Take it or leave it, SAP is making quiet a some news about its new NetWeaver offerings. After a lot of buzz about HANA, it’s time for SAP NetWeaver Cloud based offerings. SAP Cloud is no more just about the ByDesign and mySAP components. SAP NetWeaver Neo – is a PaaS (Platform as a Service) for developing and managing enterprise applications based on Java.  SAP says, NetWeaver Neo will be used by its users to build SaaS applications and sell them to customers. They can also build custom applications so that they can make most of their SAP Business Suit.

In SAP’s words, NetWeaver Neo is a PaaS based cloud solution based on Java and relies on open standards. It leverages industry leading tools to speed up ramp-up and enhance developer productivity. The platform is entirely managed by SAP in its highly secured data centers.

Right now we do not have more information available about how does SAP NetWeaver Neo works? or what are the tools used in SAP NetWeaver Neo? But it seems Portal Application Development would be moved in cloud. Do you think NetWeaver Studio will also be moved into the cloud? Not sure yet but I assume it should be as it is the only application development platform we use right now. Tools like Visual Composer and Web Page Composers are just Application Modeling tools and hence I don’t see them as a part of SAP NetWeaver Neo.

When it comes to version specific application development, I think NetWeaver Neo should offer scalable framework to support development specific to full versions such as 7.0, 7.3 and CE version like 7.1 & 7.2. However there are some serious questions I have about this Neo Program. What if I already have Java Applications running onto Portal and I want to move them in the cloud? What about Application Maintenance? These questions will be answered when we get more insights about SAP NetWeaver Neo.

NetWeaver Neo is currently in Beta release and available for anyone who is interested to be a part of this Beat Program. If you are interested, you can sign-up here participate: neo-beta@sap.com

More about NetWeaver Neo later when more information is out officially or when I get accepted in its beta program. Till then you can read more about HANA, River and ByDesign at this post: Sail by River HANA, build ByDesign