Starting with SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 (fka “2004s”), SAP offers a new data storage option which can significantly reduce the tangible TCO of your SAP NetWeaver BI implementation while also taming those exponential storage growth charts that are keeping your data management teams up at night.
The BI Accelerator
SAP NetWeaver BI Accelerator (BIA) addresses the online requirements for consistently fast response times, even as data volumes, number of users, and analytic demands increase. Based on technologies such as compressions, parallel in-memory processing, and search, the BIA is positioned to improve query performance, reduce administration tasks, and shorten batch processes.
Nearline Storage
With BI 7.0, SAP now also offers support for the “NearLine Storage” (NLS) option. NLS offers the ability to move infrequently-used data into another repository while still keeping it transparently accessible by BEx (or any certified SAP NetWeaver BI frontend).
NLS is an important component of SAP’s overall Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) approach to data management. This is particularly true as many SAP NetWeaver BI implementations grow to be multi-terabyte or tens of terabytes in size. NLS provides a very straight-forward approach to reigning in unbridled growth in the SAP NetWeaver BI environment.
More Than the Sum of Their Parts
By being part of SAP’s ILM strategy, NLS is also a complementary component to the BI Accelerator (BIA). While the BIA is focused on very frequently-used data, NLS is focused on infrequently-used data. NLS can be leveraged to significantly increase the scope of BIA’s impact on your SAP NetWeaver BI implementation. Because less-frequently used data in Infocubes can be “nearlined”, customers can remove aged data from Infocubes (especially those which are candidates for BIA) to the NLS repository. By reducing cubes to “fighting weight”, more cubes can actually be stored in the BIA. Thus, when NLS is used in concert with BIA, NLS actually extends the reach of the BIA by allowing the BIA to stay focused on frequently-used data. The infrequently-used data still remains accessible to queries but without the “penalty” of filling up the BIA with data that is rarely touched.
The SAND Approach
SAND Technology extends the ILM approach with SAND/DNA for SAP BI, which acts as a software-based NLS repository for SAP NetWeaver BI. SAND offers immediate TCO reduction through it’s ability to do deep compression on the data removed from the online (relational) database into the NLS repository. Our customers, such as the US Goverment, Volkswagen Bank, Entega, RI-Solution, and others have proven the ability to compress data from SAP NetWeaver BI down to 3 to 5% of its original size. Between this compression ratio and superior query retrieval times (without decompressing), SAND offers a uniquely robust offering to manage data explosion in your SAP NetWeaver BI solution.
Glen Leslie
August 21
