Snow introduces HANA optimization for SAP customers

1st Dec 2015: Snow Software, the leading developer of on-premise and hosted Software Asset Management (SAM) solutions, today announced the release of its Snow Optimizer for SAP® Software version 1.5 solution, introducing a wealth of new features designed to help SAP* customers optimize their software license expenditure across the vendor’s databases. 

The latest version of the solution, which is used by SAP customers around the world including leading energy provider, RWE, is the first SAP license management solution to monitor memory usage by SAP’s HANA database, which is critical to meeting contractual obligations and giving organizations the information they need to effectively manage contract renewals.

Peter Björkman, Chief Technology Officer at Snow, commented: “With SAP pushing customers hard to adopt HANA, our latest version of Snow Optimizer for SAP® Software ensures that they get a good deal and don’t fall foul of any licensing traps through failing to manage the database’s memory consumption effectively. By tracking and reporting on all HANA users, we can extend the same optimization capabilities we already provide on other SAP systems to the HANA instances, ensuring organizations are not paying for the wrong license types or unused licenses.” 

The latest version of Snow Optimizer for SAP® Software also gives organizations the ability to centrally record and manage all SAP contracts, enabling SAP admins to compare entitlements against usage and giving procurement managers the intelligence required to accurately determine future SAP licensing needs. Snow’s unique approach makes SAP contract and usage information available in both the SAP user interface and the multi-user Snow License Manager dashboards. 

Ralf Leufkes, ERP Consultant at German IT services provider, Items, recently began to implement Snow Optimizer for SAP® Software: “The decisive factors for selecting the Snow solution for managing SAP licenses were a combination of the fact that the technology is hosted in the SAP environment and that now we can track all our SAP contracts centrally. This will enable us to achieve a level of standardization and optimization not previously possible.”

With a growing number of organizations using Engines and ‘self-declaration platforms’ from third-party vendors, Snow Optimizer for SAP® Software now empowers organizations to manage SAP licensing based on metrics other than users (metrics for Engines might include orders, transactions, accounts, patients treated etc.). These metrics can now be recorded in the solution and used to product the new Engine Compliance Analysis report, helping organizations model their annual costs and avoid under-licensing. 

Snow Optimizer for SAP® Software is available with immediate effect. For more information, please contact your local Snow sales office. 

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 * SAP is the registered trademark of SAP SE in Germany and in several other countries.