Until now, the SAP Analytics Cloud, add-in for Microsoft Office could be connected to native SAP Analytics Cloud models, SAP Datasphere and SAP S/4HANA Public Cloud (for more information, see SAP Help). With the QRC4 release on November 20, 2023, users will be able to access SAP S/4HANA Private Cloud Edition and SAP BW (BW/4HANA, 7.50 SP14 or higher) within their Microsoft Excel workbooks.

To do this, SAP Analytics Cloud, add-in for Microsoft Office uses the live connection to the backend system defined in SAP Analytics Cloud. As a pre-requisite the Tunnel connection type is required for both connections to prevent cross domain problems. The tunnel connection standards – User / Password and SAML Single Sign-On – are supported as authentication methods.

SAC BW Live connection of type Tunnel

In the SAP Analytics Cloud, add-in for Microsoft Office the SAP S/4HANA and SAP BW connections are displayed in the Select Data Source dialog. After successful authentication, the user can search for the BW query or CDS view.

Select connection in the SAC Add-in

If variables are defined, the variable dialog is displayed for further selection. In addition, the variable types hierarchy, hierarchy node, formula and text variables are supported.

Specify variable values

The standard result set defined in the query is then displayed. An example of a query with 2 structures is shown below.

2 structure query

If ID and description are defined as default display for a dimension, the ID will be shown and the description is added as a property column for this dimension. The display of compounded keys is automatically derived from the backend. Other new features are available in the designer panel. Users can select the position of the totals and parent node, enable zero suppression and a compact display visualization (Universal Display Hierarchy) to show multiple dimension columns as a hierarchy.

Compact Display visualization

All existing features, such as filters, show/hide properties, custom functions, additional rows and columns, sort & rank, undo & redo are supported accordingly for the SAP S/4HANA and SAP BW connections and will be further extended in upcoming releases. Keep an eye on our roadmap for the SAP Analytics Cloud, add-in for Microsoft Office.

Existing features in combination with new connections

Note: There are no plans to support data entry for SAP BW as the recommended planning solution for the SAP Analytics Cloud, add-in for Microsoft Office remains SAP Analytics Cloud Planning.