SAP Accelerates Geo-Enabled Access to Enterprise Data

July 23, 2015  - By

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SAP SE is offering new capabilities to turbocharge spatial intelligence by simplifying, accelerating and geo-enabling access to enterprise data.

In the era of the Internet of Things (IoT), proliferation of low-cost location-aware devices is augmenting enterprise data with the “where” component. The SAP HANA platform can help break the silos between enterprise and GIS systems, enabling companies to get more value from corporate data and uncover trends and patterns in a visually intuitive manner, the company said in a statement.

The announcement was made at the Esri User Conference (Esri UC) being held July 21–23 in San Diego.

Accelerating Spatial Processing for Real-Time Insights. The latest release of SAP HANA further enhances in-memory spatial processing capabilities to deliver faster responses for millions of data points, the company said. SAP HANA SPS10 brings new spatial features and enhancements, such as support for multidimensional geometries and on-the-fly spatial coordinate transformations, driven by customer innovation projects such as flight operations for Lufthansa Systems.

Case Study: Lufthansa

Lufthansa Systems is using the spatial capabilities in SAP HANA for tracking global flight operations. Changes in airport, meteorological and fleet data are monitored in real time and used to reroute flight trajectories in split seconds while optimizing fuel and crew costs. Lufthansa Systems believes that this innovative technology for dispatching, monitoring and visualizing air traffic by providing instant insights and real-time decision support will help change the face of its business.

“Together with SAP, we built a prototype of a future operational database for commercial flight support,” said Christoph Krüger, lead architect, Lufthansa Systems. “The spatial engine in SAP HANA has given us the ability to track thousands of flights per day on a rich 3D mapping interface that includes both spatial and temporal coordinates. At the same time, we were able to uncover breakthrough application scenarios that would not have been possible without the SAP HANA platform.”

Deeper Integration of SAP HANA and Esri

In addition to the existing read-only query layer integration to SAP HANA released by Esri in 2014, ArcGIS for Desktop now supports feature services providing a method for users to create, read, update or delete spatial data directly in SAP HANA. This simplifies the access and use of spatial data in SAP HANA and provides powerful, transactional spatial data creation and editing capabilities to support real-time operational and analytic applications, opening a broad new range of use cases and workflows for both Esri and SAP users.

The State of Indiana uses SAP HANA, SAP Lumira software and SAP Predictive Analytics software in combination with Esri for geo-spatial analytics to help ensure safer roads and traffic conditions and improve the lives of its citizens.

“Our long-standing technical co-innovation with SAP has taken a major step forward with the introduction of the SAP HANA platform and its spatial capabilities,” said Jack Dangermond, founder and president of Esri. “We now have a single platform from SAP that simplifies both integration and the deployment of mapping and spatial analysis across the entire SAP application landscape.”

Analytics Solutions from SAP Enhanced by Partner Extensions

The native integration between Esri ArcGIS and data visualization software from SAP, SAP Lumira, provides new capabilities for customers. It includes a rich library of charts and visualizations, overlay charts with geo-spatial data for location-based insight, support to visualize multiple layers of business data on top of Esri base maps and support to embed and create custom extensions with software development kits (SDKs). SAP partners such as Galigeo use these SDKs to extend the value of analytics solutions from SAP with new options for visualizing and analyzing information in SAP Lumira and SAP BusinessObjects Design Studio using Esri cloud and on-premise resources. A free version of SAP Lumira is currently available for download.

Geo-Enablement of SAP Business Suite powered by SAP HANA

SAP is delivering geospatial enablement of SAP Business Suite powered by SAP HANA software with a geo-enabling services offering. Geo-enabling allows SAP Business Suite powered by SAP HANA to store spatial data directly on SAP HANA instead of on a third-party database, resulting in faster response times and a simpler architecture.

Spatial Enhancements in SAP Work Manager

The SAP Work Manager mobile app has added Esri feature layer integration and offline mapping capabilities. These improve user interaction on mobile devices and enable mobile technicians servicing clients in the field to access their maps and associated information without Internet connectivity.

For more information, visit the SAP News Center. Follow SAP on Twitter at @sapnews, or view the video below for a demonstration from the 2015 Esri UC.

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About the Author: Tracy Cozzens

Senior Editor Tracy Cozzens joined GPS World magazine in 2006. She also is editor of GPS World’s newsletters and the sister website Geospatial Solutions. She has worked in government, for non-profits, and in corporate communications, editing a variety of publications for audiences ranging from federal government contractors to teachers.