So, what is SAP Note 3255746?
On February 2, 2024, through SAP Note 3255746, SAP issued a notification that prohibited businesses from using ODP API for 3rd party applications. This will most likely stop you from ingesting data from SAP to Databricks through Qlik Replicate, Azure DataFactory, or any other non-SAP data consumption tools.
However, there is no need for organizations to panic right now. The SAP Note 3255746 clauses are not legally binding right now though ODP limitations are ultimately expected to be incorporated into contracts made by SAP with clients subsequently.
What Effect Does SAP Note 3255746 Have On Clients?
In a nutshell, the SAP Note 3255746 prohibits SAP clients or other third-party applications from using the Remote Function Call (RFC) modules in the Operational Data Provisioning (ODP) Data Replication API. This activity has been traditionally done to extract or access SAP data from SAP ABAP sources, regardless of whether it is cloud editions or on-premises.
SAP has also given detailed clarifications about RFC modules in the Note. It states that RFC modules can only be used in internal applications of SAP and that this clause can be changed at any time without notice. SAP also has the authority to implement measures that restrict and audit the unauthorized use of RFC modules of the ODP Data Replication API.
SAP also warns that any issue that might arise from using the RFC modules in third-party applications or customer applications is entirely the responsibility of the client. SAP will neither be responsible for resolving such issues nor will it provide the necessary support for doing so.
What are RFC modules?
Since using RFC modules is central to the SAP Note 3255746, a brief explanation of what is RFC is required at this stage. SAP RFC (Remote Function Call) is a means to facilitate interaction, exchange of information, and communication between client applications of different systems in the SAP ecosystem. SAP RFCs also include connections within non-SAP and SAP systems as well as between SAP systems. With RFC, customers can call or enable a function to be run on a remote platform.
At present, there are several variants of RFC, each with a different property and purpose. There are 2 interfaces of RFC, one is the ABAP Program Calling Interface and the other is the Non-SAP Program Calling Interface.
Implications of SAP Note 3255746 on businesses
What does the SAP Note 3255746 mean for your business? Is the outlook grim and will you be put to a lot of inconvenience with this SAP notification? The short answer is “It Depends” on what you use.
The position of your business is not very bright if you use the SAP RFC module to extract or replicate data within the ODP Data Replication API. In this case, any data that is implemented through SAP will be at risk. You must exercise caution here as the heavy investments that you are likely to make in SAP data extraction processes should not go to waste due to lack of support or the required permissions.
In a worst-case scenario, it is possible that SAP will stop operations or even penalize your organization if you continue to use RFCs. However, the silver lining is that major corporations including IBM and Microsoft use SAP RFCs to gain access to SAP data. The same holds true for ETL and data replication companies such as Informatica, Qlik Replicate, Matillion, and more.
What are the likely situations that might arise due to the SAP Note 3255746?
First, SAP Data Intelligence/Datasphere might become the exclusive medium for ingesting data from SAP ERP systems, and ingestion tools using ODP via OData will not be affected. The drawback here is that these tools are not capable of handling data ingestion on a large scale.
Next, in all probability, data ingestion via SAP Extractors will be permitted and ingestion from SAP BW through OpenHub will not be adversely impacted.
The SAP Open Hub mechanism allows you to allocate data from BI systems to non-SAP data marts, analytical applications, and other applications, making sure of controlled distribution across multiple systems. The target to which data is to be transferred is decided by Open Hub.
How to get around the SAP Note 3255746 for SAP data extraction?
Is it the end of SAP data extraction with SAP Note 3255746? The answer is an equivocal NO. You can use a specific SAP connector that uses SAP-certified and recommended mechanisms to extract SAP data from SAP sources and deliver real-time data from SAP sources to multiple destinations.
These include Snowflake, Redshift, Amazon S3, Azure Synapse, ADLS Gen2, Azure SQL Database, Google BigQuery, Postgres, Databricks, and SQL Server Change Data Capture.
We have seen that SAP Note 3255746 will not affect data extraction from SAP ERP systems when ingestion tools that use ODP via OData are used. Let us go a bit deeper into the functioning of ODP for better clarity in this regard.
ODP or the Operational Data Provisioning framework for data distribution offers cutting-edge and consolidated technology for data consumption and provisioning. It supports data extraction and replication for several targets at a time while providing support to capture changes made to databases at the source.
The benefit here is that the mechanisms of ODP for extracting, transferring, and loading data support several target applications. These include SAP BW, SAP BW/4HANA, SAP Data Services, and SAP HANA Smart Data Integration (SAP HANA SDI).
Summing Up, all is not lost because of SAP Note 3255746.
Copyright © 2025 California Business Journal. All Rights Reserved.
For California Business Journal Disclaimers, go to /terms-conditions/.
