Unlocking Agro Insights with SAP Datasphere
Overview
An APAC based leading global agricultural trading firm manages large volumes of data from diverse sources. With multi-market presence, the company needed a real-time data analytics solution to improve business metric understanding, sales forecasting, and profitability insights.
Even though they leveraged SAP S/4HANA, integrating data from multiple non-SAP sources, including Google BigQuery, Amazon Redshift, and other third-party databases, still caused a bottleneck. The lack of a unified data ecosystem resulted in fragmented decision-making, slow reporting cycles, and more.
Challenges
Seamless Integration Across SAP and Beyond
The client faced several operational challenges including:
1. Disjointed Data Sources
- Data was spread across SAP S/4HANA and multiple non-SAP systems, including Google BigQuery, Amazon Redshift, and flat files from file servers.
- In the absence of a unified data platform, users couldn’t access, analyze, and utilize information efficiently.
2. Manual Reporting
- Extensive manual intervention was involved in compiling Sales and business reports.
- Delayed access to real-time, data-driven insights, lead to long-spanning strategy execution.
3. Scalability and Data Governance
- The existing architecture was not scalable, which lead to limited support for future data growth and analytics.
- There were concerns about data duplication, security, and governance due to disparate data sources.
Solution: An Integrated Data Ecosystem with SAP Datasphere
To address these issues, we created a comprehensive cloud-based data integration solution driven by SAP Datasphere on SAP BTP. This solution offered seamless integration between SAP and non-SAP data sources, reducing data silos and speeding up analytical workflows.
Key Solution Components
1. Federated Data Access using Google BigQuery
- Rather than replicating or duplicating data, we implemented a federated architecture that allows SAP Datasphere to access data in Google BigQuery in real time via virtual tables.
- With this approach, the data remained in its original source system, leading to better efficiency and lesser storage costs.
2. Improved Data Integration
SAP Datasphere was used to integrate SAP S/4HANA with non-SAP data sources, like:
- Google BigQuery
- Amazon Redshift
- Flat files from local file servers
- Industry-specific solutions like Nitea
This resulted in a single, unified analytics platform that facilitated decision-making.
3. Automated Data Workflows
- The client used SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) with SAP BTP to automate data modelling and visualisation.
- By connecting structured and unstructured data sources, the organisation was able to perform complicated analytics queries with little manual work.
Business Impact & Results
1. Faster Report Generation
- Reports that previously took 2–3 days are now generated within minutes (approximately 99% faster), enabling faster strategic decisions.
2. Real-Time Sales-Related Insights
- The firm could access up-to-the-minute sales data across regions, which enhanced forecasting accuracy.
- They also opened to a holistic view of key business metrics, improving agility in responding to market changes.
3. Better Data Governance & Compliance
- SAP Datasphere and BTP standardise data security and governance across all platforms, assuring regulatory compliance.
4. Future Business Growth
- The company now has a scalable, future-ready data strategy, which backs the integration of additional data sources and advanced analytics capabilities including AI-driven insights.
Technology Stack
- 1. SAP Datasphere – Federated data access & integration
- 2. SAP S/4HANA – Core business data processing
- 3. SAP BTP (Business Technology Platform) – Integrated analytics framework
- 4. Google BigQuery & Cloud Storage – Non-SAP data storage & processing
- 5. Amazon Redshift – Additional data warehousing
- 6. SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) – Real-time analytics & visualization
Wrapping Up
By integrating SAP Datasphere on SAP BTP, the agricultural trading organisation successfully altered its data landscape, resulting in real-time insights, faster decision-making, and better profitability.
This demonstrates how SAP's intelligent data solutions can help organisations modernise analytics, reduce inefficiencies, and drive success in a competitive market.
Want to integrate your data with SAP Datasphere? Get in touch today!
