Deloitte readies enterprise public cloud practice with AWS and SAP

Deloitte has begun working with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and SAP to deliver public cloud-based in-memory analytics to Fortune 500 businesses.

The collaboration could be an important step in lowering the barriers that have prevented many enterprises from moving production workloads to the public cloud.

While many organisations use AWS for software development and testing, as Computer Weekly has previously reported, IT departments are more likely to adopt hybrid cloud strategies than migrate fully to the public cloud.

As part of the joint effort, Deloitte said it would expand its cloud capabilities by forming an AWS cloud practice with 2,500 practitioners globally. The consultants will focus on helping businesses change the way they work, it said.

The collaboration aims to help clients accelerate their ability to achieve digital transformation and powerful insights-based outcomes with SAP S/4 Hana, SAP BW/4 Hana and the SAP Hana in-memory computing platforms.

“A key focus of our AWS collaboration is to accelerate clients’ digital core transformation through SAP S/4 Hana to modernise their ERP [enterprise resource planning] technology and de-risk cloud migrations,” said Craig Hodgetts, national managing principal, technology at Deloitte Consulting.

“Equally important is the ability to help clients lead with analytics to deliver insight-based outcomes, so we are also investing in building more than 20 preconfigured industry-specific analytics solutions powered by SAP Hana and AWS. We plan to provide companies with a strong digital core foundation built on the AWS cloud that can scale with flexibility, enabling faster time-to-value and the ability to instantly act on information and make better decisions across the enterprise.”

Matt Law, a principal at Deloitte, said: “Our legacy has been working on-premise. We are now getting past the questions of whether the cloud is safer, or moving capex/opex.”

Instead, he said CIOs need to have a dialogue with the business. “A key tech trend in IT is multi-modal operations. There is no one size fits all – you will still need box solutions – and will need the kind of planning to execute, but it is also possible to categorise workloads that can be more agile.”

The business requirement for agility could drive greater adoption of the cloud, said Law. “A business may want to start up a brand new channel and will ask: how fast can I get there?”

But there is no one size that fits all, so Deloitte has focused its AWS/Hana practice on a number of core industry sectors. “We have preconfigured solutions in life sciences, consumer businesses and energy industries,” said Law.

Operating in the cloud is far more than moving on-premise IT onto AWS. It offers an opportunity for cross-organisational collaboration in a digital supply network. Law gave an example: “Food safety has to go across the supply chain. We need to tie together the value chain, such as collecting sensor data in agriculture, food producers and distribution.”