Battlecard:
Competing against SAP BI
SAP BI Solution Summary
SAP BusinessObjects is a comprehensive product
portfolio that spans 5 major categories: Business
Intelligence, Enterprise Performance Management,
Enterprise Information Management, Governance, Risk,
and Compliance, and Analytic Applications.
SAP/Microsoft Comparative Solutions
Capability Business Objects / SAP
Operational SAP Crystal Reports
Reporting
Ad Hoc Queries SAP BusinessObjects Web
Intelligence or SAP Crystal
Interactive Analysis (for
SME) [Legacy:
BusinessObjects Desktop
Intelligence]
In-Memory SAP Business Objects
Analysis Explorer, Accelerated
OLAP Analysis SAP BusinessObjects
Advanced Analysis
(edition for Web + edition
for Microsoft Office)
[Legacy: Voyager, SAP
BEx, OLAP Intelligence]
OLAP Cube SAP BW
Data Mining Predictive Workbench
(IBM SPSS OEM)
Document SAP BusinessObjects
Management, InfoView, SAP Enterprise
Portal Portal
Search SAP BusinessObjects
InfoView, SAP Business
Objects Explorer,
Accelerated
Microsoft Office Live Office, SAP
Interoperability BusinessObjects Advanced
Analysis edition for
Microsoft Office
Data Integration SAP BusinessObjects
/ ETL DataServices [aka Data
Integrator]
Data Cleansing Data Quality features in
SAP BusinessObjects
MICROSOFT CONFIDENTIAL
DataServices (Denali) Product Roadmap leaving existing customers stranded
Planning, SAP BusinessObjects Partner Solutions SAP end of lifed 6 different products in the
Budgeting, Planning and (Tagetik, deFacto,
Forecasting Consolidation (BPC) Prophix, Infor) BusinessObjects product line:Desktop Intelligence,
[legacy: BusinessObjects Performance Manager, Planning XI (SRC), Planning
Planning XI] Extended (Cartesis), Voyager (previously already EOL
Dashboards SAP BusinessObjects PerformancePoint OLAP Intelligence / Crystal Analysis)
Dashboards or SAP Crystal Services, SharePoint
Dashboard Design (for Dashboards
SME) [aka Xcelsius], Products between acquisitions not tightly integrated
Microsoft Equivalent Scorecarding SAP Strategy Management PerformancePoint SAP’s acquired scorecarding solution SAP Strategy
Reporting Services (SSM) [legacy: Services Management (Pilot acquisition) is not tightly integrated
BusinessObjects
Report Builder, Excel, Performance Manager]
with SAP BusinessObjects which is also not tightly
Project Crescent Industry SAP BusinessObjects Partner Solutions integrated with SAP BusinessObjects Planning and
(Denali) Applications Analytic Applications Consolidation (OutlookSoft).
Mobile BI for Blackberry, Partner Solutions
iPhone/iPad (Sybase
Low end user adoption
Mobility future)
PowerPivot Cloud crystalreports.com, SAP SQL Azure Reporting SAP encounters broad adoption issues that have
BusinessObjects BI On plagued the BI industry. Gartner found that “Cost” and
PerformancePoint Demand, SAP StreamWork “Lack of User Skills” being the top two limitations for a
Services, Excel, BI Data Exploration SAP Business Objects n/a wider BI deployment. The BI Survey recently found that
Semantic Model Explorer
(Denali) just 8% of employees actually use BI.
Microsoft is uniquely positioned to reach information
SAP BI Challenges
workers. In fact, a recent InformationWeek survey
SQL Server Analysis SAP BI faces many challenges.
showed that Microsoft BI Products are the most widely
Services
SQL Server Data used, have the highest planned usage, and is the most
Systemic SAP Customer Satisfaction Issues
Mining Add-in, SQL evaluated BI Product in the industry.
Server Analysis
For the third year in a row, Gartner MQ survey showed
Services customer support ratings for SAP to be the lowest. As
High Total Cost of Ownership
SharePoint well, changes in pricing, contracting models, combined
While not the priciest solution in the market, it is
with sales realignments, caused major disruptions. In
comparable to most mega vendors and much pricier
fact, a global SAP User Group Executive Network survey
SharePoint (Microsoft than Microsoft. A sample proposal (discounted Federal
BI Indexing Connector) revealed that more than one third of UK Business
proposal) can be found here
Objects customers feel SAP is not meeting their needs.
Excel, SharePoint Selling Scenarios
SAP becoming more SAP
Net New Deals (Greenfield opportunities)
SAP is losing credibility as an authentic agnostic
Message to the TDMs and IT Pros:
solution. As well, SAP has changed the license and
1. Talk about TCO (Total Cost of Ownership): SAP BI is
Integration Services maintenance agreements of classic Business Objects
considerably more expensive. See above.
customers to the SAP model, causing customer
2. Let them know that our BI solution can also
dissention.
Integration Services + interoperate on third party datasources including
Data Quality Services SAP applications
INTERNAL ONLY

3. If customers have any part of the Microsoft stack
(SQL, SharePoint, Office), show them how to
interoperate these into a bigger BI story.  2) Build business case / cost justification for migration
4. Talk about the concept of “managed self-service”
Message to the business users:
Model-less in-memory exploration: Show the end users
how they can be empowered to do highly responsive
analysis with Excel/PowerPivot without waiting for IT to
create a traditional OLAP cube or index into a SAP’s
explorer solution.
Surround (If the customer already standardized on
Sybase DW, or SAP Applications
Existing SAP Applications customers
For customers who have already standardized on SAP
for their applications layer (ERP or CRM), a key part of
your strategy is to level set that Microsoft BI
interoperates well on SAP. View the following
resources: Video – Sales strategy, Video – technical
integration strategy, SAP BI interop paper
Integration story:
Access directly to SAP
-Reporting Services can access SAP BW directly
-Excel 2007 can connect directly to SAP BW directly
Access through Analysis Services
- SSIS customers can use Openhub (for SAP BW) and the
Biztalk Adapter Pack to connect to BW or ECC to move
data to SQL Server and Analysis Services
-Once in SSAS, customers can use PPS, SSRS
Access using Partner developed solutions
-ERP-Link, Theobald, Simplement
Migrate (existing SAP customers)
Migrate Crystal Reports / Business Objects customers
1) Target customers for migration will want to
rationalize maintenance fees and have no budget
to migrate to newer versions. Also customers may
be feel abandoned by SAP, facing a product that is
MICROSOFT CONFIDENTIAL
End of Life or experiencing frustration from
licensing and maintenance changes from SAP
a. Determine the cost savings that customers
will receive migration to Microsoft
b. For Crystal Reports customers, talk about
the migration campaign
2) Engage partner expertise with Migration
experience:
Quasar, RPTtoRDL, Crystal Conversions, KTL
Solutions, Mariner, Avanade, plusIT, WiPro,
Blue Fox Software, Neudesic, ResultData,
Hitachi Consulting, BAC, Sonata
Other – Planning, Budgeting Scenarios
1) Engage our planning partners (Tagetik, deFacto,
Prophix, Infor) who have depth planning solutions
and the capabilities to compete against Hyperion.
Evidence to Emphasize
Customer Evidence
1. SAP Interop: Sysmex America, Novozymes, CSR,
Rodenstock, Northumbria University
2. Crystal/BOBJ Migration: Bon Marche, Summit
Partners, Epicor, Pacific Life, Mount Sinai Hospital,
Tyler Technologies
3. Dissatisfied SAP BOBJ Customer: Bigelow Teas
Myth Busters
Who else would integrate better to my SAP
deployment than SAP BusinessObjects?
Review the Microsoft’s Surround Story on SAP section
(above) carefully along with the video that discusses
this topic in-depth. Talk confidently that we have
strong interoperability with SAP.
Microsoft’s BI is only meant for the Microsoft stack. It
is not a heterogeneous solution - Dispel this myth by
talking about the fact that Microsoft SQL Server
Reporting Services has out of the box support for SAP.
Battlecard:
Competing against SAP BI
Microsoft BI doesn’t have a single, enterprise,
business, metadata - Microsoft’s UDM provides an
abstraction layer over both OLAP and relational data
sources. It stores KPIs centrally that can be accessed
from other applications. SQL Server “Denali” will
provide the BI Semantic Layer (BISM) that will support
both OLAP and Relational queries and able to federate
queries.
Microsoft does not have Vertical or LOB BI analytic
applications
Microsoft BI has a broad ecosystem of SI partners that
have the industry/vertical expertise. Microsoft partners
have deployed to thousands of customers addressing
an entire solution that will include vertical/industry
domain expertise.
References and Resources
1) BI Compete Website
http://infopedia/Pages/Microsoft-Business-
Intelligence-Competitors.aspx
2) SAP 4.0 Roundup Update
3) BI SAP Interop page
4) BI deal escalation (COMPHOT) http://comphot
5) BI internal site http://bi
INTERNAL ONLY