RFP No.: 2000001544 Issued Date: June 6, 2018 Title: Systems, Applications and Products (SAP) Support and Staff Augmentation Services Bench

Appendix A – BMC Asset Management SAP Integration

TECHNICAL WHITE PAPER

BMC Asset Management SAP® IntegrationHow to bridge the gap between your company’s SAP systems and BMC Asset Management

TAbLE of CoNTENTs

IntroductIon 1

Procurement and receIvIng 1

IntegratIon tasks 1

understandIng the Process 2

Bmc asset management Procurement Process 2

Bmc asset management wIth saP IntegratIon Process 2

saP Process handlIng 3

saP IntegratIon connector oPtIons 3

weB servIces 3

» Why Use Web Services? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

csv ImPort 5

summary 7

1

INTRoduCTIoN

PRoCuREmENT ANd RECEIvINgIT organizations need to identify and capture costs throughout the entire lifecycle of an IT asset — even before

it’s deployed (whether waiting on a docking bay or sitting comfortably on a shelf in its inventory location) .

Unfortunately, with today’s high volume of IT components and bulk items, it’s difficult for IT asset management

teams to manually enter and track all the necessary data about requisitions, purchases, shipping, receiving, and

inventory that’s necessary to conduct basic cost analysis and assess IT’s budget for the future .

Thankfully, due to existing implementations of SAP®, most medium and large organizations today don’t need to

worry about finding and entering this information into two separate systems . SAP’s accounting and purchase

ordering software is used to track requisitions and purchases and provide information that’s also important

to BMC Asset Management software, such as purchase order (PO) numbers, unit cost, shipping costs, vendor

information, manufacturer information, quantity ordered, and location information . Although this data is usually

maintained by a company’s accounting department, IT asset managers also need this information to maintain

accountability and produce accurate reports for the IT assets they own or deploy .

Using one of several out-of-the-box integration methods to BMC Asset Management, this information can be

automated in a scheduled or near-real-time fashion with SAP as the source of truth .

INTEgRATIoN TAsksIntegrating BMC Asset Management (part of the BMC Remedy IT Service Management Suite) and SAP relies on

several methods and technologies that allow the two systems to communicate with each other . Communication

can be unidirectional (one way) or bidirectional (both ways) . Because each SAP environment may differ in use

and functionality, an in depth look at the types of available data stored within SAP is required . For this reason,

data mappings (i .e . the mapping of a field from one system to another) are crucial to obtaining accurate and

consistent data that meets the needs of the IT asset management team .

2

uNdERsTANdINg THE PRoCEss

bmC AssET mANAgEmENT PRoCuREmENT PRoCEssIT asset information is stored in several places within the BMC Asset Management solution, where it is tracked

throughout the asset’s lifecycle . The process starts within the requisition management component of the

software and then transitions into purchase orders once proper authorization has been granted and a PO has

been cut . From here, POs are transitioned to the receiving management component of the software, which

can be used to receive partial or complete orders or returns to the vendor . Once items are physically received

and transitioned out of the receiving management console, they are physically created as IT assets linked to

the requisition and order information marked as “received .” From here, received assets can be configured

with additional information (i .e . serial number); sent to an inventory location (managed through the inventory

management component); returned to a vendor; assigned to an individual or group; reserved; or deployed .

ReceivingPurchasing Inventory

Figure 1 . Managing the asset throughout its lifecycle .

Figure 2 shows the standard lifecycle of this process without integrating SAP to BMC Asset Management .

Figure 2 . Standard lifecycle without BMC-SAP integration .

bmC AssET mANAgEmENT WITH sAP INTEgRATIoN PRoCEssWith SAP integrated to BMC Asset Management as an automated purchasing solution, the manual processes

in steps 1a through 4 (in Figure 2 above) can be eliminated . Instead, SAP becomes the “source of truth” for

purchasing and cost-related data imported into BMC Asset Management, and BMC Asset Management becomes

a “sub-ledger” to SAP .

3

SAP IntegrationConnector

SAP

BMC Application Server Components

FinancialTeam BMC Remedy Asset

Management SAP Staging Form

PurchasingReport

BMC RemedyApplication Server

BMC Atrium IntegrationEngine (AIE)

Figure 3 . Requisition and Purchasing Best Practices

sAP PRoCEss HANdLINgIn the best-practice scenario above, requisitions and purchases are handled through the company’s financial

team . This data is stored in the company’s SAP environment through the requisition and purchasing process

it has established to meet the needs of the business . Purchasing reports are run periodically (daily, weekly,

bi-weekly, etc .) . Each report contains a formatted version of SAP’s requisition and purchase records and is

stored on the SAP server and sent out as necessary . The SAP Integration Connector (which is discussed in

the next section of this document) is set to look for these reports on a scheduled basis, and import their data

into the BMC Remedy Application Server through a component called the BMC Atrium Integration Engine . This

integration engine handles this data by mapping the information from the report to a custom staging form

through workflows that translate the data into a format that BMC Asset Management accepts .

sAP INTEgRATIoN CoNNECToR oPTIoNsThere are two recommended ways in which SAP data can be integrated into BMC Asset Management: Web

Services or CSV Import . These next sections will cover these two integration methods in more detail .

WEb sERvICEsWeb services provide a simple, platform-agnostic method for application integration . By using standard

messaging protocols and service definitions to support computer-to-computer interaction over a network,

web services allow application integration — regardless of the hardware or software platforms and

independent of the programming languages in which the applications are written .

Note: In order to use web services, you must have at least one (1) deployed BMC Remedy Mid-Tier in your

environment .

You publish a web service to make BMC Remedy Action Request System (AR System) functionality available

over the web by creating a web service object, associated forms, and optional workflow . AR System

developers can use a web service to make AR System operations (such as submit, modify, and query)

available to other applications . Web services that are published in AR System can be very basic, such as

creating a record in the AR System database, or more complex, such as processing a PO that spans multiple

AR System forms .

4

You consume a private or public web service to obtain external information for use in an AR System application

by creating a form and an associated filter that uses a Set Fields action .

Starting with BMC Asset Management version 7 .6 .03, you can use web services to create, query, and update

purchase requisitions, purchase line items, purchase work information records, purchase orders, and purchase

returns — using out-of-the-box web services that are connected through integration interface forms .

The following is a list of the out-of-the-box interface forms available for BMC Asset Management:

» AST:PurchaseRequisitionInterface_Create — Creates a purchase requisition and related work information

record » AST:PurchaseLineItemInterface_Create — Creates a purchase line item and related work information record

Note: A PO can be created depending on the input status. » AST:WorkInfoInterface_Create — Creates a work information record for either purchase requisition or

purchase line item » AST:PurchaseRequisitionInterface — Queries and modifies a purchase requisition » AST:PurchaseOrderInterface — Queries and modifies a PO » AST:PurchaseLineItemInterface — Queries and modifies a purchase line item

The following is a list of the web services available for BMC Asset Management .

» AST_PurchaseRequisitionInterface_Create_WS — Supports the creation of parent purchase requisitions

and child purchase line items . It also supports the creation of a work information record for parent and child

items . A PO can be created depending on the status of the purchase requisition and purchase line items . » AST_PurchaseRequisition_QueryModify_WS — Queries and modifies purchase requisitions and its work

information records and purchase line items » AST_PurchaseOrder_QueryModify_WS — Queries and modifies a PO and its purchase line items » AST_PurchaseLineItem_QueryModify_WS — Queries and modifies purchase line items and its work

information records and return records » AST_WorkInfoInterface_Create — Supports the creation of work information records for either a purchase

requisition or purchase line item

For more information on these web services, see the bmC Remedy IT service management Integrations guide.

Why use Web services? Using web services to integrate SAP to BMC Asset Management eliminates the need for both a staging form and

the extra workflow to parse the SAP data from the staging form to the necessary interface forms (as described

in the previous section) . This functionality is available already because the out-of-the-box web services and

interface forms that communicate with BMC’s purchasing and receiving modules already exists .

Not all SAP environments will allow the capability to integrate to BMC’s out-of-the-box web services for BMC

Asset Management, and you may need to work with someone from SAP’s Development team to develop, map,

and adhere to the BMC solution’s published web services standards . However, it is recommended by BMC as a

best practice that web services be used if possible .

5

ReceivingPurchasing

BMC Remedy AssetManagement

BMC RemedyApplication Server

BMC RemedyMid-Tier

Deployed WebServices

SAP

Inventory

BMC Asset Management Components

Figure 4 . SAP Integration Process

Csv ImPoRTSAP can also be integrated through a scheduled CSV Import process . This process relies on SAP to produce a

report of purchasing and requisition data that is exported to a .csv file . At a minimum, this file should contain

the following information:

» Purchase order (PO) number and / or requisition number » Name of purchased asset » Manufacturer of purchased asset » Supplier of purchased asset » Quantity ordered » Per unit cost » Total cost

Optional Fields information may include:

» Shipping costs » Shipping tracking number » Cost center » Order location » Individual or group who placed the order

Prior to importing this information, it is crucial that the name of the product, manufacturing company, and

supplier in SAP align with information configured in the BMC Remedy Product Catalog . If this information is

missing, or is not configured prior to import, BMC Asset Management will not be able to properly map the

data to an existing product catalog entry . For more information regarding the configuration of the Product

Catalog please see the bmC Remedy IT service management Configuration guide.

Once the report has been generated and exported in .csv format, it must be placed locally or on a remote

share drive that the BMC Atrium Integration Engine can access locally . The integration engine is used to

schedule and map the fields and data contained within the .csv file to a custom form that will need to be

created in BMC Remedy .

6

Using the BMC Remedy Developer Studio, a custom staging form will need to be created that contains both the

fields that are contained within the .csv file, as well as the fields contained within the BMC Asset Management

Interface forms described in the Web Services section of this document . Since every SAP environment is

different, the exact fields needed for the integration must be determined by first analyzing the data and then

determining which integration interface forms must be used for creation of the PO in BMC Asset Management .

Note: You may need to copy several fields from one or more of the available interface forms .

After creating the staging form, workflow will need to be created within the BMC Remedy Developer Studio to

perform several lookups and checks before it can be “pushed” directly to the staging forms . Some common

lookups that will need to be performed include the following:

» Person ID and Login ID lookup of PO submitter » Manufacturer Company ID lookup » Supplier Company ID Lookup » Product Catalog Lookup based on Name of Product Order – (Product Categorization Tier 1, Product

Categorization Tier 2, Product Categorization Tier 3, Product Name, Model / Version)

You will also need to create workflow that converts cost data from SAP to BMC Remedy Currency Fields . This

can be done easily if the SAP cost data is first stored on the staging form as a character field, and then converted

using a filter to set the currency fields .

After creating the workflow above to “stage” the data for import to the purchasing component of BMC Asset

Management, a series of filters can be created to “push” this data to the available BMC Asset Management

Integration Interface forms as described in the Web Services section of this document .

Note: The workflow created here can be very sophisticated, and may require advanced Remedy Development

experience . A working knowledge of Filter Phasing and order of operations is required to create this workflow .

If your company is not familiar with creating advanced workflow in BMC Remedy, it is recommended that you

consult bmC Consulting services for assistance building this integration .

The following diagram shows the general integration approach using this method:

ReceivingPurchasing

SAP

BMC Application Server Components

PurchasingReport

BMC Atrium IntegrationEngine (AIE)

BMC RemedyApplication Server

BMC Remedy Asset Management SAP Staging Form

Asset ManagementIntegration

Interface Forms

Figure 5 . BMC Remedy Advanced Workflow

7

summARySAP is a powerful financial tool that can be combined with the full lifecycle and tracking capabilities in BMC

Asset Management, part of the BMC Remedy IT Service Management Suite . By integrating SAP using the

methods described in this document you can:

» Save money by reducing overall time spent producing purchasing information that would otherwise be

entered manually » More effectively prepare and provide documentation for audits by maintaining a consistent sub-ledger » Ensure accurate inventory and spending on assets owned .

To learn more about how BMC and SAP work together, please visit www.bmc.com/partners/strategic-alliances/sap-partnership.html .

busINEss RuNs oN IT. IT RuNs oN bmC sofTWARE.Business thrives when IT runs smarter, faster and stronger . That’s why the most demanding IT organizations

in the world rely on BMC Software across distributed, mainframe, virtual and cloud environments . Recognized

as the leader in Business Service Management, BMC offers a comprehensive approach and unified platform

that helps IT organizations cut cost, reduce risk and drive business profit . For the four fiscal quarters ended

September 30, 2011, BMC revenue was approximately $2 .2 billion .

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