SAP Business Warehouse vs. Microsoft SQL Server

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
SAP BW
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
SAP Business Warehouse, or SAP BW (formerly SAP NetWeaver Business Warehouse) is SAP's legacy data warehouse solution, now superseded by SAP BW/4HANA, and the SAP Data Warehouse Cloud which was launched in 2019. SAP BW versions up to 7.4 have reached end of maintenance. SAP BW 7.5 support is extended to align with SAP Business Suite with NetWeaver components. For existing customers maintenance is scheduled to continue through 2027, with extended support available through 2030.N/A
Microsoft SQL Server
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft SQL Server is a relational database.
$1,418
Per License
Pricing
SAP Business WarehouseMicrosoft SQL Server
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Subscription
$1,418.00
Per License
Enterprise
$13,748.00
Per License
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
SAP BWMicrosoft SQL Server
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
SAP Business WarehouseMicrosoft SQL Server
Considered Both Products
SAP BW
Chose SAP Business Warehouse
The main reason we chose SAP was the price. SAP Business Warehouse was relatively cheaper compared to other alternatives. SAP Business Warehouse is very popular software for reporting purposes and data storage. But also, it is hard to shift to a newer software once the roots …
Chose SAP Business Warehouse
SAP Business Warehouse scores higher in data warehouse functionalities for integration to SAP ERP and other SAP solutions such as SAP CRM, SAP APO, and SAP SRM. Standard SAP data source extractors which are available in SAP ERP can be used immediately for full or delta …
Microsoft SQL Server

No answer on this topic

Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
SAP Business WarehouseMicrosoft SQL Server
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
SAP Business Warehouse
8.8
3 Ratings
2% above category average
Microsoft SQL Server
-
Ratings
Multi-User Support (named login)9.73 Ratings00 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)9.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Single Sign-On (SSO)9.73 Ratings00 Ratings
Location-Based Data Governance7.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Data Modeling
Comparison of Data Modeling features of Product A and Product B
SAP Business Warehouse
9.0
3 Ratings
12% above category average
Microsoft SQL Server
-
Ratings
Data model creation9.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Data Exploration
Comparison of Data Exploration features of Product A and Product B
SAP Business Warehouse
5.7
3 Ratings
5% above category average
Microsoft SQL Server
-
Ratings
Visualization5.73 Ratings00 Ratings
Data Warehouse
Comparison of Data Warehouse features of Product A and Product B
SAP Business Warehouse
7.7
3 Ratings
7% above category average
Microsoft SQL Server
-
Ratings
High-Volume Data Processing8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Data Warehouse Management9.33 Ratings00 Ratings
Administrative Automation7.73 Ratings00 Ratings
Self-Optimization6.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
SAP Business WarehouseMicrosoft SQL Server
Small Businesses
Google BigQuery
Google BigQuery
Score 8.6 out of 10
SingleStore
SingleStore
Score 9.7 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Cloudera Enterprise Data Hub
Cloudera Enterprise Data Hub
Score 9.0 out of 10
SingleStore
SingleStore
Score 9.7 out of 10
Enterprises
Oracle Exadata
Oracle Exadata
Score 8.0 out of 10
SingleStore
SingleStore
Score 9.7 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
SAP Business WarehouseMicrosoft SQL Server
Likelihood to Recommend
8.3
(15 ratings)
9.6
(96 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(6 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
9.9
(10 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
-
(0 ratings)
7.9
(25 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(5 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
SAP Business WarehouseMicrosoft SQL Server
Likelihood to Recommend
SAP
SAP BW is best for: 1. Large enterprises 2. Enterprises with 3+ legacy systems with entrenched users (politically difficult to merge) 3. Enterprises with employees who can understand both the technical capabilities of SAP BW and the needs of the business users - ability to speak both languages, otherwise the program could be unwieldy and potentially underutilized (it's not particularly inexpensive) SAP BW is less appropriate for: 1. Small enterprises 2. Enterprises who have well established, same location, CRM and UFS - the integration of data analysis will be easier and less expensive with other solutions 3. HANA
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Microsoft
Microsoft SQL Server is a great RDBMS and meets all of our requirements. If you need a stable DB platform to support your line of a business application you'll be well served. Licensing costs are far cheaper, more portable and a lot more user friendly than Oracle. Product support and security patches from Microsoft are strong.
Read full review
Pros
SAP
  • It tracks bin locations for parts which can be really helpful.
  • SAP Business Warehouse tells you who has a part checked out so you can find it.
  • It shows current parts shortages so buyers are flagged to get parts on order based on current demand.
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Microsoft
  • Easy to configure and use with Visual Studio and Dot Net
  • Easy integration with MSBI to perform data analysis
  • Data Security
  • Easy to understand and use
  • Very easy to export database and tables in the form of SQL query or a script
Read full review
Cons
SAP
  • Support comes slow. This is not a limitation of the software itself but could be a symptom from the local office. Once we get support everything works along smoothly.
  • It is always important to review the instructions. This is not a system that does well initially with personalization without review of standard procedures. A log of time can be lost if the technicians and programmers working with the data are not following correct procedures.
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Microsoft
  • The import/export process can be tricky to follow with lots of steps and could be better for importing flat files
  • Obtaining help from Microsoft is cumbersome and often other internet sources are better and quicker
  • The documentation is not great and again it's generally better to obtain help elsewhere if needed
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Likelihood to Renew
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
We understand that the Microsoft SQL Server will continue to advance, offering the same robust and reliable platform while adding new features that enable us, as a software center, to create a superior product. That provides excellent performance while reducing the hardware requirements and the total cost of ownership of our solution.
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Usability
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
SQL Server mostly 'just works' or generates error messages to help you sort out the trouble. You can usually count on the product to get the job done and keep an eye on your potential mistakes. Interaction with other Microsoft products makes operating as a Windows user pretty straight forward. Digging through the multitude of dialogs and wizards can be a pain, but the answer is usually there somewhere.
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Reliability and Availability
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
Its does not have outages.
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Performance
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
SSAS data cubes may some time slow down your Excel reports.
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Support Rating
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
We managed to handle most of our problems by looking into Microsoft's official documentation that has everything explained and almost every function has an example that illustrates in detail how a particular functionality works. Just like PowerShell has the ability to show you an example of how some cmdlet works, that is the case also here, and in my opinion, it is a very good practice and I like it.
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In-Person Training
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
It was good
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Online Training
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
very hands on and detailed training
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Implementation Rating
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
Other than SQL taking quite a bit of time to actually install there are no problems with installation. Even on hardware that has good performance SQL can still take close to an hour to install a typical server with management and reporting services.
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Alternatives Considered
SAP
SAP Business Warehouse scores higher in data warehouse functionalities for integration to SAP ERP and other SAP solutions such as SAP CRM, SAP APO, and SAP SRM. Standard SAP data source extractors which are available in SAP ERP can be used immediately for full or delta replication into SAP Business Warehouse. System governance in SAP Business Warehouse is top-notch with change management support for migration between system landscape from the development system to production system.
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Microsoft
[Microsoft] SQL Server has a much better community and professional support and is overall just a more reliable system with Microsoft behind it. I've used MySQL in the past and SQL Server has just become more comfortable for me and is my go to RDBMS.
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Scalability
SAP
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
SQL server does handle growing demands of a mid sized company.
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Return on Investment
SAP
  • Exporting of data and reports to Excel is very easy for the end user to interpret and manipulate.
  • Negatively, the speed at which BW retrieves data and reports is very slow and out of date.
  • Addition of daughter application HANA has helped this aging application stay afloat for a few more years. Overall it has been a great tool but it's showing its age very fast.
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Microsoft
  • Increased accuracy - We went from multiple users having different versions of an Excel spreadsheet to a single source of truth for our reporting.
  • Increased Efficiency - We can now generate reports at any time from a single source rather than multiple users spending their time collating data and generating reports.
  • Improved Security - Enterprise level security on a dedicated server rather than financial files on multiple laptop hard drives.
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ScreenShots