Should I Upgrade To Sap Business Objects Business Intelligence 4.0? One Question, Five Answers

Since the September 2011 general availability of SAP Business Objects Business Intelligence 4.0 (BI4)

, the first major release of the BI suite since SAP 2008 acquisition of Business Objects, there has been one question on the minds of SAP Business Objects customers: Should I upgrade?

There is no single answer to this question, instead, there are five.

1. New Customers

Yes. Despite SAP Business Objects Business Intelligence 4.0 being a new product, it offers new and improved methods for creating and consuming business intelligence compared to its predecessors, particularly for organizations that use SAP BW for their data warehouse but have not yet begun using SAP Business Objects tools. You are just getting started, so start small, start now, and you will probably be going live with your first pilot project when SAP Business Objects Business Intelligence 4.0 Feature Pack 3 ships next year.

2. Existing Customers with SAP ERP

Maybe. You will eventually have to go to the BI 4.0 platform, but the question is do you have to do it now or later? SAP Business Objects Business Intelligence 4.0 includes improved and simplified integration with SAP ERP and Netweaver BW. But customers with a large existing infrastructure will have to weigh the cost of migrating that infrastructure to the new platform as well as the potential costs associated with maintaining two production BI environments during the transition period. Larger organizations are better able to have the staff resources to manage this transition period easier than smaller organizations.

3. Existing Customers with Non-SAP ERP

Maybe. You will also eventually have to go to the BI 4.0 platform, but the question is do you have to do it now or later? In some cases, only BI 4.0 supports the latest version of your favorite database or operating system, so the answer in those cases is a definite "upgrade now". Customers with large amounts of Desktop Intelligence need a retirement strategy and may want to address most of the retirement while still on the XI 3.1 platform. Plus, business users will need retraining on Web Intelligence 4.0, which is a radical departure from previous versions.

Your BI team will also need training on the new Information Design Tool, whose adoption is required to take advantage of many of the new BI 4.0 capabilities. As with the SAP ERP organizations above, customers with a large existing infrastructure will have to weigh the cost of migrating that infrastructure to the new platform as well as the potential costs associated with maintaining two production BI environments during the transition period.

4. Existing Customers with Both SAP and Non-SAP ERP

Maybe. Sounding familiar? But if your BI strategy relies heavily on SAP Netweaver BW, you should lean closer to "Yes" than "No".

5. Classic Business Objects or Crystal Enterprise Customers

No. If you are using classic Business Objects (versions 5 or 6) or "classic" Crystal Enterprise, there is no direct migration path to BI 4.0. And if you are using SAP Business Objects Enterprise XI R2, that product is no longer under support as of July 2010. Instead, migrate or upgrade to SAP Business Objects Enterprise XI 3.1, which was originally released in 2008 and is currently on Service Pack 5 (SP5), released in December 2011.

Version XI 3.1 includes many of the features of BI 4.0, including mobility, Explorer, Metadata Manager, and everyone favorite, Desktop Intelligence. It is a great intermediate step to the future with many more years of longevity (and support) to it.

Conclusion

SAP Business Objects Business Intelligence 4.0 has many groundbreaking features. But despite SAPs highly regarded ramp-up program, it is still a dot-zero release. Not only in terms of software quality, but in the infrastructure (education, best practices, trained staff, etc.) required to support it. Although the next minor release, BI 4 Feature Pack 3, has no release date, it probably will not arrive until the second half of 2012. And the next major release is further away still. Can you afford to wait?

These are not easy decisions. Weigh your options by evaluating your current use of business intelligence, performing a health check on your current environment, and creating a strategic plan to align your organizations business objectives to your business intelligence strategy and the software used to realize them.

by: Dallas Marks

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