NetApp Increases Support for the SAP Co-Innovation Labs Network

With NetApp, Inc. and SAP AG, customers and partners benefit from integrated, end-to-end solutions from the network of SAP Co-Innovation Labs.

As one of the four founding sponsors of the first SAP Co-Innovation Lab in Palo Alto, CA, NetApp delivers both solution expertise and the storage platform for all SAP Co-Innovation Labs in locations that include Bangalore, India and Tokyo, Japan. NetApp announced an increased investment to support the SAP Co-Innovation Labs Network, including the new SAP HANA Center of Excellence Switzerland in Zurich.

The first SAP Co-Innovation Lab was opened in 2007. Since then, SAP has opened a network of labs and facilities featuring showrooms, engineering facilities, data centers, and project resources. Its mission is to facilitate project-based co-innovation between SAP and its partners on global and regional levels and in a real-world context. Working with SAP for more than a decade, NetApp has a role in driving data management innovation for customers.

Developments Resulting from Efforts of NetApp and SAP
in the SAP Co-Innovation Lab

FlexPod
The Cisco and NetApp FlexPod data center solution is an example of how, through cooperation with SAP, NetApp has transformed innovation into a solution. Started as an exploratory proof of concept called ”Lean Cloud Reference Architecture,’ NetApp and its partners evolved the concept beyond a pure hardware stack and built it on the FlexPod shared infrastructure. Through integration with SAP applications, processes, and workflows, the FlexPod solution offers value to customers.

Working with the SAP Co-Innovation Lab and the SAP CTO team, NetApp and partners enhanced the FlexPod solution by developing SAP solution-specific core services and workflow descriptions. The use of NetApp technologies such as FlexClone, Snapshot, and SnapManager helps customers reduce risk and cost and to accelerate SAP lifecycle management and run SAP landscapes in the cloud. The solution is based on the pretested FlexPod design architecture by Cisco and NetApp and integrates VMware cloud infrastructure.

Today, customers have a choice for FlexPod automation and orchestration that leverage open APIs, including Cisco Intelligent Automation for Cloud, VMware vCloud Director, and VMware vCenter Server. The new integration with VMware vCenter Orchestrator provides workflows and enables administrators to automate existing manual tasks and execute workflows.

In-Memory Computing, Including SAP HANA
Through involvement in the SAP Co-Innovation Lab and hardware partner Cisco, NetApp is a stakeholder in the new SAP HANA Center of Excellence Switzerland. It is dedicated to SAP HANA, performing proof of concepts, developing customer-specific demo scenarios, and executing development tasks. The lab has the latest hardware and software versions on site, including the SAP ERP application, the SAP BusinessObjects solution portfolio, and the SAP NetWeaver technology platform, all integrated with NetApp data management.

Real-life Disaster-Recovery Simulation
Between Tokyo and Osaka
A Japanese system integration partner posed a challenge to participants in the SAP Co-Innovation Lab: Create an efficient disaster-recovery concept. Five partners, including NetApp, worked together to meet the challenge. One scenario was set up in the Tokyo data center of the SAP Co-Innovation Lab, and a temporary one was set up at the member’s site in Osaka, backed by NetApp business continuity solutions. The scenario was tested successfully, and soon gained broader interest, because it was simulated shortly before the tsunami hit Japan’s coast in March of 2011.

NetApp Contributes to SAP Co-Innovation Labs
NetApp solutions provide the storage and data management backbone of the network of SAP Co-Innovation Labs, helping to meet the challenges of limited resources and a global shared-project infrastructure. Working concurrently with many partners worldwide involves sensitivity to data privacy and security, as well as to timely closing conditions. Projects require different landscapes based on solutions from both SAP and its partners.

Building on agile NetApp storage and data-management solutions, as well as leveraging full virtualization and cloud capabilities, the SAP Co-Innovation Lab network is able to save resources, reduce SAP landscape provisioning to hours, and support 140 concurrent landscapes worldwide. Customers and partners can concentrate on their application challenges rather than on infrastructure needs.

Patrick Rogers, VP, Data Center Platforms, NetApp, said: "For more than a decade, we have been working closely with SAP to create innovative solutions for our joint customers. The SAP Co-Innovation Lab concept is highly appealing, because it provides an open framework to build the solutions of tomorrow and makes the results of co-innovation efforts on solutions such as SAP HANA visible and tangible to customers and partners worldwide. We are excited to be part of the ecosystem of partners involved in the SAP Co-Innovation Lab network, as both a storage expert and a supplier."

Dr. Axel Henning Saleck, VP and head of Global SAP Co-Innovation Lab Network, SAP Research, Technology and Innovation Platform, SAP, said: "NetApp is a highly committed partner, driving innovation for joint customers. From the launch of the first SAP Co-Innovation Lab, NetApp has been ready to take the next step and share its technology and knowledge. NetApp is easy to work with, inspiring and open minded, and has the attitude of getting things done. Customers, resellers, and industry partners clearly benefit from core innovation efforts resulting from the labs. Together with our partners in the labs, we are accelerating new innovations and deployments, providing best practices, and shortening time to market for our customers."