Additional Linux Power For SAP Business One

It’s well known that more and more companies of all shapes and sizes are taking the first step towards S/4 Hana or are already operating it. What’s not as well known, however, is that Business One (B1), a solution for smaller and mid-sized companies, has been on a steep growth trajectory for a few years now. Experts put the estimated number of B1 installations at 100,000 worldwide.

SAP Business One was designed for the needs of smaller businesses who might need an ERP software but not all the functionalities of the big suites.

10,000 Suse B1 installations

Companies of all industries are using B1. Many global conglomerates use it as well for subsidiaries or foreign branches to provide them with their own application system. For example, HQ could be using S/4 Hana (or ERP/ECC) while subsidiaries use B1 or Business One on Hana. This shows that there are many different use cases and possible combinations of the two SAP solutions.

It’s a fact that the general demand for B1 on Hana has increased steadily in the past years. The most recent version is 10.0 with many new functionalities compared to its predecessors, e.g. a web client in Fiori. By the way: SAP Business One can be deployed on premises and in the cloud.

With a rise in B1 on Hana installations comes a rise in Linux. As is known, SAP has mandated Linux use in combination with Hana; i.e. the more Hana installations there are, the more Linux there is.

Two years ago, 6,000 SAP customers used B1 with Suse Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications which is often recommended as operating system platform for SAP systems. In July 2020, there were 10,000 SAP customers using B1 and SLES for SAP Applications, which is an increase of 67 percent. Suse Linux Enterprise is also the only Linux system which is certified for B1 on Hana by SAP.

Support when and how you need it

SAP Business One is almost exclusively sold, implemented and maintained by SAP partners, which is why Suse is working with numerous B1 partners to support them and customer when and how they need it.

For example, the Suse partner program offers preconfigured software images and technological Linux best-in-class training sessions for companies with Suse Academy certification. These sessions are online training courses to better understand the solution.

Furthermore, partners can leverage Suse’s installation assistant which is an efficient and optimized automation tool for implementing SAP Business One on Hana with Suse Linux Enterprise.