Operating a multi-tenant solution on BTP CF - 1 GB Runtime = 10 Routes

[former_member194549]

Dear SAP,

We, as a Gold Partner, run a small portion of our business value on SAP BTP and its Cloud Foundry runtime. We provide SaaS solutions to our customers. These solutions are developed in a microservice fashion and use the multi-tenancy approach. For now, we are running our services on 4GB runtime and are totally fine for now. Besides the huge conceptional failure on the BTP about connecting runtime to available routes.

Let's do a short recap:
For each GB of runtime, 10 routes will be added. While onboarding a new tenant alias customer, we have to add a new route onto each of the SaaS solutinos. These are the core concepts of BTP Cloud Foundry.

Right now, we are blocked in onboard new customers, because we exceed the technical limitations of routes available in our account. We already reached out to the SAP support (see Ticket) to increase the available routes above 40 routes. The only response we got was to add more runtime resources and increase our daily operating costs. This response is not suitable and not satisfying for our needs. The second response (use custom domains) of SAP Support works neither. Our account is billed in the subscription model, the BTP Service Custom Domains is not available in the subscription model according to Discovery center.

Quote from SAP help:
SAP BTP provides a multitenant functionality that allows application providers to own, deploy, and operate tenant-aware applications for multiple consumers, with reduced costs.

Your response from support, the current technical underlying restrictions about routes and the cited quote does not fit together. In the current state, you are telling us the following statements:

• We should not follow a microservice approach on BTP to save routes quota.
• Multi-Tenant services on BTP will not run budget-friendly.
• Technical limitations can only be solved by paying more unneeded resources.

We escalated this scenario inhouse and don't have arguments to go along with these concepts. On top of this, we are blocked in our deployment and sales approach to generate revenue. This is a highly important topic to us, how many facets of regulations we have to face on BTP.

Regards
Simon

[MustafaBensan]

Hi Simon,

This is certainly a valid example of the type of friction which risks the widespread adoption of BTP for SaaS solutions. I have updated my blog Is SAP Business Technology Platform Ready for Developing Industry Cloud SaaS Applications? with a reference to your feedback.

To your point about custom domains, assuming they were available for the subscription model, how would that solve the limitation of available routes?

Regards,

Mustafa.

[gregorw]

As far as I understand the post from denys.kempen at Getting Started with Multitenant Business Applications on SAP BTP | Hands-on Video Tutorials you can configure a “wildcard” host mapping when you use a custom domain. So no routes are needed. Hope Denys can confirm that.

[jreimann]

Hi @Marco_Dorn,

I apologize for bringing up this topic again after nearly 2.5 years. I hope you can still assist me or provide some information, as the documentation on this matter is quite sparse. The Global Account is still based on the subscription-based model.

We’ve recently noticed a change in the configuration of "Space Quotas." When editing a "Space Quota", it is now possible to specify how many routes can be assigned to a specific plan. 

In my subaccount, I have assigned 6 units of Cloud Foundry Runtime. In the past, this meant I had 6 GB of runtime and 60 routes available. Under the input field for routes, it correctly states "Org Quota: 60." However, I can now assign any arbitrary value (including -1 for "Unlimited" routes) without receiving a warning when saving.

Does this mean that the limitation (1 GB of runtime provides 10 assignable routes) no longer exists, or does this limitation still apply even though I can assign "Unlimited" routes to my space? If the limitation still exists, what happens if I exceed the Org Quota (e.g., using 61 routes in my example)? Will the application no longer run, or will I be charged afterward for routes that exceed the Org Quota? Is there any usage analysis available for the routes being used?

Unfortunately, the SAP Help pages don’t provide answers to my questions, and it seems that only the used GB are considered as a metric, not the routes:
https://help.sap.com/docs/btp/sap-business-technology-platform/cloud-foundry-environment#service-pla...

Thank you for your help!

Best regards,
Johannes

[Beyhan]

Hello Jreimann,

[Beyhan]

Hello Jreimann, let me try to answer the question again :-). If the space quota limit for a resource exceeds the org quota limit, the org quota limit applies as documented BTP help portal https://help.sap.com/docs/btp/sap-business-technology-platform/create-space-quota-plans. If you exceed the quota you won't be able to deploy your application and will get an error during deployment like " Pushing app ... to org ... / space ... as ... For application '...': Routes quota exceeded for organization '...'. FAILED". The Cloud Foundry Runtime price is calculated based on GB memory (https://discovery-center.cloud.sap/serviceCatalog/cloud-foundry-runtime?region=all&tab=service_plan) that is why the usage analysis doesn't include this information. Regarding the UI behaviour for space quota management I will contact our UI team and provide the feedback. Thank you for that and I hope this answers your questions.