Your SAP Data is Stuck in a Silo: How AWS Glue Zero-ETL Finally Sets It Free
How AWS Glue zero-ETL for SAP eliminates custom data pipelines, enabling native SAP data replication to Redshift, S3, and SageMaker Lakehouse with built-in change data capture.
Every SAP customer has the same complaint: "We have all this data in SAP, but we cannot get it out without building and maintaining custom ETL pipelines." For years, the answer was either expensive middleware (SAP Data Services, Informatica), custom ABAP programs writing to flat files, or RFC-based extractors that nobody wanted to maintain.
As of December 2025, that problem has a fundamentally different solution. AWS Glue zero-ETL now supports native SAP data ingestion and replication, with change data capture, no custom pipelines to build, and data landing directly in Amazon Redshift, SageMaker Lakehouse, or Amazon S3 Tables.
The Old Way (And Why It Hurt)
Getting data out of SAP traditionally required one of these painful approaches:
Option A: Custom ABAP Programs. You write Z-programs that extract data, write to flat files or staging tables, push them to S3 via the AWS SDK for ABAP or SCP interfaces. Works, but now you maintain custom code for every data entity.
Option B: Third-Party ETL Tools. Informatica, Talend, SAP Data Services. Expensive licenses, additional infrastructure, another team to manage.
Option C: SAP BW/4HANA as Middleware. Extract to BW first, then extract from BW to your data lake. Two hops, double the latency, double the maintenance.
Option D: Custom OData Extractors. Build OData services in SAP, write Python/Lambda functions to call them on a schedule, handle pagination, error recovery, state management. It works but it is brittle.
The New Way: AWS Glue Zero-ETL for SAP
AWS Glue zero-ETL with SAP eliminates all of this. The solution uses the AWS Glue SAP OData connector, a managed connector that understands SAP data structures, protocols, and security frameworks natively.
How CDC (Change Data Capture) Works
For ODP sources: Initial full extraction establishes baseline. SAP creates an ODQ entry and issues a delta token. Each subsequent cycle sends the delta token to SAP, receives only changed records (INSERT/UPDATE/DELETE). AWS Glue persists delta tokens internally.
For non-ODP sources: Uses a "last modified" field to track changes. OData filters built on timestamp comparisons. New/changed records merged into destination.
Replication frequency: Configurable between 15 minutes and 6 days for managed zero-ETL.
Why This Matters (The Business Case)
1. No Custom Code to Maintain: Zero-ETL is managed by AWS. You configure it, point it at your SAP OData endpoints, select your target, and it runs.
2. Native SAP CDC Without BW: AWS Glue zero-ETL handles ODP deltas natively. Your data lake gets incremental updates without a separate BW layer.
3. Foundation for GenAI: Once SAP data lands in Redshift or S3, you can use Amazon Q Business for natural language queries, Amazon Bedrock Knowledge Bases for RAG-based agents, and AI agents that reason over SAP financial, procurement, and supply chain data.
4. Cost Reduction: No middleware licenses. No dedicated ETL servers. Pay only for AWS Glue processing and target storage.
Real-World Architecture Pattern
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SAP S/4HANA (on AWS or on-premise)
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+-- OData APIs (ODP-enabled CDS views)
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AWS Glue Zero-ETL (SAP OData Connector)
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+--> Amazon Redshift (BI/Analytics)
+--> Amazon S3 Tables (Data Lake: Apache Iceberg)
+--> SageMaker Lakehouse (ML/AI training data)
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v
Amazon Bedrock / Amazon Q Business (GenAI insights on SAP data)References
- SAP data ingestion and replication with AWS Glue zero-ETL: https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/big-data/sap-data-ingestion-and-replication-with-aws-glue-zero-etl/
- Guidance for SAP Data Integration and Management on AWS: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/solutions/sap-data-integration-and-management-on-aws/
- Guidance for Data Federation between SAP and AWS: https://aws.amazon.com/solutions/guidance/data-federation-between-sap-and-aws
- AWS for SAP MCP Server in Bedrock AgentCore: https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2026/05/aws-sap-mcp-amazon-bedrock/
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