What is SAP Integration suite or SAP Cloud Integration?
SAP Integration Suite serves as an Integration Platform as a Service (IPaaS). This comprehensive solution facilitates the seamless connection of SAP applications with third-party software, whether they operate on-premises or across various cloud environments. It allows for the utilization of diverse integration methods to address specific use cases, enabling the execution of integrations on major public cloud platforms, providing enhanced flexibility.
Robust Functionality for Mission-Critical Processes
The robust functionality inherent in SAP Integration Suite instills confidence in integrating and managing mission-critical processes across complex and distributed landscapes, spanning SAP and third-party applications. It boasts enterprise-grade capabilities, including a 99.95% uptime guarantee, multizone availability, failover prevention, and elastic scaling to ensure high performance and throughput.
Enabling Innovation with Modular Functionalities
Innovation is made more accessible through SAP Integration Suite, offering features for modular functionalities, real-time event management, and API management. Moreover, it provides a centralized hub for access to a vast repository of over 3,600 APIs from SAP and its partner network, facilitating faster innovation.
Accelerating Connectivity with Prebuilt Integrations
SAP Integration Suite extends its reach with an extensive library of over 3,000 prebuilt integrations and connectors designed for both SAP and third-party solutions. These preconfigured integrations, developed and maintained by SAP and its partner ecosystem, expedite connectivity and deliver superior time-to-value.
Leveraging the Integration Assessment capability, aligned with the SAP Integration Solution Advisory Methodology, further expedites integration projects. It enables collaboration between integration architects, practitioners, and business users, offering trusted best practices for more efficient integration management and deployment, increasing the likelihood of successful integrations.
Streamlining Complex Integration Challenges with SAP Integration Suite
Real-world challenges often span multiple lines of business, services, and APIs, posing difficulties for even the most experienced developers in understanding their relationships. With SAP Integration Suite, the advantage of data semantics is harnessed through the SAP One Domain Model, which defines business objects like product, customer, or order information, along with their contextual usage within the business. Additionally, SAP Integration Suite incorporates features such as Graph and SAP Business Accelerator Hub, enabling the swift exploration, testing, and documentation of APIs to access SAP-managed data, regardless of its location.
Is this the same as CPI?
SAP Integration Suite was previously known as SAP Cloud Platform Integration (CPI). SAP CPI was the first solution offered by SAP as part of cloud integration. SAP has developed this solution over time, making it a comprehensive integration platform. The name of the solution was changed to SAP Integration Suite accordingly. The solution is positioned under the roof of the SAP Business Technology Platform today.
Let’s look into the capabilities of the Integration suite.
SAP Integration Suite Components
The SAP Integration Suite is composed of several key components, each serving distinct functions within the integration platform:
- SAP Cloud Integration: This central component of the SAP Integration Suite is a cloud-based middleware platform. SAP has focused its functional development efforts on SAP Cloud Integration in recent years, making it the primary middleware platform in their product portfolio, while other platforms have seen reduced development focus.
- SAP API Management: Included in the SAP Integration Suite, SAP API Management allows centralized planning, development, and management of interfaces for applications. It is particularly useful when implementing comprehensive security measures, monitoring data traffic, handling errors, or monetizing calls to application interfaces.
- Integration Advisor: This component facilitates the rapid development of integration content. Currently, it includes functionality for creating Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) mappings. The Integration Advisor leverages knowledge from previously created mappings to generate many mappings automatically, which can then be exported for use in SAP Cloud Integration or SAP Process Orchestration.
- SAP Event Mesh: SAP Event Mesh is designed for handling event-driven communication. In this approach, applications send small messages to an event broker when specific events occur. The event broker makes these events available for other applications, which can then determine their relevance.
- Open Connectors: SAP provides Open Connectors as a component to simplify the integration of various cloud-based applications. These applications typically have different APIs defined by their providers, with varying authentication methods and supported technologies. Open Connectors offers a uniform way to make APIs from different cloud-based applications accessible throughout your organization.
- SAP Process Orchestration: While SAP Process Orchestration is part of SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP), it is not part of the SAP Integration Suite. It is an on-premise middleware platform that has been offered since 2004, but SAP’s focus for further development is on SAP Cloud Integration. Maintenance of SAP Process Orchestration will conclude in 2030, with no further versions planned.
Additional Integration Tools
Alongside the mentioned process integration tools covered by the SAP Integration Suite license bundle, SAP provides a range of additional tools for data integration as part of the SAP Business Technology Platform.
- SAP Data Intelligence: Focusing on data integration and orchestration, SAP Data Intelligence has been available as a service on SAP Business Technology Platform since 2019. It represents an evolution of SAP Data Hub and incorporates machine learning capabilities for enhanced data science and machine learning operationalization.
- Data Integration Tools: SAP also provides on-premise applications designed to support data-level integration. These tools are particularly useful when dealing with large volumes of data in integration scenarios.
- Cloud Connector: In hybrid landscapes, connecting on-premise and cloud environments can be challenging. SAP offers the Cloud Connector as part of the SAP Connectivity service, which is a small on-premise software component that establishes secure connections between SAP Business Technology Platform and on-premise landscapes.
- SAP API Business Hub: As part of SAP’s hybrid integration platform, SAP API Business Hub serves as a central repository for APIs, integration resources, events, and Core Data Services (CDS) views. It provides an overview of standard interfaces available within the SAP ecosystem.
The licensing processes
SAP Integration Suite offers flexible licensing options to accommodate diverse organizational requirements and financial considerations. These licensing options are available through the SAP Store:
- SAP Free Tier: This is a good way to get started with SAP BTP. This provides Instant access to BTP production environment with some limitations.
- Subscription and Pay-as-You-Go: The SAP Integration Suite can be licensed using subscription and pay-as-you-go models, providing organizations with choices tailored to their specific needs and budgetary constraints.
In addition to the above options, SAP Integration Suite can also be licensed through the SAP Cloud Platform Enterprise Agreement (CPEA) or by directly contacting SAP for a customized quotation. Here’s a breakdown of these licensing approaches:
- SAP Cloud Platform Enterprise Agreement (CPEA): This licensing method involves entering into an agreement between the customer and SAP. The CPEA allows customers to acquire a bundle of SAP software products and services for a predetermined duration. During this period, customers can install and utilize the licensed products and services as per the terms of the agreement. The CPEA also offers supplementary benefits such as software updates and technical support. This licensing option is particularly suitable for organizations seeking a comprehensive and long-term approach to meet their integration requirements.
These flexible licensing alternatives enable organizations to align their integration strategy with their unique operational and financial preferences.
Intellect Consulting, a leading SAP consulting company, stands as a dedicated partner ready to empower businesses in their transformative journey through future enable SAP Integration suite. With our expert guidance and team, we are committed to assisting customers across diverse industries in harnessing the full potential of SAP Integration Suite for a seamless and successful Integrations.