How can SAP for Me simplify SAP ecosystem management?

SAP for Me is a personalized portal that provides a snapshot of the most relevant aspects of a user's SAP landscape.

SAP offers a comprehensive and varied set of software products. To put it another way, there's a great deal of complexity in most SAP landscapes, which can include multiple SAP products alongside third-party software and custom code. There are as many ways to configure SAP as there are customers, and each SAP environment may include both cloud and on-premises software, multiple database engines and a variety of different license types.

That complexity makes the task of managing an SAP landscape especially challenging. And, despite the "Run Simple" marketing slogan that was in widespread use at SAP a few years ago, the company has never done a great job making things appear simple. It can be enormously time-consuming to keep track of multiple SAP products, versions, maintenance schedules, user licenses and technical notes.

Last year, the company began piloting a new customer portal called SAP for Me. Earlier this year, it was released for general use, and customer reviews so far have been quite positive. SAP describes SAP for Me as a personalized portal that "aggregates important alerts, metrics and insights about your SAP product portfolio with a single access point."

For SAP system administrators, the value of SAP for Me is likely to rest on having a single point of access with visibility to users, support tickets, technical notes and important updates that are relevant to their specific SAP landscape. The product also supports provisioning, and it provides an access point to e-learning and legal and licensing agreements. There is even a feedback portal that the company claims will enable customers to influence product features going forward.

The new product seems to be distinguished by the simplicity of its mission to be a one-stop shop that provides a complete, highly personalized view of a company's SAP landscape.

Perhaps the most notable aspect of SAP for Me is the philosophy that drives it: The intention is to provide a streamlined, personalized view of an SAP landscape, with capabilities that serve the unique needs of individual users and roles. Customer feedback indicates that the product is hitting its mark; it saves time and makes it easier to manage an SAP landscape.

As with many of SAP's products, there is a potential for overlap between SAP for Me and some of the company's other product offerings. After all, SAP already has a customer support portal, and SAP Solution Manager provides an extensive, albeit complex, tool set for managing SAP implementation projects.

The new product seems to be distinguished by the simplicity of its mission to be a one-stop shop that provides a complete, highly personalized view of a company's SAP landscape, along with the ability to perform certain management functions within the portal.

An early SAP for Me blog post from product owner Jürgen Jakowski promised that the new portal will not be a sales and marketing tool; its primary mission is to make it easier to manage your SAP environment.

SAP for Me is available for free to existing SAP customers.