IDO ECC - Case study

IDO moves SAP Business Suite systems to AWS with Runibex

IDO (İstanbul Deniz Otobüsleri) had already moved its SAP Hybris ticketing platform to AWS with Runibex, and wanted the same scalability and agility across the rest of its SAP landscape. In a phased migration with Runibex, IDO moved its SAP HANA-based CRM production system, its BusinessObjects production system and its ECC test environment from on-premise servers to AWS. Performance improved, especially on analytics, and business continuity was maintained during and after the migration.

At a glance

Customer	IDO (İstanbul Deniz Otobüsleri)
Industry	Passenger and vehicle ferry transport
Location	Turkey
Systems moved to AWS	SAP CRM production (on SAP HANA), SAP BusinessObjects production, SAP ECC test environment
AWS services	Amazon EC2 (X1 and R4 instances), Elastic Load Balancing, Amazon S3, Amazon CloudWatch
Earlier engagement	SAP Hybris ticketing platform moved to the cloud and managed by Runibex
Outcomes	Savings in support and maintenance costs; better performance, especially on analytics; shorter R&D and product development cycles; business continuity maintained

About IDO

At the time of the original case study, IDO was the largest passenger and vehicle ferry operator in Turkey and the fifth largest in the world.

IDO ran SAP ECC, SAP BusinessObjects and SAP CRM alongside SAP Hybris. Its employees used these systems, and they supported IDO’s customer-facing functions, covering day-to-day work in ticketing, supply chain, analytics, order management, procurement, line planning and finance.

The Challenge

ECC, BusinessObjects and CRM were hosted on-premise. Runibex had already moved IDO’s SAP Hybris instance to the cloud and was managing it. After that move, IDO wanted the same scalability and agility across the rest of its SAP landscape, so that it could stay competitive on pricing and technology.

The move had specific goals. SAP users had asked for quicker response times and higher performance. IDO wanted to lower its capital expenditure and move to a more manageable operating-expenditure model, cutting costs while improving performance. Shortening the project deployment cycle was also in scope, because it would reduce the occasional under-utilisation of infrastructure and add to the cost savings.

Stability and security mattered as well. Managed internally, the on-premise infrastructure carried high costs and sometimes complicated maintenance. Its availability was also lower than IDO expected.

The phased migration

The migration ran in phases, starting with CRM and finishing with the ECC test environment.

CRM production on SAP HANA

The SAP HANA-based CRM production instance moved first. Instead of one lift and shift of multiple terabytes at once, the move started with a relatively smaller instance on the cloud in a hybrid model. With scalability as the critical KPI throughout, a full move to the cloud followed. After the lift and shift, the CRM environment was restructured and re-platformed to take full advantage of the cost reductions available.

BusinessObjects production

The SQL-based BusinessObjects production system came next. IDO used it every day, across multiple clients, for analytical reporting on operations, executive dashboards and financial outlook. A daily cycle was designed around that usage. During the day, an API call allocated more compute automatically, and at night resources were cut back sharply. Compute was available when IDO needed it, and IDO didn’t pay for it through idle hours. This improved system performance.

ECC test environment

The ECC test environment moved at the end of the project. Test systems could then be started quickly when they were needed and shut down once the need was met.

The SAP on AWS architecture

The migrated systems ran on this setup:

Compute. Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) ran the instances, with an Elastic Load Balancer distributing traffic between multiple EC2 instances.
CRM. CRM ran on Amazon EC2 X1 instances, powered by Intel Xeon E7 8880 v3 processors that are optimised for enterprise and database workloads and designed for large-scale in-memory applications such as SAP HANA.
ECC and BusinessObjects. ECC and BusinessObjects ran on R4 instances, which are also memory-optimised for large in-memory applications.
Backups. Amazon S3 held backups.
Monitoring. Amazon CloudWatch monitored all server resources.

The results

IDO saw these outcomes after the move:

Outcome	Result
Support and maintenance costs	IDO saw savings in support and maintenance costs by running its SAP environment on AWS.
Resource use and cost model	Resource utilisation improved. IDO paid for what it used and sized compute up and down to its needs.
Performance	Performance improved, especially on analytics.
Development cycles	R&D and product development cycles shortened, because SAP sandbox environments could be opened on demand and scaled on the cloud, which gave IDO cost control over this work.
Business continuity	Business continuity was maintained during and after the migration.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Which SAP systems did IDO move to AWS?

IDO moved three SAP systems from on-premise servers to AWS in a phased migration with Runibex: its SAP HANA-based CRM production system, its SQL-based BusinessObjects production system and its ECC test environment.

How did IDO's SAP CRM migration to AWS start?

IDO’s migration started with its SAP HANA-based CRM production instance. Instead of one lift and shift of multiple terabytes at once, the move started with a relatively smaller instance on the cloud in a hybrid model, and a full move to the cloud followed, with scalability as the critical KPI. After the lift and shift, the CRM environment was restructured and re-platformed to take full advantage of the cost reductions available.

Which AWS services did IDO's SAP systems run on?

IDO’s migrated SAP systems ran on Amazon EC2, with an Elastic Load Balancer distributing traffic between multiple EC2 instances. CRM ran on Amazon EC2 X1 instances, and ECC and BusinessObjects ran on memory-optimised R4 instances. Amazon S3 held backups, and Amazon CloudWatch monitored all server resources.

How was compute sized for IDO's SAP BusinessObjects on AWS?

IDO’s SAP BusinessObjects production system on AWS ran on a daily cycle designed around its usage. During the day an API call allocated more compute automatically, and at night resources were cut back sharply, so compute was available when IDO needed it and IDO didn’t pay for it through idle hours. This improved system performance.

What results did IDO see after moving SAP systems to AWS?

IDO saw savings in support and maintenance costs by running its SAP environment on AWS, and performance improved, especially on analytics. R&D and product development cycles shortened because SAP sandbox environments could be opened on demand, and business continuity was maintained during and after the migration.