The ties that bind the SAP digital enterprise
SAP often refers to SAP cloud integration using Cloud Platform tools as the glue that companies can apply to bind the intelligent enterprise. In this utopian vision of the digital enterprise, all systems and applications are connected and able to smoothly merge the enterprise business data that SAP systems have been generating for years with cloud applications and next-generation technologies at the heart of the digital future.
The promise of the intelligent enterprise is that traditional business systems will become smarter and companies can develop new business models by using data in new ways. In the SAP intelligent enterprise, digital core ERP systems like S/4HANA can be integrated with cloud applications like Ariba for procurement, Concur for travel and expense reporting and Fieldglass for workforce management.
The vision is there, but can companies make it a reality?
The idea of connecting all these systems through Cloud Platform is great, but SAP cloud integration at this level of complexity is never as easy as it's touted. SAP has done a good job of making sure its applications can be glued together via Cloud Platform. That part, therefore, should be relatively straightforward for most SAP organizations. But in today's distributed environments, SAP systems need to be integrated with any number of outside applications -- from home-baked internal systems to industry standards like Salesforce.
Although the task is complicated, there's good news about SAP Cloud Platform integration. Tools and integration options abound, including numerous third-party APIs. And for SAP developers in particular, the SAP Cloud Platform ABAP Environment provides a familiar terrain for extending ABAP-based applications to the cloud.
This handbook is a starting point in exploring the landscape of SAP Cloud Platform tools for integration.
