Jumpstart Your AWS for SAP Journey: Automated SAP S/4HANA Fully-Activated Appliance deployment for quick evaluation and fit-gap analysis

Introduction

Implementing SAP S/4HANA, whether through SAP RISE or natively on AWS, is a major endeavor for organizations, involving long timelines and multiple layers of complexity. A key focus in these initiatives is the adoption of simplified business processes and cleaning the core, which requires substantial adjustments and thorough testing in controlled environments. Success in these projects depends on effectively navigating new SAP S/4HANA functionalities, understanding simplification processes, and supporting organizational change through robust training programs.

Well before the implementation begins, customers and partners may want to deploy a working non-production SAP S/4HANA system on AWS to assess performance and functionality. This preliminary deployment allows them to conduct a fit-gap analysis and explore how AWS services can modernize business processes before migrating production workloads, ultimately supporting a strong business case. For such evaluations, SAP offers a Fully-Activated Appliance (FAA), a pre-packaged SAP S/4HANA system designed for non-production scenarios like sandbox, proof-of-concept, scoping, or fit-gap analysis. The appliance includes ready-to-use demo scenarios based on SAP Best Practices and a separate client for greenfield activation of SAP Best Practices across all available localizations.

The SAP S/4HANA FAA can be deployed through two main methods:

SAP Cloud Appliance Library (SAP CAL)

This is the fastest and simplest method available. By using SAP CAL, you can deploy the appliance on AWS, in about 1-2 hours. SAP CAL offers a pre-configured system template that is ready for instant use. Please note that SAP licenses for the deployed SAP products are required to use SAP CAL. If you plan to keep an appliance for more than 30 days, there are two important considerations to keep in mind:

• License(s) for the SAP product(s) built into the appliance are needed
• Subscription of SAP Cloud Appliance library is required

The SAP Cloud Appliance Library system verifies the licensing and subscription status of the organization associated with the S-User who initiated the appliance creation. Activation of the appliance beyond the initial 30-day period is contingent upon successful validation of the required licenses and an active SAP Cloud Appliance Library subscription.

Please refer to SAP Cloud Appliance Library FAQ and FAQ for Licenses for more details.

Custom Installation

For customers who have their own license from SAP and prefer more control over their infrastructure or need to align with specific AWS account structures, there’s an option to manually install the appliance within their own AWS environment. This method offers greater flexibility but requires more technical expertise and time, typically taking a few days for setup.

Although the installation process for the SAP S/4HANA FAA differs from a standard SAP installation and involves several technical steps which can be challenging for functional users in the evaluation phase, this blog introduces a more efficient alternative. Here, we’ll outline an automated installation method using AWS Launch Wizard, which reduces deployment time and effort to under two hours.

The goal of this blog is to show how this streamlined approach can accelerate the early stages of SAP S/4HANA exploration and implementation, helping organizations advance their RISE with SAP or native SAP S/4HANA journey on AWS.

Key Considerations

• The custom installation option offers flexibility to tailor the setup to specific AWS account structures and administrative controls.
• It grants full administrative rights and comprehensive control over the system configuration.
• This approach is ideal for organizations with strict data governance policies or unique infrastructure needs.
• Whichever method is chosen, the SAP S/4HANA FAA delivers a complete SAP S/4HANA environment with pre-configured best practices, sample data, and demo scenarios for evaluation, testing, and proof-of-concept.
• Leveraging AWS Launch Wizard, we reduce the setup time for the SAP S/4HANA FAA from days to under 2 hours.

Prerequisites

• SAP S/4HANA FAA installation media and SWPM are stored in an Amazon S3 bucket.
• Access to the SAP on AWS Automation GitHub Repository providing the automated installation package and documentation. The installation package currently supports installation of the SAP S/4HANA 2023 FPS00 Fully-Activated Appliance only.
• SAP S/4HANA trial license (valid for 30 days, only fees for involved AWS services apply). See SAP KBA: Ordering process for on-premise installation of SAP software appliances (2041140) for further information
• To deploy the SAP S/4HANA FAA, ensure you have properly configured an Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) and Amazon EC2 key pairs. This network setup is essential for securely hosting and accessing your SAP environment within AWS.

Architecture

To achieve this streamlined installation approach, we actively maintain a GitHub repository with the necessary deployment files. You can find the latest information about supported versions and further installation instructions here.

Installation Process

To install the SAP S/4HANA FAA, follow these steps:

Start by downloading the SAP S/4HANA FAA installation media and Software Provisioning Manager (SWPM) from the SAP Software Download Center. Then, upload these files to an Amazon S3 bucket. The name of the Amazon S3 bucket must begin with “launchwizard-“.

Next, download the post_deploy_s4h_faa.sh script from this location. Open this script and adjust it to set three essential parameters:

1. s4h_faa_exports: Set this to the S3 URI path where you stored the SAP S/4HANA FAA .ZIP exports.
2. s4h_swpm: Set this to the S3 URI path where you placed the SWPM .SAR file.
3. s4h_version: Set this to choose the SAP S/4HANA FAA version to be installed (currently only 2023_FPS00 is supported)

Once these modifications are complete, upload the post_deploy_s4h_faa.sh script to the same S3 bucket containing the SAP installation media. Store the file in the post_deploy directory.

Now, access the AWS console and select the region where you want to deploy the SAP S/4HANA system.

Go to the AWS Launch Wizard service and start setting up an SAP infrastructure-only single instance deployment. Select EC2 instance size of at least R[5|6|7]i.8xl to ensure sufficient memory and storage to host the SAP S/4HANA FAA.
For more information, refer to the AWS Launch Wizard User Guide. The SAP S/4HANA FAA installation package supports deployment via both the Console and AWS CLI. If you prefer using the AWS CLI, you can download and customize a sample JSON specification file to suit your needs before deployment.

During this process, specify the post_deploy_s4h_faa.sh script as the post-deployment configuration script.

Once the deployment process completes successfully, you will have access to the SAP S/4HANA FAA 2023 FPS00 on the designated host.

The deployment is expected to take around 60 to 90 minutes. You can monitor the progress by checking the deployment log at “/root/install/post_deploy.log”. Once the deployment is complete, the log will display the SAP system details including the password.

Pricing Example

AWS Launch Wizard provides a dynamic cost estimate for SAP deployments. After selecting the EC2 instance type, you’ll see a breakdown of estimated monthly charges for core services like EC2 and storage. This estimate updates in real-time as you modify your configuration, allowing you to optimize costs before deployment.

The table below presents a price estimation based on the recommended instance size in region US East (N. Virginia).

Price estimation for SAP S/4HANA FAA deployment

Resources	Description	Amount in USD (730h/month)
Compute Instance	Instance type: r6i.8xlarge	1471.68 USD
Block Storage	Volume type: gp3	124.16 USD
	Volume type: st1	51.20 USD
Monthly costs		1647.04 USD

You can further reduce costs by deactivating the EC2 instance when it’s not in use, such as during nighttime or over weekends. This can be accomplished through AWS Systems Manager for SAP.

Call To Action

To streamline your SAP S/4HANA exploration and implementation process with AWS Launch Wizard, you can take the following steps:

1. Visit the GitHub repository to review the automation package
2. Go to the AWS Console and find the Launch Wizard interface.
3. Start the deployment of your SAP S/4HANA FAA using the automated method outlined.

By following these steps, you can quickly establish your environment and begin exploring the vast opportunities provided by the SAP S/4HANA FAA and AWS. This proactive approach will enable your organization to make informed decisions and accelerate your RISE and/or native SAP journey on AWS.