilities
Light footprint perfect for embedding into applications
Software is less than 100 MB in size and < 30 files
NOTE: Reference data required is GB’s in size
No third party software required (RDBMS, App Server, etc..)
Seamlessly integrated in process with no user interface
Easy to use for developers
Java, .Net and C++ API’s for ultimate flexibility
Simple and flexible API to integrate quickly and maintain easily
Many example programs to get up and running right away
Semantic Layer
We plan to make all data more easily BI consumable and we intend to deliver on this vision by offering with a new and significantly enhanced semantic layer. With its single, common Universe metadata layer, Business Objects has long been a pioneer in easily making critical data easily available for BI consumption. While usable by most of the BI clients the universe is not always used for all tool deployments (for example Crystal Reports deployments). And while the Universe provides one version of the truth and easy BI consumption of data from relational databases, OLAP system, and business applications, it is not consistently used for accessing other sources such as XML and unstructured text.
Our plans are to create and deliver a single deep and broad semantic layer that supports all BI clients, across all data types including true multi-dimensional support and a support broader reuse and sophisticated modeling of calculations.
Highlights:
One semantic layer across all tools
One semantic layer supporting all data types
Easy multi-source access – We will integrate Data Federator into the universe so that all clients can execute federated queries against additional sources including RDBMS, web services, XML, stored procedures and SAP BW
More powerful and extendable calculations – Make it easy to share and reuse calculations that have been defined in other tools. And make existing calculations more reusable.
Easy migration - Easy conversion from existing universes, BEx queries, and Business Views
SAP BusinessObjects Data Services
- See previous page for script details
One place for data stewards and IT data analysts to ALIGM and VIEW their data
A solution that will help better understand and analyze trustworthiness of the data
So how do these 2 key concepts translate to our upcoming event BI offering.
Our new solution will be divided into 3 key components, targeting 3 groups of users.
This is very much align with the same strategy we have adopted traditionally in BI. Support IT, enable the power users/analysts and empower the end user.
Start with a solution to help IT collect/process and manage events. Lower the cost and time to solution in integrating huge volume of events that can be heterogeneous and widely distributed. This is also the tier where IT can help detect those complex event patterns I mentioned in the previous slide. The key is to turn raw events into meaningful business event streams.
At the next level, we enable power users and content creators to model and query these streams. Allow the melding of business events and traditional BI data to create a whole new set of BI assets, bridging the gap between BI and business. At the same time leveraging customers’ existing BI platform and client investment (Xcelsius, Alerts, CR, Explorer etc)
Finally, we want to deliver this new set of BI to the end users via push paradigm. Help frontline workers understand this new information and notify them in real-time. Allow end user to self service by customizing the BI to their needs.
Key take here is that we will provide the right tool for the right folks to solve problems that are relevant to them. This differs from the all-in-one approach adopted by some of the pure play vendors.
Open, Accelerated Data Exploration across All Sources
Last year (2009), a new BI solution from SAP has garnered strong interest from SAP customers: SAP® BusinessObjects™ Explorer Accelerated version, a solution that addresses the need for self-service access to information while reducing resource burdens on IT. The solution leverages two key technologies from SAP: the performance technologies of SAP NetWeaver® Business Warehouse (BW) Accelerator and the data exploration and visualization functionality from SAP BusinessObjects.
Our current plan is to offer an accelerated version of SAP BusinessObjects that allows organizations to leverage other data sources than SAP NetWeaver BW and offer the same intuitive and self-service user experience to business users and the same ease of deployment to IT groups. In other words, offer accelerated data exploration across the enterprise based on a source-agnostic, high performance, stand-alone ‘appliance’ approach.
For existing Explorer customers using the solution on top of SAP NetWeaver BW, the next release will provide significant additional value to customers. Where the existing accelerator solution mainly focuses on accelerating read times for InfoCubes, the next version is much more tightly coupled into existing SAP NetWeaver meta data:
MultiProvider (a subset of available MultiProviders is planned for the upcoming Explorer releases)
Hierarchy handling (a subset of NetWeaver-supported hierarchies will be available for grouping data during navigation)
Calculated Key figures (basic, line-wise arithmetics are planned to be supported based on the query definition)
Restricted key figures (some data models have additional semantics within the query using restricted key figures. These semantics are planned to be taken into account for SAP BusinessObjects Explorer as well)
Added capabilities for SAP BW Customers:
Multi-provider support
Common business user hierarchies support
Restricted key figure support
Calculated key figure support
Export to Web Intelligence
The SAP BusinessObjects philosophy has always been to give each user persona the right BI tool for the way they work. Power users who want to analyze data need a different experience then an executive who wants to track and monitor key metrics. In other words, business users have distinct needs and have different IT skill sets.
Our BI portfolio provide business users with access to information through a broad suite of BI tools on a single, scalable BI platform. The ultimate goal is to empower all users (executives, analysts, staff, suppliers, and partners) so they can make better-informed choices and decisions
Our Bi portfolio includes different categories of tools: Reporting, Dashboard, interactive analysis, etc.
If you are not familiar with our BI portfolio, I encourage you to review the additional information you will find in the annex of this presentation about our different BI solutions.
Interactive Analysis – Web Intelligence
Refined User Experience and Interactivity
One of the big themes across our entire BI suite is the user experience harmonization. For Web Intelligence, we plan to provide a much improved next-generation user experience for both guided and ad hoc analysis. The main benefit is to provide ease-of-ease for both business users and casual BI consumers
What is currently planned:
New analysis panel with sliders, radio buttons, list boxes, filters
More interactivity (e.g. mouse-over for values, alerter)
New query panel for dimensional sources
New charting engine (shared with other SAP BusinessObjects BI tools)
Using a shared chart engine will enable greater interoperability between tools, especially with our next-generation OLAP analysis client
Some of the chart types currently planned:
Scatter Bubble
Polar Bubble
Dual axes charts
Tree maps
Heat maps
Box plots
Series Pie charts
Tag clouds
Data Manager capability for managing queries and previewing data (a tool very much appreciated by many Desktop Intelligence power users). The benefits of Data Manager are:
Viewing/browsing the data associated with the microcube itself
Validating of query results
Understanding how data “hangs” together
Lower TCO for report maintenance
Screenshot shown:
New tool bar
A few of the new chart types available
Self-Service Access
Few simple clicks to fast business insights
Modern look-and-feel with intuitive drag-and-drop
Pervasive web-based analysis
Deep Business Insights
Analyze across multiple dimensions and hierarchies
Break data silos to enrich analyses and visualizations
Immediate response time regardless of data volume
Leverage All Your Investments
Run with all existing BW cubes and BEx queries
Run all analytics from the same common platform
Run with non-SAP multidimensional data sources
Simpler and More Intuitive
Few simple clicks to fast business insights
Intuitive drag-and-drop to analyze multiple dimensions and hierarchies
Modern and familiar Microsoft Office user experience
More Powerful
Input personal context into Excel to enrich analysis
Build pervasive Excel-based BI applications
Immediate response time regardless of data volume
Leverage All Your Investments
Run with all existing BW cubes and BEx queries
Bring live analyses into PowerPoint presentations
Run all analytics from the same common platform
The SAP BusinessObjects philosophy has always been to give each user persona the right BI tool for the way they work. Power users who want to analyze data need a different experience then an executive who wants to track and monitor key metrics. In other words, business users have distinct needs and have different IT skill sets.
Our BI portfolio provide business users with access to information through a broad suite of BI tools on a single, scalable BI platform. The ultimate goal is to empower all users (executives, analysts, staff, suppliers, and partners) so they can make better-informed choices and decisions
Our Bi portfolio includes different categories of tools: Reporting, Dashboard, interactive analysis, etc.
If you are not familiar with our BI portfolio, I encourage you to review the additional information you will find in the annex of this presentation about our different BI solutions.
BI Workplace – InfoView
Easier Content Navigation for All Users
We are planning on delivering a more engaging user experience across the entire SAP BusinessObjects BI suite, including one of the main user touch points, the BI portal known as SAP BusinessObjects InfoView. The BI portal or workplace is an important part of our strategy of enabling organizations to access and deliver decision-making information to the majority of employees in corporations who aren’t using it today. It’s often the door to the wealth of existing corporate information and as such it must be able to present the information available in an efficient and visually attractive way so users don’t loose time manually sifting what is relevant from what is not for their particular task or decision. Filtering and pertinent search options are therefore critical to assist users in quickly finding the right trusted information. Companies using SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise and InfoView as the mean to store and access BI information should expect greater user productivity with a much improved BI portal experience and improved BI search relevancy and usability.
What is currently planned
InfoView will get a new modern styling and more intuitive look and feel.
For example, it will allow users to work multiple documents at the same time
InforView will also get revamped search capabilities and new filtering widgets allowing users to narrow down the content they are looking for.
For example, users will be able to navigate to a particular folder and use a filter (for this folder only) in order to limit the number of items listed so they can retrieve the report, dashboard, or analysis they are looking for.
Capabilities currently planned
New self-service BI access making it easier to find all available content
Enhanced filtering and search options reducing page scrolling
Enhanced navigation for working with multiple documents at the same time
Tighter integration with SAP BusinessObjects Dashboard Builder
Screenshots shown
The screenshot at the top shows a prototype of SAP BusinessObjects BI portal (known as InfoView in XI 3.x or earlier versions)
The screen shot at the bottom is a prototype implementation of our search capabilities within the platform
Now that you know we have discussed the BI workspace value proposition and purpose, let’s elaborate on what BI workspaces actually is and what it offers users.
BI workspaces is a browser-based application that is provided as part of the SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise professional package.
It is an evolution of the Dashboard Builder product and includes most of the capabilities found in its predecessor, especially those related to content layout.
New workspaces can be viewed, created, and modified using the BI launch pad. They can also be viewed via openDocument or in your favorite Enterprise Portal using the Portal Integration Kit.
BI workspaces are most suitable for displaying BusinessObjects reports and applications, such as: Dashboard Design (Xcelsius), Interactive Analysis, Advanced Analysis and Crystal Reports. It can also display other content types such as external web pages, Microsoft Office documents and BI launch pad modules.
Note that every content item that is displayed on the page or in the module library is called a module.
The key capabilities of BI workspaces include:
Organizing and displaying modules
A simple and intuitive Runtime Authoring environment for designing the workspace pages
An integrated inter-portlet communication framework for enabling components on the page to exchange information
And last but not least: Page Preview and the option to print a page or the entire workspace.
Finally making more information available to more users, means that you need to server information in the users’ language.
Multilingual support is key when it comes to delivering information with less IT support. If you offer multilingual support, users can consume BI in their own language without having to without having to duplicate existing reports and analyses.
BusinessObjects BI platform supports over 21 languages natively and the semantic layer and Translation Manager, the tool that handles universe localization are at the core of SAP BusinessObjects self-service approach.
With multilingual universe, no need to support 1 universe per language. You only have to maintain 1 universe and deliver the Web Intelligence report in the native language of the user using his locale.
Reporting – Crystal Reports
Global Reach with Multilingual Reporting
Efficient, simple GLOBAL deployment of high fidelity reports for light interactivity and personalization for information consumers is one of the many options we will offer to support the concept of enabling a greater number of people accessing and sharing trusted information.
In the case of Crystal Reports, global reach with multilingual reporting means the ability to have a single Crystal report being served to different users in multiple regions, accustomed to local languages and locales. The single document allows for centralized manageability, reducing the number of Crystal reports to maintain.
What is currently planned:
Crystal report content such as text objects, prompts, tooltips can be translated to multiple languages
Metadata such as column, headers, labels can be displayed in their native language
Ability to schedule and distribute Crystal reports in multiple languages
Support of BI platform translation services - Translation Manager (multilingual universe and Translation Manager capabilities of SAP BusinessObjects can be leveraged in Crystal reports (rpt)
Benefits:
Helps customers who need reports in multiple languages
Single master Crystal report reduces TCO/maintenance effort
Avoid 1 report per language (which is today’s typical workaround for companies requiring multi-language version of the same report)
Screenshot shown:
Example of true global reach with multilingual enterprise reporting: One single Crystal report showing English, German and French metadata
With the SAP BusinessObjects Explorer for iPhone prototype, insight into your business is never more than a few flicks away.
Through simple and fast search, intuitive data exploration and visualization, and high performance and scalability, SAP BusinessObjects Explorer allows you to answer business questions "on-the-fly" and regardless of where you are.
Whether you are visiting a customer and need to see what orders they've placed, at a café dreaming up a new marketing program, or in the board room discussing this quarter's revenues, SAP BusinessObjects Explorer for iPhone prototype puts immediate access to all quality-decision information on the go.
http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/boc/innovation-center?rid=/webcontent/uuid/706569f0-989c-2c10-5ca4-e945dc3368e3