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CommVault® Simpana® Software Modern Data Management and Protection for SAP

A CommVault® White Paper

Contents

Executive Summary 3

Simpana® Software Covers the Bases of SAP Data Management 4

CommVault’s Unified Platform for SAP Backup, Recovery

and Archiving Delivers Low TCO 5

Two Types of Deduplication 7

The Benefits of CommVault’s Fast Snapshot Technology 8

Simpana: An End-to-End Solution for all Data Management and

Protection Needs 9

CommVault Replication and DR for SAP Boosts Business Continuity 10

CommVault Delivers Non-Disruptive, Hardware Agnostic, Snapshot Support 10

Simpana Software Ensures Rapid Deployment for

FAST ROI, Easy Manageability 11

CommVault Cost Savings with Additional Capabilities 12


3Copyright ®2010. CommVault Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.

Executive Summary

The importance of data

management, which once was

considered strictly an IT issue, has

been elevated to the status of major

business driver today as a result of

a lingering financial crisis and well-

publicized corporate scandals. Today,

organizations of all sizes and types

now consider the protection and

management of their data as a top

technology and business priority.

Most companies face tough obstacles,

however, when it comes to managing

heterogeneous IT infrastructures—

with various business-critical

enterprise applications running

in physical, virtual or even cloud

environments. The task becomes even more daunting as they try to manage different data stores and

databases across multiple operating systems with disparate products. What’s typically lacking is the

integration and intelligence needed to provide optimal business insight while ensuring the integrity and

safety of all vital data and applications, including SAP, which fuels major operations for global businesses.

For organizations caught in this swirling data management quagmire, CommVault Simpana software

offers a Singular Information Management® approach, which enables companies with SAP applications

to deploy truly modern data management. Simpana software provides the integration, automation and

scalability required to manage and protect SAP systems, including unified backup, archiving, compliance,

disaster recovery, replication, virtualization and cloud computing (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: CommVault® Simpana® Software



Simpana® Software Covers the Bases of SAP Data Management

SAP is the world’s leading provider

of business software, including

enterprise resource planning (ERP),

supply chain management (SCM),

customer relationship management

(CRM), business intelligence (BI) and

other major enterprise solutions.

One of the top challenges for SAP

customers, however, is determining

the best way to manage and protect

critical enterprise data and information

in SAP and non-SAP systems to meet

stringent Service Level Agreements

(SLAs) and overarching business

continuity goals.

SAP Backup, Restore & Recovery

SAP provides various tools and interfaces to help customers safeguard entire SAP systems, including

all necessary files and data essential for a complete system restore (see figure 2). The SAP backup tool

quiesces the database for data consistency, copies all necessary files to the backup devices, including all

database logs, and recovers it when necessary. Even though this interface, called SAP BR-tools, is fully

integrated into SAP’s NetWeaver application server and management stack, it requires a lot of scripting

and customization in to leverage complete and fully functional BR-tool integration.

In contrast, CommVault’s solution for SAP backup and restore is built on BR tools and uses the entire

BR-tool command structure for more efficient and streamlined operation. Scripts are included to seam-

lessly backup and restore the entire SAP instance to the exact point required while expediting the recovery

process for optimized business continuity.

As SAP environments grow over time and businesses expand accordingly, data will grow substantially,

which clearly impacts database size, storage consideration, costs and overall performance, even though

SLAs, Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) and Recovery Point Objectives (RPO) remain the same or tighten.

As a result, greater pressure then typically is placed on the backup/restore team to provide complete SAP

data protection and management. Again, CommVault Simpana software delivers a scalable solution that

takes advantage of the latest storage snapshot technology to rapidly snap the entire SAP environment—

no matter the size—in a short timeframe.

Figure 1: CommVault® Simpana® Information Governance FrameworkFigure 2: SAP B/R Tools



SAP Archiving

SAP environments are expected to grow significantly over time, especially as companies expand globally,

acquire businesses, enter new markets or simply transition more functionality into SAP. The more vital the

business data and information stored in SAP’s databases, the more impact there is on overall SAP performance,

storage requirements, costs and resources.

Therefore, a poorly performing SAP system can have a significantly negative impact on crucial business drivers,

such as revenue and compliance, while increasing overall corporate risks. In order to keep a SAP deployment in

top shape and therefore the entire business competitive without losing the flexibility, critical steps must be made

taken. Unnecessary and obsolete data and information must be deleted from the database to keep it slim for high-

er and better performance. For this purpose, SAP provides an interface to manage data and information efficiently

as well as to retire SAP data in a compliant way.

Called ArchiveLink, this interface is

the direct connection for SAP content,

data, transactions and documents

stored in a SAP database. Initiated

within SAP, decisions can be made

regarding which data and documents

can be retired. SAP then sends all the

chosen data via ArchiveLink to the SAP

archive system of choice. This attached

archive can be hardware- or software-

based and be combined with an entire

information lifecycle system. CommVault’s

solution for SAP archiving is built on

ArchiveLink to move data directly from

SAP to attached storage or tape systems

or even into the cloud.

CommVault’s solution takes full advantage of hardware systems by adding more functionality and features to

manage data and content more efficiently. CommVault Simpana software receives the data and documents from

SAP, indexes the material for later content management or compliance and then archives it on any device—even

Figure 3: SAP Archiving



into the cloud for cost and reduced complexity reasons. In addition, the archive process is fast and efficient;

all necessary archive scripts are included and CommVault makes the most of its hardware-agnostic architecture.

Another aspect and huge advantage of CommVault’s archiving solution for SAP is the unified platform. There is

a single user interface for all aspects of data management for SAP, including backup, restore, archiving and

even replication.

CommVault’s Unified Platform for SAP Backup, Recovery and Archiving

Delivers Low TCO

CommVault Simpana software’s unified data management platform is ideally suited for SAP environments as it

integrates seamlessly with all SAP ERP, finance and other modules as well as non-SAP systems. Simpana software

also includes full protection for all virtual infrastructures, which is a rising consideration as more and more organizations

are reaping the tangible benefits of consolidating and virtualizing their datacenters and deploying SAP in virtual or cloud

environments. Another certainty: organizations are moving away from point products that solve only one particular

SAP problem. Realizing the additional costs and complexity associated with solutions that treat information in separate

silos, they are demanding more comprehensive, integrated data management and protection solutions that increase

enterprise-wide effectiveness and efficiency.

At the same time, a singular data management solution for SAP must address the challenges associated with

compliance and risk management. Information extracted from SAP systems must be securely stored, backed

up and archived, so the content can be

reviewed in proper context for compliance

and risk mitigation.

Faced with more and more regulations

worldwide, it is essential that corporate

data can be searched quickly and thoroughly.

To accomplish this, a solution needs to

have full indexing capability of all extracted

data, spanning both SAP and non--SAP

systems so all relevant and related

information can be identified. Additionally,

the solution must be able to extract this

data from any device, including storage

or tape systems, as well as from

cloud storage.Figure 4: Unified Data Management Platform



CommVault software provides all functionality necessary to rapidly, securely and effectively backup and recover

SAP systems and its scalability makes it well tailored for small, medium and large environments. Built on SAP’s

BR tools, CommVault Simpana software enables customers to initiate and manage backup and recovery tasks

conveniently and directly from SAP. In order to meet SLA criteria, tight RPOs or stringent RTOs as well as overcome

network bottlenecks, the throughput for backups and recoveries can be configured to multi-stream. This permits

multiplying the amount of data streamed from and to storage, tape or cloud systems. In addition, CommVault

Simpana software enables a very granular recovery process with point-in-time selection to recover SAP precisely

to the desired recovery point. All necessary database or SAP scripts to recover the SAP database, including all log

file replay, are performed automatically, meaning there is no intervention required from administrators. With one click,

the entire AP system is recovered, no matter whether the backup data is residing on storage, tape or cloud systems.

Furthermore, the backup can be routed to any location and doesn’t necessarily need to be recovered to the exact

hardware configuration or backup location, which gives customers added flexibility when recovering an SAP system.

CommVault supports all major database vendors, such as Oracle, MaxDB, Microsoft SQL Server and Sybase, and is

storage, tape and cloud agnostic for full flexibility and easy adaption to any SAP IT environment.

Two Types of Deduplication

As companies must keep an eye on their IT budgets and SAP costs, CommVault software’s built-in source or

target-side deduplication can help reduce overall storage-related costs by lowering the data and information footprint.

Therefore, SAP costs of backups and archives can be reduced by more than 90 percent, so customers can take full

advantage of deduplication for storage, tape and cloud systems.

Even though SAP’s BR tools are the officially supported and recommended way of backing up and recovering entire

SAP systems, some organizations require faster and more efficient ways to handle the bottlenecks introduced by BR

tools, such as network latency, single backup/recovery streams, performance hits on production system during backup

or missing functionality. In any of these scenarios, CommVault provides a welcome choice, when it comes to having

more influence and impact on data management and protection for SAP environments.

In addition to having agents specifically for SAP systems that integrate seamlessly with BR tools, CommVault Simpana

software permits usage of database agents, such as Oracle or Microsoft SQL Server, to deliver more functionality

and features when backing up or recovering SAP databases. Multiple database streams and support for clustered

environments are just a few additional features that a database agent would provide. The more feature-rich solution

when using database agents is based on the integration into database interfaces that are optimized for the database,

such as RMAN for Oracle.



As a result of not using SAP BR tools and rather taking advantage of direct database data management, the SAP

system is not aware of any backup activity and why additional steps are necessary to synch backup and recovery

activities between systems. For customers with strict and tight SLAs, RTOs and RPOs, backing up large SAP

environments take too long, thus causing lost business opportunities or disrupted revenue streams. In these

situations, the standard BR tools approach cannot be relied upon and even directly backing up the database would

not solve the time issue when managing backups and recoveries. What’s needed is very fast snapshot technology,

provided by storage system vendors. Unfortunately, using snapshot technology without successfully completing

full backups from time to time makes the entire backup environment unmanageable, resulting many times in

companies losing control and reliability of their SAP backups. Often this is why recoveries fail, which leads to

data and business loss.

The Benefits of CommVault’s Fast Snapshot Technology

CommVault provides full support for fast snapshot technology—along with the added advantage of making

the snapshots manageable without performing full backups. CommVault’s SnapProtect™ technology takes

full advantage of snapshot technology by initiating and managing the snapshots. When recovering SAP systems

from a snapshot, CommVault Simpana software is fully aware of the location of the snapshot and has all

necessary features, functions and scripts to fully recover SAP granular to any point in time.

Many customers are asking about innovative architectures and flexibility without additional costs or complexity

due to integration of various solutions. SAP virtualization and cloud computing can help customers stay on the

leading edge to provide their SAP users with more functionality and quicker time to production. In addition,

these customers can expect faster response time due to enhanced performance as well as easier and more

intuitive new SAP features without losing sight of security, compliance, cost or data protection. CommVault

software has the ability to replicate SAP systems in real-time to rapidly build new test or development

environments based on existing deployments. Fast replication in and from cloud environments can provide

a cost efficient way to protect SAP systems as part of a disaster recovery solution or streamlined development,

test and production process for rapid deployment of new SAP features and functions. Furthermore, CommVault

Simpana software’s optimized and flexible architecture helps perform migrations between SAP systems,

reducing time and resources when updating or upgrading SAP systems.



Simpana: An End-to-End Solution for All Data Management and Protection Needs

CommVault’s Simpana software provides SAP customers with an end-to-end solution for all data management

and protection needs, including backup, recovery and restore as well as archiving. Simpana software is SAP

ArchiveLink-certified, therefore the software is proven to fully support SAP’s interface to archive transactional

data as well as documents and attachments. If needed, Simpana software also can retrieve data for compliance

or legal holds. Simpana software makes possible more efficient archiving before the data is stored on

an archiving device, such as secondary storage systems, tape or even cloud environments. The data can be

indexed and catalogued, which makes it easier to find later during retrieval. Thanks to an easy-to-use search

engine, customers can quickly search and find archived data. This can be a critical advantage because many

organizations hesitate to archive SAP data frequently due to the fact that the traditional searching and retrieving

takes too long. With Simpana software, this is an issue of the past as several customer performance tests

have proven that search and find tasks, which previously took days, now can be done in minutes.

While many technology vendors are SAP ArchiveLink-certified and claim to provide an archiving solution for SAP,

CommVault’s solution is unique because Simpana software provides a platform approach, which makes many of

the most important features and functions, including deduplication, compression and encryption (see figure 4),

available out-of-the-box for archiving SAP environments or heterogeneous environments with SAP and non-SAP

components. Another CommVault plus: Simpana software’s archiving target system. While many vendors provide

a solution for one particular storage system or tape technology, Simpana software can move data onto any storage

or tape system, because it is fully agnostic when it comes to storage and tape technology. Furthermore, Simpana

software can move data to public and private cloud environments for additional cost savings and complexity reduction.

Managed by data policies archiving SAP environments is mostly automated and depending on retention policies the

data can moved automatically without any administrators intervention, what reduces resources and costs.

CommVault Simpana software provides all this functionality in one completely unified platform. All data that has

been backed up or archived by CommVault is indexed and searchable, regardless of whether it resides on storage

disks, tape or cloud-based systems. A comprehensive, end-to-end data management and protection solution that

provides full coverage, flexibility and cost efficiency, CommVault Simpana software also delivers integrated content

management for more in-depth data analysis or compliance purposes. In addition, CommVault Simpana software

lowers total cost of ownership (TCO), because neither expansion nor extension requires any additional integration

or causes any disruption to ongoing business processes. Functionality can be switched on and off simply by applying

license keys, not through technology integration. As figure 4 shows, CommVault Simpana software contains all the

modern data management and protection functionality and features required for any size of SAP environment.



CommVault Replication and DR for SAP Boosts Business Continuity

As SAP environments contain

business-critical information, data

protection is essential to business

momentum, increasing revenue

and staying competitive while

being flexible enough to leverage

new innovation and business expansion.

CommVault Simpana software helps

SAP customers boost business

continuity by adding an extra layer

of data protection with state-of-the-art

encryption technology. This capability,

combined with integrated backup,

restore and archiving, provides an

elevated level of business continuity

and recovery from any business

disruption.

As today’s business world is moving fast with lots of new innovations, it’s imperative that any trusted

solution performs in a fast, orderly process from development and test to production. CommVault Simpana

software can easily replicate entire, fully functional SAP systems for multiple purposes, including executable

files and databases.

CommVault Delivers Non-Disruptive, Hardware Agnostic, Snapshot Support

The snapshot technology provided by many storage system vendors can quickly snap an entire SAP

environment within seconds, with minimal impact on the production system, resources or performance.

Snapshot management puts the SAP system into a quiescence mode, so the data in the database is

consistent and not corrupted. This guarantees a successful restore and database recovery in case of a

planned or unplanned business disruption or disaster. Hardware snapshots, however, have a very significant

disadvantage; they are neither data nor content aware. The SAP system is snapped, but the data inside

the snapshot is not indexed for compliance or search purposes. The results are very time-intensive trial-and-

error tasks when conducting restores. In addition, databases can be restored, but only after many time-

intensive and disruptive manual steps, such as replaying log files and other tasks to get the database back

to a production state. This is time that many companies cannot afford to waste to get back to business

after any kind of planned or unplanned event.

Figure 5: SAP Interface Integration



CommVault Simpana software automates the complete recovery process and reinstates the entire

SAP database by using snapshot technology in conjunction with task automation. All leading hardware

snapshot technologies are supported. In addition, snapshot content can be indexed for searchability,

content management and compliance. In a restore scenario, data can be searched and found easily

as well as recovered as needed. As well, the data can be analyzed or retained in a content store for

collaboration. With all the aforementioned features and capabilities, it is clear to SAP customers that

CommVault provides an end-to-end information and data lifecycle management solution that will

integrate seamlessly with their environment.

Simpana Software Ensures Rapid Deployment for

Fast ROI, Easy Manageability

CommVault Simpana software’s singular platform can be deployed rapidly without disruption or

lengthy and costly integration. Managing small, medium or large environments from one central

console and user interface is the key to keeping costs low and return on investments high.

CommVault provides RBAC user access, so access to content and capabilities are granted according

to user type. The entire environment is multi-tenant based, so numerous users can access the

same environment. Administrators or SAP end-users can execute individual tasks by taking

advantage of CommVault’s easy and intuitive, wizard-based user interface.

Based on the experiences of more than 12,000 customers, CommVault Simpana software’s

average deployment time, including customization and setup, is less than one week. This means

that customers can protect and manage their SAP and non-SAP environments quickly with minimal

impact to ongoing business. Deployment, configuration and customization are non-disruptive and

retrofits of existing environments are performed efficiently and effectively. CommVault Simpana

software leverages its hardware-agnostic functionality to fit seamlessly into any storage, tape or

cloud environment. CommVault customers can save up to 50 percent in storage related costs and

some customers have reported a savings of approximately 60 percent in licensing and maintenance

costs compared to their prior data management solution.



CommVault Cost Savings with Additional Capabilities

According to Gartner’s compilation

of the top 10 business and

technology priorities for 2010

(see figure 5), reducing enterprise

costs ranks No. 2, only trailing

business process improvement.

In these challenging times,

implementing cost savings is

likely to stay a top priority for

years to come. In IT matters,

optimizing infrastructure,

prioritizing enterprise projects

and spending money wisely

are a must. It’s no wonder

that large enterprise IT projects,

such as SAP or Business Objects,

often are put on hold when costs

must be kept down. Companies are demanding more holistic approaches, not solutions based on product

silos, when solving IT issues and challenges. CommVault can help reduce IT-related costs, such as resources,

software, maintenance and hardware. CommVault Simpana software’s unified technology and common platform

are ideal for modern IT environments and integrates transparently into many facets of SAP’s data management,

including backup, recovery, archiving, compliance, data protection and more.

Simpana software provides one data management solution with multiple built-in features and functions that

are directly accessible without any integration or additional software. For instance, CommVault software’s

built-in deduplication capability can reduce the amount of data sent to backup or archiving devices by up to

90 percent. This results directly in significantly less disk space or tape usage without losing flexibility or

overall data protection.

According to customer experiences, on average, Simpana software produced savings of up to 50 percent

in storage related costs for CommVault customers. One large, multinational customer that utilizes both

Figure 6: Gartner Report



www.commvault.com n 888.746.3849 n E-mail: [email protected] Worldwide Headquarters n 2 Crescent Place n Oceanport, NJ 07757 n 888-746-3849 n Fax: 732-870-4525 CommVault Regional Offices: United States n Europe n Middle East & Africa n Asia-Pacific n Latin America & Caribbean n Canada n India n Oceania

©1999-2010 CommVault Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. CommVault, CommVault and logo, the “CV” logo, CommVault Systems, Solving Forward, SIM, Singular Information Management, Simpana, CommVault Galaxy, Unified Data Management, QiNetix, Quick Recovery, QR, CommNet, GridStor, Vault Tracker, InnerVault, QuickSnap, QSnap, Recovery Director, CommServe, CommCell, SnapProtect, ROMS, and CommValue, are trademarks or registered trademarks of CommVault Systems, Inc. All other third party brands, products, service names, trademarks, or registered service marks are the property of and used to identify the products or services of their respective owners. All specifications are subject to change without notice.

SAP and CommVault software reported an immediate projected savings in hard storage costs of 66 percent

by consolidating from three backup servers to one backup server. If we estimate that the cost of each backup

server is at minimum $1MM, by consolidating down to one server, a company can save more than $600k.

This customer also predicts a reduction in the time of its backup window by at least half, a savings in IT

“people” hours that can be re-deployed on other projects.

Depending on the size of the company and IT environment, if we hypothesize annual storage (e.g. hardware,

software, license, resources and maintenance etc.) related costs of $2MM the potential 50 percent savings

n overall storage related costs can add up to more than $1MM. Such savings will enable customers to

reinvest in new or updated SAP software. The reality is that a vast number of all SAP customers are still

running SAP versions of 4.6c or older. With these savings, this segment can start upgrade projects to the

latest NetWeaver versions.

This, in turn, permits taking advantage of all the newest features and functions that will make businesses

more agile and flexible. For example, perhaps then constrained IT resources can be used more efficiently

and for important SAP projects. By using CommVault’s functionality that enables customers to automate

most data management processes, these resources can handle various new or additional tasks. With

CommVault, SAP customers have access to all the features and functionality needed to lower data

management costs and complexity, including the ability to automatically resume failed backups,

auto-discover virtual machines and automatically assign backup policies.

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