How to Create a Strong Integration Strategy With SAP Integration Suite

Today, large enterprises run hundreds of applications simultaneously, creating countless integration points to optimize and manage. However, traditional integration approaches no longer suffice for several reasons. Established methodologies cannot cope with the fast pace of technological innovation and business change.

The separation between application, data, business-to-business (B2B), cloud service, mobile app, and Internet of Things (IoT) integration technologies and skills is unsustainable. In addition, ad hoc approaches, such as the kind of do-it-yourself integration that is usually employed to achieve rapid integration, pose governance, security, and compliance challenges, as well as technical debt risks.

Why Integration Strategy Is So Important

Given this complexity, every business needs a methodological approach to integration that not only reduces complexity and cost but also lets you turn integration into a source of competitive advantage.

To turn data into meaningful insight, enterprises need to integrate all of their functions and processes based on a harmonized data model, get the complete picture in real time, and make decisions with knowledge of all interdependencies within the organization. Otherwise, they cannot make use of the data points to offer personalized experiences for their customers, or manage demand and supply seamlessly in real time.

Most companies will look for solutions that will help them combine their current environments, which are typically on-premises, with cloud-based applications (where it makes sense). Hybrid deployments will be the key solution of choice for most companies in the years to come, making SAP BTP a strategic piece of the puzzle.

How Can Organizations Benefit From SAP Business Technology Platform Integration (SAP-BTP)?

The benefits of moving to the cloud can be summarized in the following major pillars:

• Faster deployment

• Full deployment in weeks

• Mobile-grade user experience translates to less training

• Access to innovation

• Multiple releases per year

• Customer feedback to provide updates

• Agile deployment, configuration, and integration

• Rapid process configuration

• Faster adoption

• No lengthy upgrade cycles

• Faster time to value

• Prepackaged integrations

In addition to the benefits outlined above, some of the key features of the SAP-BTP are:

• Out-of-the-box connectivity support (IDoc, SFTP, Rest/Odata/SOAP/HTTPS, SuccessFactors, API, SFAPI, Onboarding APIs, Learning APIs, S4/HANA, SAP On-Premise)

• Security features such as content encryption and certificate-based communication

• Preconfigured integration patterns, providing many options for the configuration of data flow between participant systems

• SAP Cloud Connector allowing secure connectivity via a VPN tunnel between your on-premises environment and cloud instances

• Connectivity adapters (endpoint types) that allow participant systems to connect through both proprietary and open protocols (IDoc, OData, JMS, HTTPS, EDI, Ariba, AS2/4, etc.)

• Diverse integration scenarios: Link processes and data using both application-to-application and business-to-business integration scenarios

• Multiple endpoints: Integrate various applications and data sources provided by both SAP and third-parties, based either on-premises or in the cloud

• Pre-packaged content: Use pre-packaged integration content to jump-start integration projects and get productive quickly

• Customize integration: Extend preconfigured integration scenarios to include custom requirements

• Increase business agility with connected processes, applications, and data that drive a real-time enterprise

• Extend business processes across hybrid environments for greater efficiency

• Expand your competitive advantage with deeper data-driven insights, irrespective of the data location

By leveraging the solutions provided by SAP BTP, you can enable your organization to rapidly implement integrations in and out of your current environment. SAP BTP is a middleware platform that allows you to take advantage of the standard integrations that will help you accelerate implementation and reduce costs, and take advantage of the key benefits listed above.