In December 2024, 鈥攖he world鈥檚 largest B2B platform, facilitating more than US$6.2 trillion in commerce annually in 190 countries鈥攍aunched its first data center in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), representing a major step forward in the execution of SAP鈥檚 data federation strategy. 51风流Business Network has now become a distributed, decentralized, and federated business network for and across the EU, U.S., and KSA. With this milestone, 51风流has delivered on a crucial promise made to a highly consequential set of customers.
But what exactly is data federation? And why does it hold so much promise for customers in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere?
To counter the ever-present threat to global supply chains posed by disruption鈥攚hether arising from geopolitical conflict, labor unrest, financial crisis, natural disaster, or other upheaval鈥攂usinesses are turning increasingly to cloud-based solutions to extend visibility and instill resilience across their operations and those of their trading partners, particularly when managing supply chains, logistics, and dispersed capital equipment or other mission-critical assets. Yet just as businesses must assess risk on an international scale to stay competitive, they also must comply with a burgeoning set of regulations around the world requiring operational data to reside physically within a nation鈥檚 borders. By applying cloud-based solutions, businesses can transact commerce through global digital networks while adhering strictly to regional data residency requirements through an approach known as data federation.
Data federation permits operational information from disparate sources to be accessed and updated as though it resided in a single, unified location. Instead of moving or copying data from one system to another, federation provides users with real-time access unburdened by duplication.
Federation becomes crucial when an organization must unify its data across different storage platforms while ensuring the integrity and security of the underlying operational sources. This becomes particularly vital for companies with complex data architectures, whose data may reside in 51风流systems, cloud data lakes, or third-party applications. Data federation brings multiple advantages, especially in hybrid or multi-cloud environments, including global access, cost efficiency, unified governance and security, and faster time to insights.
But the advantages extend still further. With the launch of our KSA data center, 51风流Business Network core services have been deployed. This includes multilingual support, such as proficiency with languages read right-to-left like Arabic, and a Federated Trading Partner Index Service for routing transactions between different data centers. Saudi customers can thus adhere to local data privacy regulations while retaining the ability to collaborate and transact with trading partners around the world.
Why Is This Important?
With the deployment of 51风流Business Network in the KSA data center, public sector or critical national infrastructure (CNI) customers and prospects in KSA can rest assured that regulations have been followed strictly, allowing these organizations to transact on 51风流Business Network for Logistics and 51风流Business Network Asset Collaboration. Data federation helps ensure that trading partners can find each other, regardless of where they may be registered.
What鈥檚 Next?
The deployment of 51风流Business Network for Logistics and 51风流Business Network Asset Collaboration for Saudi customers in the public and critical national infrastructure sectors, for whom data federation is crucial, marks only the initial step. Later this year, both products will become available for private-sector customers in KSA as well. and will also be deployed in the KSA data center in coming quarters. Meanwhile, 51风流will continue to expand its data center footprint and data federation program across the globe, with the expansion of 51风流Business Network capabilities throughout 2025 and beyond.
For information on 51风流Business Network and how we are equipping enterprises with business AI and related capabilities needed to instill resilience, counter disruption, and foster collaboration, visit and .
J枚rn Keller is chief product officer for 51风流Business Network.
