What's New in SAP Reference Architecture? [Spring Edition]

[JuliaDorotheeMeyer]

In this article we will take a closer look at the SAP Reference Architecture and dive deeper into two new focus areas of the SAP Reference Architecture - the Technology Capability Model and Business Data Objects.

​For those of you, who need a refresher on what SAP has in store for Enterprise Architects: Along with Tooling, Methodology and two other elements, which define our Enterprise Architecture Framework, SAP also provides Reference Architectures. The SAP Reference Architecture is a standardized framework developed to align business processes with IT solutions, facilitating effective business transformations. It comprises two main components:​

• SAP Reference Business Architecture (RBA): RBA offers a business-centric and product-agnostic perspective of an enterprise. It organizes the enterprise into four enterprise domains—Products & Services, Supply, Customer, and Corporate—each encompassing specific business capabilities. Additionally, the RBA outlines a comprehensive set of business process variants for different industries and business models. These are based on eight generic end-to-end business processes, such as Idea to Market, Source to Pay, and Lead to Cash. ​
• SAP Reference Solution Architecture (RSA): Building upon the RBA, the RSA illustrates how SAP's product portfolio addresses various business challenges. It provides detailed solution architecture recommendations, including process information, to guide implementations and customer extensions. ​

Together, these components enable organizations to understand and implement SAP solutions effectively, ensuring alignment between business objectives and IT strategies.

Recently, the Capability Model of the SAP Reference Architecture has been extended towards Technology Capabilities. In addition to that, also a first wave of Business Data Objects, which is particularly important in the context of SAP Business Data Cloud were included. Both, the Technology Capability Model along with Business Data Objects will be the focus of this article.

Hint: If you are new to the world of Reference Content and Enterprise Architecture at SAP, we strongly recommend to check out this blog post by Maria Goltz here. SAP Reference Architecture is one part of the broader SAP Enterprise Enterprise Architecture Framework. Learn more about it in Rene de Daniel’s post here.

Technology Capability Model

Purpose: Why Technology Capabilities?

The Business Capability Model (BCM), currently included in the SAP Reference Architecture covers a full set all of capabilities required to perform business activities within an organization. What is not in scope of the BCM is generic, supporting capabilities that are not directly related to specific business contexts, but that may provide basic technology support or enhancements for business capabilities. Yet, SAP’s product offering comprises both: business applications that are directly related to specific business contexts, as well as technology components that enable generic technology capabilities.

To address both aspects of our offering and our customers’ needs, there is a clear expectation by the market and need for SAP to also provide a Technology Capability Model as part of SAP’s Reference architecture. Since early 2025, the Technology Capability Model (TCM) has been made available as part of the RBA/RSA.

 

Definition: What are Technology Capabilities?

Technology Capabilities describe generic abilities that are provided by technology and are relevant for an organization - independent of a concrete solution and independent from their application in a potential or actual business context. This differentiates them from Business Capabilities, which are always tied to a specific functional area of the business.

While Business Capabilities typically describe an organization’s basic capacity to perform Business Activities, Technology Capabilities can complement Business Capabilities to address underlying technological needs and/or enable additional functionality that is not part of Business Capabilities themselves.

Entities in the Technology Capability Model are typically defined “outside in”, i.e. independent of SAP offering, product structure, organization setup or strategic priorities. The Technology Capability Model follows the same hierarchical structure as the RBA Business Capability Model (RBA BCM). Each top level “Technology Domain” is broken down into several Technology Areas. Currently, there are six Technology Domains defined for the TCM:

• Application Development and Automation
• Artificial Intelligence
• Data and Analytics
• Integration
• IT Operations
• IT Security

Technology Areas are again broken down into several Technology Capabilities. A Technology Capability can be implemented by one or several Tech Solution Capabilities, each of which is enabled with a different set of one or several Technology Solution Components.

Use cases: How can I work with the Technology Capability Model?

The Technology Capability Model serves many purposes and can be beneficial in multiple situations. The following three phases serve as examples to depict the value of TCM. If you are eager to explore TCM, you can do so by checking out this spreadsheet. It is currently evaluated, in which form the TCM will be made available in SAP LeanIX moving forward.

• Begin: As the TCM is defined in a generic fashion, regardless of business context and provider-specifics, the Enterprise Architect can adopt a neutral, outside-in perspective. Start with a mapping of generic abilities that are provided by technology and are relevant for an organization. Then identify, if and which specific SAP solutions are available to enable the capability.

• Extend: With the Technology Capability Model the scope of Reference Architecture is extended, allowing you to not only focus on business context but also on technology features. If you have already, and exhaustively modelled all business capabilities, you can now continue with technology capabilities.  As opposed to BCM, the TCM is modelled independent of SAP offerings, product structure, organization setup or strategic priorities. This allows you to capture additional technological features and enrich your deliverable. With both models, TCM and BCM at your fingertips, you can convey SAP’s offering as a provider of both Business Applications and Technology Platform and underline how these complement each other.

• Focus: Apart from starting and enriching existing capability maps, you can also leverage the TCM to drill down into specific focus areas. Navigate through the various capabilities Technology can offer and learn details about these! One common example is to detect potential for Artificial Intelligence within a business.

Business Data Objects

Apart from TCM, SAP Reference Architecture now also covers a first wave of SAP Business Data Objects (BDO). Not sure what these are? One can think of SAP Business Data Objects as structured representations of business entities (like customers, orders, or invoices) to model, store, and manage business data. They play a key part in organizing and processing information. In brief, Business Data Objects:

• Represent business entities or concepts (e.g. Sales Order).
• Are used to support data integration, reporting, transactions, and process automation.

Within SAP, BDO’s can show up in SAP S/4HANA and Fiori apps for example. For now, a first set of business data objects for cross-industry processes has been mapped in the SAP Reference Architecture. Going forward, even more Business Data Objects will be included.

Objectives of BDO in SAP Reference Architecture

Now, one might wonder why Business Data Objects are included in the SAP Reference Business Architecture. So far, the SAP Reference Architecture had a focus on processes and capabilities. Surely, SAP’s strategy for 2025 with focus on Business Data Cloud is one aspect, why Business Data Objects have been added to the roadmap of the SAP Reference Architecture: With SAP’s focus on unifying data in the SAP Business Data Cloud (SAP BDC), a clear focus on business data, including business data objects, becomes clear. SAP BDC is one of SAP's newest offerings in the realm of data unification, semantic modeling, and real-time business intelligence. SAP BDC is a unified data foundation that allows organizations to access, integrate, model, and analyze business data across SAP and non-SAP systems, while preserving its business meaning and context.

By bringing in BDO’s into the SAP Reference Architecture, our aim is to meet our customer’s and consumers needs: When digging into the realm of data, Enterprise Architects using SAP Reference Architecture need a consistent taxonomy across processes to define data distribution. Having a consistent taxonomy available allows for a shared language between business and IT and to bridge transactional and analytical worlds.

BDO’s provided in SAP Reference Architecture are closely aligned with SAP’s data offerings and provide the required context. This helps Enterprise Architects overcome application specific names and segmentation challenges.

Interested in learning more about SAP Business Data Cloud? You might want to check out Gaurish Dessai’s blog post about Business Data Cloud here

Moving forward with BDO in SAP Reference Architecture

Currently, a first set of business data objects for cross-industry processes is included in the SAP Reference Architecture. Soon, Business Data Objects will be made availability on SAP LeanIX and SAP Signavio Process Explorer. A larger scope of BDO’s in the SAP Reference Architecture, and making it available to broader audiences paves the way for the following benefits:

• Data as strategic asset: Data is a strategic asset that improves decision-making and optimizes operations, helping organizations gain a competitive advantage. SAP Customers, EAs and Partners will be able to get a deeper understanding of the Data Architecture and derive benefits within RISE or GROW with SAP Journeys.

• Business context:BDOs are and remain highly relevant in the context of SAP Business Data Cloud: They show how data is modeled, managed, and consumed across different systems and provide the respective semantic and business context. Business Data Objects do not handle data as raw tables, fields, or technical structures, instead, data is understood and organized in terms of what it means to the business and how it is used in business processes.
  
  
• Increased transparency on data consumption: Once available in SAP LeanIX, users working with SAP Reference Architecture can easily build and extend their inventory of Data Objects mapped to the respective SAP Applications. Example: by mapping the relationship of a Business Data Object to a Business Capability and the Application Factsheet, users can easily learn which application uses which data. Additionally, Business Data Objects create the foundation for users to create diagrams visualizing the flow of data between applications effectively.
  
  
• Industry-specifics: Once made available in SAP LeanIX, users will be able to select an industry and identify industry-specific architectures for Public Cloud and Hybrid deployments, including the respective Business Data Objects. This allows for an even clearer view on Data Architectures, taking into account the various industry-specifics.
  

If you are interested in learning more about Reference Business and Solution Architecture, feel free to reach out. Our team of Enterprise Architects are working continuously on elevating this Reference Architecture Content. Shout out to the SAP Global Content Group Reference Architecture Team, led by Martin Effenberger for making BDO and TCM available!