SAP Digital Access Metrics

Understanding SAP Digital Access Metrics

• User Activity Tracking: Monitors individual users interacting with SAP systems.
• Document Volume: Measures the number of documents generated or accessed.
• Third-Party Integrations: Evaluates indirect access by external applications.
• Data Exchange Metrics: Tracks data transfer between systems for compliance.
• License Compliance Reports: Ensures usage aligns with purchased licenses.

SAP Digital Access Metrics

The landscape of SAP licensing has undergone a significant transformation. SAP Digital Access is at the heart of this change, redefining how businesses pay for SAP systems, especially as they connect more and more third-party applications, devices, and automated systems.

Instead of focusing solely on user-based licenses, SAP now considers document interactions. This move aims to create a fairer, more transparent system in a digitally connected environment.

Let’s dive deep into understanding how SAP Digital Access Metrics work, its core principles, and what organizations need to know for optimal management.

The Evolution of SAP Licensing

SAP Digital Access marks a shift in licensing designed to meet modern enterprises’ needs where digital ecosystems are interconnected.

Traditional SAP licensing models were straightforward based on the system’s number of users. However, as businesses expanded their digital footprints, more systems interacted indirectly with SAP, creating complexities that user-based licensing models struggled to cover effectively.

SAP Digital Access targets these indirect access scenarios. The goal is to fairly price how third-party systems create, update, or interact with data in SA, referred to as “indirect access.” The new model measures value by counting documents rather than users or systems.

Core Principles of Digital Access

1. Document-Based Measurement

The key principle of SAP Digital Access is document-based measurement. Unlike traditional methods, where you count the number of users accessing a system, the Digital Access model charges based on the number of specific documents created within SAP by non-SAP systems.

These documents reflect business transactions or activities, such as sales orders or invoices. This approach measures system usage in terms of nine specific document types:

• Sales Orders
• Invoices
• Purchase Orders
• Billing Documents
• Manufacturing Orders
• Service Orders
• Delivery Documents
• Goods Issue
• Goods Receipt

These document types represent core business outcomes, and charges are only applied for the initial creation of these documents within SAP, regardless of the source system.

2. Types of Access

Digital Access differentiates between direct access and indirect access:

• Direct Access: This is where users directly interact with SAP’s Digital Core, like ERP or SAP S/4HANA. This type of access continues to be licensed using traditional user count models.
• Indirect Access: In this type of access, systems, devices, or third-party software interact with SAP indirectly, typically by creating documents. The charges are based on the number of documents created rather than user counts.

Technical Implementation of Digital Access

Measurement Architecture

The technical implementation of SAP Digital Access relies on a sophisticated tracking system. One key technology involved is the Extended SAP Passport (EPP), which records where a request to the SAP system originates.

This helps SAP track which documents are created by third-party systems. The methodology ensures that all document creations are logged and reported accurately, which informs licensing costs.

Document Counting Mechanics

• Only initial document creation is counted. For instance, if a third-party application creates a sales order in SAP, that counts towards your licensing.
• Subsequent actions like modifying, deleting, or reading that document are not counted towards Digital Access licensing.
• Line items also play a role in some document types. Specific rules determine whether individual line items should be counted, which adds to the complexity.

The Cost Structure of Digital Access

Pricing Model

The pricing of SAP Digital Access revolves around three main factors:

1. Document Volume: The number of documents created is the primary driver of cost.
2. Document Type: Different document types may have different costs. For instance, creating an invoice might be priced differently than creating a purchase order.
3. Line Item Considerations: Each line item within a document may also influence the final cost for certain document types.

SAP launched the Digital Access Adoption Program (DAAP) to support organizations transitioning to Digital Access.

This program offers up to 90% discounts on digital access licenses and provides options to pay for estimated current document usage while allowing for future growth.

These discounts help enterprises ease into this new licensing approach without incurring significant upfront costs.

Implementation Considerations

System Requirements

To implement Digital Access effectively, organizations must ensure their systems are set up to measure document creation from remote access calls. This means:

• Configuring system identification properly so that interactions from third-party software are correctly logged.
• Setting up appropriate tracking mechanisms to capture document creation data.
• Establishing reporting infrastructure for accurate usage monitoring.

Measurement Tools

SAP provides several tools to help measure and track Digital Access effectively:

• License Administration Workbench (LAW): A tool that helps aggregate licensing data.
• USMM Transaction: An older transaction-based tool for managing licenses.
• Digital Access Evaluation Service: A more modern service designed to evaluate document creation patterns for Digital Access purposes.

Strategic Benefits of SAP Digital Access

SAP Digital Access offers multiple strategic benefits to businesses:

1. Eliminates Licensing Uncertainties: By focusing on document creation, SAP moves away from complex interpretations of indirect access a major cause of disputes and audits in the past.
2. Predictable Costs: The document-based model ensures organizations have better visibility over their costs, as charges are directly tied to measurable business activities.
3. Supports Digital Transformation: By aligning licensing with business outcomes (i.e., document creation), SAP Digital Access provides a model that scales with a company’s digital initiatives, especially as new third-party systems and automation processes are implemented.

4. Improved Compliance and Reporting

Document-based licensing enhances compliance management. Companies can use SAP’s advanced tools to generate detailed reports, ensuring that document creation patterns are always visible. This makes it easier to demonstrate compliance in case of an audit and to adjust licensing needs proactively.

5. Alignment with Real Business Value

Traditional user licensing often led to disparities, especially in companies that extensively leveraged automation or third-party integrations. By focusing on documents, SAP Digital Access ties licensing directly to business value—reflecting processes like sales transactions, manufacturing orders, or goods receipts. This alignment ensures that companies are paying for what truly drives value.

6. Incentives for Cloud and Digital Integration

SAP’s Digital Access model also incentivizes cloud adoption. As enterprises migrate more workloads to the cloud, especially those involving interconnected systems and IoT, Digital Access provides a simplified licensing framework that accommodates these shifts more naturally than traditional user-based models.

Challenges in Measuring Digital Access

While the principles of Digital Access seem straightforward, implementing it has its challenges.

1. Data Collection: Organizations often struggle to determine which data sources are reliable for measuring document creation. Many SAP environments involve a mix of new and legacy systems, making consistent data tracking challenging.
2. Historical Data Analysis: Businesses may need to review historical data to understand baseline document usage. This can be particularly challenging if prior logging is inconsistent or incomplete. Accurately understanding past document creation helps forecast costs and ensures proper license allocation.
3. Line Item Calculation: Certain document types may require counting individual line items, adding another layer of complexity to license calculation. For example, a sales order with multiple line items might necessitate a different licensing approach than a simpler document type, making calculations non-trivial.
4. Complex Integration Environments: Modern enterprises often operate with a complex ecosystem of interconnected applications and services. This makes tracking indirect access more challenging as many non-SAP systems might generate documents in SAP. Ensuring these interactions are accurately captured and reported requires meticulous integration and monitoring.
5. Cost Control Challenges: Since document creation counts can fluctuate significantly based on business activities, managing licensing costs becomes dynamic. Businesses must continuously monitor document volumes, especially during peak business periods, to avoid unexpected cost spikes.

Best Practices for Managing SAP Digital Access

Monitoring and Compliance

Effective management of Digital Access involves continuous monitoring of document creation across all systems.

This means examining the number of documents generated and understanding the access patterns of different parts of the organization.

• Regular assessments of document creation patterns should be conducted to detect any unexpected spikes or changes.
• Maintain clear documentation of all third-party integrations and their impact on SAP.
• Use automation where possible to track document creation across multiple environments.
• Designate a Digital Access Compliance Team to oversee ongoing measurement, ensuring continuous alignment with SAP licensing policies.

Cost Optimization Strategies

To keep costs in check:

• Regularly evaluate the growth trajectories of your business and how these impact document creation.
• Work with SAP’s Digital Access Evaluation Service to gain accurate insights into your document creation trends. This will help you avoid over-licensing or incur penalties for under-licensing.
• Implement document archiving policies to minimize unnecessary document creation that can inadvertently inflate licensing costs.
• Adopt capacity planning—predict future document creation needs and align them with your business’s seasonal or market fluctuations.

Advanced Tools for Digital Access Management

1. SAP Fiori and Advanced Analytics

For a more comprehensive analysis, SAP Fiori applications can be used to provide a visual breakdown of Digital Access metrics. These dashboards allow companies to:

• Track real-time document creation trends.
• Create predictive models that help in estimating future document creation.
• Segment document data by department or business unit for more targeted monitoring.

2. Digital Access Estimation Tool

This tool offers an advanced evaluation mechanism to estimate licensing costs based on document counts, usage trends, and integration complexities. The Digital Access Estimation Tool helps companies plan by simulating different scenarios and assessing their impact on licensing.

Future Considerations in Digital Licensing

As enterprises continue on their digital transformation journey, several trends are likely to impact how Digital Access evolves:

• IoT Integration: With the proliferation of IoT devices, there will be more opportunities for machine-generated document creation, which could impact Digital Access costs. Each connected device that sends data and creates a corresponding document in SAP systems must be accounted for, likely necessitating additional planning and cost assessment.
• Increased Automation: Systems that previously involved human interaction are now increasingly automated. Each automated action that creates a document in SAP may lead to Digital Access charges, which requires careful planning. The rise in automation highlights the need for robust monitoring frameworks to manage cost implications effectively.
• Third-Party Application Growth: With more business applications integrating with SAP, indirect access will continue to grow, making document monitoring even more essential. Enterprises must build scalable tracking systems that can monitor these growing interactions.
• Blockchain and SAP: As blockchain technology becomes more integrated into supply chain and logistics, many document types will likely be linked to blockchain events. This may create new categories of document creation and require specific compliance measures for managing Digital Access in blockchain-integrated environments.
• AI and Machine Learning Integration: With more SAP systems integrating AI/ML for predictive analytics and automated decisions, these advanced tools may also generate documents within SAP. Companies must understand how these AI-driven interactions will be licensed under the Digital Access model.

FAQs

What is SAP Digital Access?
SAP Digital Access measures document usage generated by human, system, or application interaction with SAP systems.

How does SAP track digital access metrics?
It uses automated tracking systems to monitor document creation, user activities, and indirect system interactions.

What are the main digital access metrics in SAP?
Key metrics include user interactions, document volume, and indirect access through third-party integrations.

What is indirect access in SAP Digital Access?
Indirect access refers to non-SAP applications interacting with SAP data, often incurring additional licensing fees.

Why is document generation a key metric?
SAP charges are based on the number and type of documents generated or accessed, making it a critical cost factor.

What types of documents are monitored under SAP Digital Access?
Common types include sales orders, invoices, purchase orders, and similar transactional records.

Can third-party tools affect digital access metrics?
Yes, third-party tools interacting with SAP data may trigger additional indirect access fees.

How does SAP Digital Access impact licensing costs?
Costs are influenced by user count, document volume, and indirect access, requiring accurate tracking for compliance.

What tools are available to monitor SAP Digital Access?
SAP provides specialized dashboards and reports to monitor digital access metrics and ensure compliance.

Can I optimize SAP Digital Access costs?
Accurate tracking and analyzing document usage can help identify areas to reduce unnecessary usage or adjust licenses.

What happens if metrics exceed the licensed limits?
Exceeding limits can result in compliance issues and additional fees during audits or license true-ups.

How are SAP Digital Access metrics calculated?
Metrics are based on user activity, the volume of generated documents, and data shared through third-party systems.

Why is tracking SAP Digital Access important?
It helps businesses manage costs, ensure compliance, and avoid potential penalties for overuse.

What is the difference between user-based and document-based licensing?
User-based licenses depend on the number of users, while document-based licenses are calculated on generated document volume.

Can SAP Digital Access metrics impact overall IT strategy?
Understanding metrics is crucial for cost forecasting, compliance, and optimizing enterprise resource planning.