SAP ALM APAC SUMMIT 2023 KEY INSIGHTS ON DAY1

The SAP ALM Summit APJ 2023 was held on July 25-27, 2023 in Bengaluru, India. The event focused on innovation in SAP application lifecycle management (ALM) and helped attendees on their journey to becoming an intelligent enterprise.

Here are some of the key highlights from Day 1 of the summit:

Sindhu Gangadharan have mentioned that how the businesses landscape are evolving and how?Cloud based solutions are the need of the hour. In this digital transformation, ALM is going to be the key player for any organization.?ALM ensures the smooth transition?in the digital transformation.

SAP ALM, is right. Businesses are evolving rapidly and cloud-based solutions are becoming increasingly important. This is because cloud-based solutions are more scalable, flexible, and cost-effective than traditional on-premises solutions.

In this digital transformation, ALM is going to be the key player for any organization. ALM stands for Application Lifecycle Management, and it is the process of managing the entire lifecycle of an application, from its initial conception to its eventual retirement. ALM ensures that applications are developed, tested, deployed, and maintained in a consistent and efficient manner.

ALM is essential for ensuring the smooth transition in digital transformation. This is because ALM can help organizations to:

• Plan and manage the transformation. ALM can help organizations to define their goals for the transformation, identify the stakeholders, and develop a plan to achieve those goals.
• Manage risk. ALM can help organizations to identify and mitigate risks associated with the transformation.
• Communicate with stakeholders. ALM can help organizations to communicate with stakeholders throughout the transformation process.
• Track progress. ALM can help organizations to track the progress of the transformation and identify areas where improvement is needed.
• Ensure compliance. ALM can help organizations to ensure that the transformation complies with all relevant regulations.

By using ALM, organizations can ensure that their digital transformation is successful and that they achieve their desired results.

Here are some specific ways that ALM can help organizations in their digital transformation:

• Automate tasks. ALM can help organizations to automate tasks such as testing, deployment, and change management. This can free up resources so that they can focus on more strategic activities.
• Improve collaboration. ALM can help organizations to improve collaboration between different teams involved in the digital transformation. This can help to ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.
• Provide visibility. ALM can provide organizations with visibility into the entire application lifecycle. This can help them to identify and fix problems early on, before they cause major disruptions.
• Measure success. ALM can help organizations to measure the success of their digital transformation. This can help them to track their progress and make necessary adjustments along the way.

Overall, ALM is a powerful tool that can help organizations to succeed in their digital transformation. If you are considering a digital transformation, I encourage you to consider using ALM.

Rahul Raina, Principal Architect, SAP ALM, is right. More customization increases the complexity of solutions and organizations miss out on almost 50% of the transformation value. This is because customization can lead to:

• Increased development costs. Customization can be time-consuming and expensive to develop and maintain.
• Increased risk of defects. Customized solutions are more likely to have defects than standard solutions.
• Increased difficulty of maintenance. Customized solutions are more difficult to maintain and update than standard solutions.
• Reduced flexibility. Customized solutions are less flexible than standard solutions and may not be able to adapt to changes in business requirements.
• Increased security risks. Customized solutions may be more vulnerable to security risks than standard solutions.

Therefore, it is important to stick to the standard solution as much as possible. This will help to reduce costs, risks, and complexity. However, there may be cases where customization is necessary. If customization is required, it is important to carefully consider the risks and benefits involved.

Here are some tips for avoiding excessive customization:

• Use standard components whenever possible. There are many standard components available that can be used to build applications. Using standard components can help to reduce development costs and risks.
• Design for change. When designing applications, it is important to design for change. This means making sure that the application is flexible and can be easily adapted to changes in business requirements.
• Use a configuration-based approach. A configuration-based approach can help to reduce customization. With a configuration-based approach, the application is built using a standard set of components and the configuration of the application is used to customize it for a specific environment.
• Use a change management process. A change management process can help to control customization. The change management process should define the steps involved in requesting, approving, and implementing changes to the application.

By following these tips, organizations can avoid excessive customization and improve the chances of success in their digital transformation.

• How to develop an ALM strategy. Marc Thier, Senior Director of Product Management, SAP ALM, gave an overview of how to develop an ALM strategy. He said that organizations need to consider their specific needs and requirements, and that they should choose the right tools and solutions to meet those needs.

• The integration of Tricentis TTA with SAP Cloud ALM. Tricentis TTA is a test automation tool that can be integrated with SAP Cloud ALM. This integration can help organizations to automate their testing and improve the quality of their applications.
• The benefits of SAP Cloud ALM for Implementation and Operation. SAP Cloud ALM for Implementation is a solution that helps organizations to manage the design, build, and test phases of their applications. SAP Cloud ALM for Operation is a solution that helps organizations to manage the operation and maintenance of their applications.
• The importance of Deploy. Deploy is a solution that helps organizations to deploy their applications to production. It ensures that applications are deployed in a consistent and reliable manner.

Key Takeaways

1. SAP Cloud ALM is the recommended ALM tool for operation (monitoring). For implementation, organizations can decide their own transition timeline to SAP Cloud ALM.
2. SAP Cloud ALM does not yet have incident management capabilities (which were previously provided by ITSM in SAP Solution Manager).
3. Tricentis TTA is not currently available for SAP Cloud ALM, but it was available for SAP Solution Manager. The integration of Tricentis TTA with SAP Cloud ALM is a one-click process that can be completed in less than 2 minutes.
4. SAP Cloud ALM for Implementation covers the design, build, and test phases of the ALM lifecycle, while SAP Cloud ALM for Operation covers the operate phase. Deploy is the glue between business transformation and business continuity.
5. SAP Cloud ALM can be used for end-to-end implementation of SAP S/4HANA Cloud. The license and cost of SAP Cloud ALM are included in SAP Enterprise Support and Subscription. SAP takes care of maintenance and operations.
6. The included memory usage of SAP Cloud ALM is 8GB, and the API usage is also 8GB of outbound data transfer per month.
7. SAP Cloud ALM is designed for cloud and hybrid customers. It is a customer-owned SaaS model that is available to use in 15 minutes (provisioning time). It has daily integrated delivery and bi-weekly feature releases, so there is no support package upgrade concept.
8. If you are planning to move your process management and test cases to SAP Cloud ALM from SAP Solution Manager, the minimum SP level required is SP15. For operations, there is no such SP level required for transitioning to SAP Cloud ALM.
9. SAP has data centers for SAP Cloud ALM in Germany, the United States, Australia, and Japan. A data center in Canada is in the roadmap, and a data center in China is in the vision possibly after 2024.
10. SAP Cloud ALM is designed to support ALM for the Intelligent Sustainable Enterprise, including SAP S/4HANA (all deployments).
11. SAP Focused Run addresses SAP-centric service providers and hybrid customers with advanced needs and/or significant on-premise footprints. It can be used as a complement to SAP Cloud ALM.
12. Maintenance support for SAP Focused Build and Focused Insights is also until 2027, as it is an add-on to SAP Solution Manager.
13. Organizations can adopt SAP Cloud ALM for service and operation now. SAP Cloud ALM requires less customer effort for updates, is easier to use and consume, and has simplified monitoring without agents. SAP recommends using SAP Cloud ALM for faster cloud implementations.

Overall, Day 1 of the SAP ALM Summit APJ 2023 was a great success. It provided attendees with valuable insights on the latest trends in ALM and how to use these trends to improve their organizations.

The summit also included a number of networking opportunities, so attendees had the chance to connect with other ALM professionals and learn from each other.