SAP HANA through the eyes of a data modeler

SAP HANA is used for modeling. It is the data warehouse which is used by the business intelligence team for storing data as well as for developing logical models for the finance, sales, purchase, invoice, logistics, demand, and quality teams. HANA Sidecar is used as a database and an analytical processor. It is the secondary database for SAP ECC.

Yes, both the features help a lot. In-memory database provide amazing speed while running data models. It also prevents data redundancy and hence reduces costs. In-memory also enables real-time data processing, which helps in faster and more accurate analysis of data. Our organization worked on an initiative to move from BW to SAP HANA and it helped business users in getting more accurate real-time data with more speed.

In my organization, we have only worked with relational data and therefore I have not been able to utilize the data type support provided by SAP HANA.

This is a great capability. This is one of the main reasons for great speed provided by SAP HANA. HANA Sidecar acts as the secondary database for SAP ECC and therefore provides the capability to store data in its in-memory database. This helps in avoiding unnecessary data movement and provides great performance.