Discovering the Reference Architecture Content

This lesson focuses on the Reference Architecture Content, which is one of the five pillars in SAP Enterprise Architecture Framework.

SAP Enterprise Architecture Methodology – Artifacts Overview

SAP Enterprise Architecture Methodology artifacts are organized and arranged into seven domains.

From left to right these domains are: architectural principles and vision, strategy and motivation, Business Architecture, Solution Architecture, Technology Architecture, Roadmap, and Transition. Additionally, at the bottom we have: Requirements and Governance.

The focus of this lesson is on the Business Architecture domain with the artifacts:

• Business Capability Map
• Business Process Catalog
• Business Value Flow Diagram

and Solution Architecture domain and its artifacts:

• Product Map
• Solution Component Diagram
• Solution Value Flow Diagram
• Solution Process Flow Diagram
• Solution Data Flow Diagram

SAP provides Reference Architecture content for these artifacts.

Reference Architecture Content: Linking Business and Solution

The Reference Architecture Content from SAP covers the Business Architecture and the Solution Architecture.

Inside the Business Architecture, there are two types of models. There is the Business Capability Model and the Business Process Model. Both are solution-agnostic and so independent of SAP solutions.

Business Capability Model

The Business Capability Model organizes the complete set of business capabilities that an organization requires to successfully complete its mission, reach its strategic objectives, and execute its business model. It observes the MECE (ME - mutually exclusive/ CE- collectively exhaustive) principle.

Business Process Model

The Business Process Model classifies business processes in eight end-to-end business process groups. All business processes follow the same hierarchical structure. At the leaf level of the hierarchy business activities, which are aligned with APQC business activities, are defined.

Inside the Solution Architecture, there are also two types of models, which correspond to the models defined as part of the Business Architecture: the Solution Capability Model and the Solution Process Model.

Reference Solution Architecture content from SAP provides insights into how SAP solutions are built by depicting solution capabilities they realize, leveraged solution components, including their roles, and data objects they manage. Moreover, it details out processes supported by solution components, and integration and data flows between them.

Reference Architecture Content Example

Here is an example of the reference architecture content. On the figure 4 enterprise domains are depicted. Starting from the left: "Develop Products and Service," "Supply Fulfilled Demand," "Customer - Generate Demand," and "Corporate - Plan and Manage The Enterprise". In the example, these four enterprise domains set the anchor for the rest of the example. The color code assignment is prevalent throughout the content.

Business domains are part of the Business Capability Model FROM SAP. The Business Capability Model defines a total of 21 business domains that are logically grouped per enterprise domain. In the example: under the enterprise domain "Develop Products & Services" different business domains are represented: "R&D / Engineering" and "Product Management". Another example is the business domains of "Marketing", "Sales", "Omnichannel Commerce" and "Customer Service" which is defined under the enterprise domain of "Customer – Generate Demand."

Second we have end-to-end business processes which consist of 8 groups. You can see end-to-end processes like Idea to Market, Source to Pay, Lead to Cash, Recruit to Retire, etc . These also have a logical grouping under the enterprise domain and have a direct connection to the business domains via the business capability itself.

All of this reference architecture content is considered Reference Business Architecture. SAP also provides Reference Solution Architecture content, which is aligned with the Reference Business Architecture content. In particular, mapping of business capabilities and end-to-end business processes to solution capabilities, solution components and solution processes is provided. In this example, you can see some of the solution component groups (for example, SAP Business Technology Platform, SAP Partner Cloud Applications) that are connected to the end-to-end processes and business capabilities themselves.

The Reference Business and Solution Architecture Content is also tailored according to industries, which reflects SAP's deep industry knowledge gained in the collaboration with partners and customers.

Reference Architecture: RBA Link to RSA

Let’s further explore the reference architecture content and how reference Business Architecture is linked to the reference Solution Architecture.

For that, let’s explore some of the entities and objects that are associated to the process models or capability models.

On the Reference Business Architecture side:

In Business Capability Model and Business Process Model everything is anchored by four enterprise domains, namely "product and service," "supply," "customer" and "corporate."

There is the Business Capability Model, which describes a complete set of capabilities an organization requires. It provides a segmentation of the business capabilities across various levels and describes what an organization requires in order to deliver business value and needs to be successful.

There is the Business Process Model, which defines process segments used to standardize business processes across different process levels. The Business Process Model is based on the APQC Cross-Industry Process Classification Framework.

The Business and Solution Architectures are connected via solution capabilities and solution processes. On one side, the linkage is defined in terms of solution capabilities and solution components that are needed to implement a business capability. A business capability might be supported by none, one, or many solution capabilities. On the other side, end-to-end business processes and business activities are linked to realizing solution processes and solution activities respectively.

Let’s look at the next level of detail, at the entities and objects that sit within the reference Business Architecture on one side and reference Solution Architecture on the other side.

The Business Capability Model consists of the business domain, the business area and the business capability. The business capability is describing what the organization needs to know to generate value, independent of how software or technology may support it.

Each business capability is assigned to one business area, and consequently to one business domain.

The business process model consists of end-to-end business processes, business process modules, business process segments, and business activities. Business activities are associated to business capabilities, and describe the how an organization creates value and achieves an outcome by performing a series of steps.

On the reference Solution Architecture side, Solution Capabilities are used to describe a functional ability of a single or multiple software components, that addresses and supports a Business Capability.

Being a technology and solution provider SAP has the answer to "a how" when it comes to how technology supports the business to drive value to the organization.

The linkage between business and Solution Architectures is what organizations are really looking for. It helps to answer critical questions, such as which stakeholders or which division of business units could be impacted or involved; what are the strategy and objectives the organization should try to accomplish, and how that refers to requirements, processes, and ultimately to the integration and data that is sitting within business applications.

Let’s look at a specific example of the Business Capability Model.

In this example, the enterprise domain "Supply – Fulfill Demand" is in focus. Under this enterprise domain, the business domains "Sourcing and Procurement," "Supply Chain Planning," "Supply Chain Enablement," "Supply Chain Execution," "Manufacturing." and "Service Delivery" are defined.

Now, zooming in to one of those business domains, we are exposed to business areas that are sitting below the domain. For example, under "Supply Chain Execution" you can see the five business areas associated to it: "Dock and Yard Logistics," "Inventory Management," "Transportation Management," "Warehouse Management," and "Order Promising."

On the next level below, business capabilities are specified. Each of the business areas is linked to one or more business capabilities. The "Dock and Yard Logistics" business area has three business capabilities attached to it: "Gate Processing," "Yard Management," and "Dock Appointment Schedule."

The "Transportation Management" business area has six business capabilities attached to it; for example, "Transportation Execution" and "Fright Change Management and Settlement."

Let’s now investigate how these business capabilities are linked to solution capabilities and solution components, which are classified as "SaaS - Non S/4" (light grey), "Business Technology Platform (BTP)" (grey), "SAP S/4HANA" (blue), and "on-Premise" (dark grey).

We are now looking at the solution capabilities and components associated to the business area "Dock and Yard Logistics" and "Transportation Management."

All business capabilities assigned to the business area "Dock and Yard Logistics" are realized by solution components "SAP Business Network for Logistics," "SAP S/4HANA" and "SAP Yard Logistics for SAP S/4HANA." Solution components highlighted in grey are SAP services and applications running on SAP Business Technology Platform. Royal blue is used for SAP S/4HANA Public Edition, and darker gray for SAP S/4HANA on-premises.

Business capabilities assigned to the business area "Transportation Management" are realized by cloud solution components "SAP Event Management on SAP S/4HANA" and "SAP S/4HANA" and an on-premise solution component "SAP Transportation Resource Planning."

In addition to solution components, solution capabilities realized by the solution components are shown. So, you can see on "Dock and Yard Logistics" solution component "SAP Business Network for Logistics," which subsumes two solution capabilities - these two solutions capabilities are "Gate Processing (ISBNLog)" and "Dock Appointment Scheduling (ISBNLog)."

The users can also filter by industry and get business capability maps that are specific to the industry. In this example, once you apply the filter of retail, the ones that are not pertaining to retail are grayed out.

Let’s have a look at a Business Process Model example.

Entities of the Business Process Model are depicted on the left-hand side. The actual content is depicted on the right-hand side.

Let’s look at the enterprise domain "Supply – Fulfill Demand." Within the enterprise domain end-to-end business process "Plan to Fulfill" is defined. It is further decomposed into six business process modules, one of which is "Deliver Product to Fulfill." This business process module is further decomposed into four business process segments, one of which is "Manage transportation." This business process segment is further decomposed into the business activities "Source transportation," "Plan transportation," "Execute transportation," and "Perform transportation settlement." Business activities are linked to APQC process classification framework, if applicable. Codes associated to the activities are indicating the mapping and alignment between Business Process Model from SAP and the APQC process classification framework. One business activity can be mapped to none, one or many activities from the APCQ Cross-Industry PCF.

Business capabilities from the Business Capability Model are assigned to business activities. One business activity may enable one or many business capabilities.

By leveraging the linkage between business capabilities on one side and solution capabilities and solution components on the other side (elaborated in previous section), it is possible to depict business activities and all related solution capabilities and solution components realizing them.

For example, the business activity "Source Transportation" is linked to the solution capabilities "Fright Order Collaboration (ISBNLog)," or "Strategic Freight Management (SAP S/4HANA TM) and "Carrier Booking and Tendering (S/4 TM)." The names inside the brackets indicate solution components that are needed in terms of providing the particular solution capability for that particular business activity.

Talking about the depth and breadth of the reference Solution Architecture, it is important to differentiate between:

The high-level reference Solution Architecture, which covers the entire business scope and on a high level in terms of solution scope a recommended mapping to SAP products.

A detailed reference Solution Architecture, which complements the Business Architecture, covers selected business scope, and provides detailed process and integration information. Detailed reference Solution Architecture has been validated via integration tests.

Let’s explore the linkage between the Reference Business and Detailed Solution Architectures and what it means for Enterprise Architecture (EA) practitioners.

Let’s start with a Solution Value Flow shown at the bottom.

This Solution Value Flow, depicted in the Solution Value Flow diagram, is an abstract representation of the Solution Process. The diagram shows only those value-adding activities, which are implemented by the underlying Solution Components. Details like implementing Solution Components and associated Solution Capabilities might also be displayed.

In the Reference Solution Architecture from SAP, Solution Value Flows follow the hierarchical structure of the related Business Value Flows, which are defined as part of the SAP Reference Business Architecture. This means, they follow the structure of the business process modules, business process segments and business activities as defined in the Reference Business Architecture.

In the example, the business process module "Deliver Product to Fulfill (Finished Goods)" and the included business process segment Managed Transportation (Outbound) follow the hierarchical structure of "Deliver Product to Fulfill (generic)" and "Manage Transportation (generic)," respectively. The latter are defined as part of the related business process depicted as business value flows. The names of solution processes, process modules, process segments, and business activities contained in the Solution Value Flow diagrams are inherited and derived from business processes as represented in the Reference Business Architecture.

There are however some exceptions.

• Names of business activities, elements depicted on the lowest level in the Solution Values Flow and the corresponding Business Value Flow may differ in cases solution process realizes or implements a restricted scope of the business process. Or different names may reflect solution specific tailoring. A solution activity may realize a subset of business activity scope and so the activity name shall express this. Moreover, business activity name can differ due to industry specific or business process variant specific language.
• The number of business activities or objects represented in a module itself may differ. The number of entities in terms of modules or segments or activities in a Solution Value Flow may be different due to the scope of the solution. The Reference Business Architecture covers the full business portfolio. Detailed Reference Solution Architecture from SAP depicts implemented and validated solutions, which might not cover the full scope of a generic business process.

From Business Architecture to Detailed Solution Architecture: Solution Value Flow

In comparison to the business activities in Business Value Flows, value adding activities is Solution Value Flows have associations to solution-specific entities, such as a detailed process flow.

A Solution Process Flow describes a typical process flow through the solution components that implement the process.

The Solution Process Flow Diagram is a behavioral diagram that is used to describe a concrete process flow of a solution process.

The goal is to provide a common understanding of which solution activities are provided by the solution components to implement a particular solution process and the ordering of solution activities. Moreover, Solution Process Flow Diagrams specify how different solution components collaborate by depicting the integration between them.

Solution Process Flow Diagrams are basically BPMN 2.0 collaboration or process diagrams with SAP Enterprise Architecture Methodology-extensions to describe, for example, integration architecture aspects.

Pools in solution process flow diagrams represent a solution component, which require common deployment.

The message flows describe the collaboration and integration aspects between these Deployment Units. They are connected to related implementation artifacts, for example an API, published in SAP Business Accelerator Hub.

Here is a definition of the used API "Integration with Fleet Management System" published in SAP Business Accelerator Hub. You can even test these APIs, using testing data that are provided through the Sandbox API.

Another artifact, which is defined as a part of the Solution Architecture from SAP is the solution data flow diagram for master and transactional data flows.

The solution data flow diagram or data flow diagram for short represents the typical flow of data between solution components in the context of a specific solution process.

A data flow diagram depicts solution components and their implemented, integration relevant solution data objects. The data flows show the flow of data between a system of records and subsequent solution components.

Here is a summary for the Reference Business Architecture.

The Reference Business Architecture subsumes:

• The Business Capability Model, which describes the abilities required by the enterprise to deliver business value. It is depicted using a business capability map.
• The Business Process Model, which introduces end-to-end business processes with value adding business activities at the lowest level.

These models can facilitate business-oriented scoping and heat mapping exercise. They provide an SAP-portfolio agnostic, exhaustive system of business capabilities and processes.

Here is a summary for the Reference Solution Architecture.

The Reference Solution Architecture subsumes:

• The Solution Capability Model with the link to the business capabilities and solution components realizing them, all visualized in the product map.

• The Solution Process Model depicted using Solution Value Flow diagrams, solution process flow diagrams and solution component diagrams.

  • Solution Value Flow elaborates parts of a Business Value Flow, which are implemented by solution components.

  • Detailed solution process flows depict process and integration details implemented by solution components.

• The solution data model, with solution data flow diagrams depicting how data flows between different solution components in the context of a solution process.

The high-level reference Solution Architecture from SAP provides a recommended mapping from Business Architecture to SAP solutions and solution components.

The detailed reference Solution Architecture from SAP provides a validated reference architecture content, which can be used to define a target architecture based on specific needs. It allows us to explore how process implementations can be broken down to implementation artifacts, including used APIs, events, and so on.