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BW/4HANA is a great tool for a number of use cases
Updated July 30, 2021

BW/4HANA is a great tool for a number of use cases

Robert Harper | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with SAP BW/4HANA

We use BW/4HANA as the platform to host our operational data warehouse. We use a separate instance of BW/4HANA to host our profitability and performance management application (PAPM).
  • Near real-time data replication from HANA databases.
  • Strong BW functionality.
  • A host of cloud reporting tools can seamlessly connect to it.
  • Enterprise license pricing is very expensive and run-time license limits the usefulness of the tool.
  • Integration with SAP Analytics Cloud for write-back to BW/4HANA. Live connection is only read from SAC.
  • Make run-time licenses more useful.
  • Seamless connectivity
  • Ease of use
  • Scalability
  • Eliminates data interfaces and cumbersome reconciliation from our ERP systems.
  • Ability to replicate data in near real-time.
  • Ability to standardize on cloud-based reporting tools.
They all have different uses. BW/4HANA is mainly a HANA based data warehouse.

Do you think SAP BW/4HANA delivers good value for the price?

No

Are you happy with SAP BW/4HANA's feature set?

Yes

Did SAP BW/4HANA live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of SAP BW/4HANA go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy SAP BW/4HANA again?

Yes

Suitable for hosting large volumes of data and using multiple cloud-based reporting tools to create dashboards, KPI's, and reports that need to be available daily or in near real time. Good integration with most HANA applications although there seem to be some limits with others. It is not suitable for massive volumes of data given the nature of SAP's pricing for HANA. Large volumes and analytics may be more suited to a data lake external to BW/4HANA.

Using SAP BW/4HANA

5000 - Finance, supply chain, sales, service, IT
100 - IT developers, basis, report support & developers
  • Operational Data warehouse
  • Management reporting
  • Spend analysis

SAP BW/4HANA Support

Overall support is good, however there needs to be more architectural maturity in how BW/4HANA can fit in with other SAP tools and external cloud applications and data warehouses.
ProsCons
Quick Resolution
Good followup
Knowledgeable team
Kept well informed
Support cares about my success
Quick Initial Response
Need to explain problems multiple times
No. Purchasing decisions for software and support are done centrally at my company. I don't have a lot of visibility on why we didn't purchase premium support
Yes - We received a response quickly, but it was basically to upgrade to the latest support pack. Upgrading is not always an option so it can be a problem to receive support while waiting on the support pack upgrade to be completed.

Using SAP BW/4HANA

Features are good and the HANA adds a lot of usability. Integration can be an issue depending on the type of license and the system.
ProsCons
Like to use
Relatively simple
Easy to use
Well integrated
Consistent
Quick to learn
Convenient
Feel confident using
Requires technical support
  • Info provider and info object creation
  • Integration with reporting tools such as business objects
  • Process chain development
  • Integration with SAC
  • Standard BW extractors must be used for run-time license
Yes, but I don't use it