Many analyses fail not because of the question but because of the path to the data: the export runs overnight, someone maintains an Excel file, and three weeks later nobody knows which figure applies.
The path we built
Data from SAP Cloud ERP flows via the SAP Business Data Cloud (BDC) into the Azure Data Lake, where it is available to Microsoft Fabric. Four stations, one continuous flow. No nightly export scripts, no manually maintained intermediate states.
What matters is what does not happen: no second version of the truth is created. The ERP remains the leading system; the data lake holds an analysable copy with clear provenance. Anyone questioning a figure can trace it back to the document.
What this enables
- Analysis across system boundaries, ERP data together with what already lives in the Microsoft world
- Familiar tools: Power BI and Fabric notebooks instead of yet another specialist tool requiring training
- Currency instead of month-end: data follows on without anyone triggering an export
- Traceability: every figure remains traceable to its source
Our assessment
The real gain is not the technology but the division of labour: the ERP does what it does well, running processes and keeping documents clean. The analytics platform does what it does well, combining and analysing large volumes of data.
Forcing both into one system is paid for in complexity. Separating them without governing the data flow is paid for in contradictory figures. This path solves both.