VENKATESWARA RAO LAM

SAP BusinessObjects Consultant

Experience Summary

Currently working in IT KeySource, Inc. since August, 2013 and have 8+ years of total experience in the field of Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence.

Previously worked in Infosys Technologies Ltd. from June 2008 until August, 2013 as Technology Analyst with expertise in Data warehousing and reporting solutions especially in SAP BusinessObjects BI platform

Key Expertise

Around 8 years of professional experience in using SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence 4.x (BI4.x), SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.1 (XI3.1) and SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI R2 platforms.

Ability to work and communicate effectively with end business users and understand their reporting needs and requirements.

Experienced in understanding the business and underlying data warehouse quickly and effectively and transform business requirements into technical specifications.

Good development skills in SAP BusinessObjects Web-Intelligence and Desktop-Intelligence reports designing, Crystal Reports, Dashboards.

Excellent universe design skills using Universe Design Tool (UDT) and Information Design Tool(IDT) involving various data sources.

Worked on SAP Lumira and created reports/dashboards out of it and provided training to the business users to learn and self-visualize corporate data.

Working knowledge of Tableau desktop software to develop sleek and intuitive dashboards to end users.

Expertise in Deploying, Migration and Administration of SAP BusinessObjects BI4.x / XI3.1 landscapes.

Working experience in SAP BusinessObjects migration from SAP BusinessObjects XI3.1 to SAP BusinessObjects BI4.x versions.

Knowledge of SAP BusinessObjects Data Services (BO-DS) architecture.

Good knowledge of Data Warehousing concepts and ability to relate to reporting needs.

Strong decision making skills, organizational skills, and customer service oriented.

Excellent analytical and problem solving skills.

Technical Skillset

Involved in full lifecycle Planning, development of various assignments including Data Warehouse and Business Intelligence projects.

Extensively worked on SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.x, SAP BusinessObjects XI3.1 and SAP BusinessObjects XIR2 platforms and has thorough working knowledge on SAP BI product suite applications and client tools.

Deep knowledge and working experience in designing single source and multi-source universe based on relational data sources like Oracle, SQL server, DB2 using SAP BI client tools (Information Design Tool (IDT) tool and Universe Design Tool (UDT).

Thorough working experience in designing Desktop Intelligence (Deski), Web Intelligence (Webi), Crystal Reports and dashboards using SAP BI product suite applications.

Had experience in scheduling reports to different types of destinations like Inbox, E-mail, file system both in Central Management Console (CMC) and BI Launch pad (formerly Infoview) etc.

Knowledge in creating publications, scheduling events, server groups and maintaining them in Central Management Console (CMC).

Working experience in SAP BusinessObjects platform migration from XI3.1 to BI4.x versions which involved migration of multiple content like reports, universes, users and groups, access levels, schedules, events, programs etc. using Upgrade Management Tool.

Had experience in Deploying, Migration, Administration of SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.x and SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.1 various server components, client tools, third part components like Explorer, Crystal Reports 2008

Working knowledge of clustering the servers using Central management Console (CMC) and maintaining the SAP BI4.0/XI3.1 environments and infrastructure.

Deployed SAP BusinessObjects BI4.0/XI3.1 on multiple Tomcat 5 and Tomcat 6 web servers.

Worked on SAP BusinessObjects Client tools like Import Wizard, LCM/Promotion Management, Report Conversion Tool, Upgrade Management Tool etc.

Configured different types of Authentication methods like Windows AD, SAP Authentication. Working knowledge of implementing Single Sign-On (SSO) for SAP BusinessObjects from windows Ad systems.

Working knowledge of performing base installations and update installations of SAP BI4.0 platform involving different Service Packs and Patches.

Worked on Tableau desktop and created dashboards as port of proof of concept for end users.

Worked on databases like Oracle, SQL Server and have knowledge of PL-SQL and basic SQL concepts

Good knowledge of SAP BusinessObjects Data Services (SAP BO-DS) server architecture and its installation and deployment. Worked on setting up and configuring the BODS servers and repositories.

Knowledge of creating different types of connections to interface with other systems such as BICS connections for BW, ODBC, OLEDB connections for legacy systems

Good communication skills, strong decision making skills, organizational skills, and customer service oriented. Excellent analytical and problem solving skills.

Technical Summary

BI Tools:

SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence 4.x,

SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI3.1,

SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI R2,

Clients Tools => Web Intelligence Rich Client(WRC), Desktop Intelligence, Import Wizard, Universe Design Tool(Designer), Information Design Tool(IDT), Life Cycle Management(LCM) or Promotion Management, BI Launch pad(Infoview), Upgrade Management Tool, Report Conversion Tool, Dashboard Designer(formerly Xcelsius), Crystal Reports Designer 2008, SAP Lumira, SAP Design Studio, Tableau desktop

Operating Systems:

Windows 2003/2000/XP, UNIX

RDBMS:

Oracle 8i/9i/10g/11g, MS Access 2005, Teradata 12, SQL Server 2005/2008.

Front End Tools:

SQL developer for Oracle, Management Studio, Control-M

ETL Tools:

Abinitio, SAP BusinessObjects Data Services(BODS), Informatica

Data Modeling Tools:

MS Visio.

Languages:

C, C++, Visual Basic, SQL, .Net, Java Script.

Project Profiles

1) Project Name: Cloverleaf Reporting

Client : Credit and Financing Services Company in US

Team Size: 6

Project Role: Lead BusinessObjects developer and administrator

Description:

Cloverleaf is an ongoing project which involves complete systems migration. The client is migrating from LeasePak business systems to FIS system. The purpose of the Cloverleaf reporting project is to provide business solutions to finance users through SAP BI. The reporting project involves both administration and development tasks which involved deployment of SAP BusinessObjects 4.1 suite, migrating current reports from SAP BO enterprise 3.1 to SAP BI 4.1 version and creation of new Web Intelligence reports, Dashboards, Visualization reports through Lumira in SAP BusinessObjects 4.1. Several universes are created for different applications and reports are built on them.

Responsibilities

Correlated with the business end users to understand the business and functional requirements for the application. Created high level and detail level documents and reviewed them with the client before starting the design phase.

Lead a team of 3 developers and performed administration tasks in the Business Objects landscape.

Understand existing SAP BO3.1 configuration

Planning, Preparing and deploying SAP BusinessObjects 4.1 suite including server installations and clustering in multiple environments.

Use Upgrade Management Tool to migrate content from 3.1 to 4.1 including reports, universes, users and user groups. Set up Enterprise Security on BI platform.

Performed server sizing such as APS sizing and memory allocations to optimize the distributed platform.

Setup auditing functionality in the new 4.1 landscape. Knowledge of auditing universe and reporting on it.

Worked on design of stand-alone report layouts and got them reviewed and sign-off from users.

Designed multiple universes based on requirements for different applications using the IDT tool in BI4.1.

The data foundation layer is built on oracle databases, a business view layer created on top of data foundation which has all the classes and objects defined and categorized based on user needs.

The data foundation layer involves many standard tables, derived tables are created to use database SQL statements.

Web Intelligence reports are created using Rich Client and standard corporate templates.

Created multiple data providers within a Web Intelligence document and used merged dimensions to display data.

Worked on SAP Lumira and developed stories in the form of reports, presentations and took training sessions to users to use Lumira as self-service tool.

Created test cases document and performed unit testing on the reports for data validation to meet business requirements.

Performed code review for peer developer reports and involved in review meetings.

Participated in migration activities from development to UAT environments. Had working knowledge of promotion management in CMC

Created training materials for using BI Launchpad as users are new to BI 4.x version

Tools used: Information Design Tool (IDT), Universe Design Tool (UDT), Upgrade Management Tool (UMT), Promotion Management, Rich Client, BI Launchpad, Central Management Console (CMC), SAP Lumira, SAP Design Studio, SQL Developer for Oracle

2)Project Name: NPC Reporting conversion

Client : One of the Fortune 500 fastest growing payment processing company in US

Team Size: 4

Project Role: SAP BO lead developer and administrator

Description:

A SAP BusinessObjects reporting solution in SAP BusinessObjects BI4.1 is created for the client who wanted a single stop solution to create and view reports from various business systems. The project involved creation of a universe using the Information Design Tool (IDT) tool, from multiple oracle database systems from different business domains. The project also involved creation of stand-alone Web-Intelligence (WebI) reports using BI launch pad and Rich Client tools and dashboards using Tableau desktop. These reports are then scheduled to run monthly and delivered as excel reports to multiple users via. Email and to BI inboxes.

Responsibilities

Involved in continuous interaction with the business analyst and end users to understand the business and functional requirements for the application. Created high level and detail level documents and reviewed them with the client before starting the design phase.

Worked on design of stand-alone report layouts and got them reviewed and sign-off from users.

Designed the single stop multi-source universe using the IDT tool in BI4.1. The universe involved creation of a local project, multiple connections to the databases and shortcuts, data foundation layer is built involving two oracle databases, a business view layer created on top of data foundation which has all the classes and objects defined and categorized based on user needs.

The data foundation layer involves many standard tables, derived tables are created to use database SQL functions, and calculated columns are also created for time related information.

The data foundation layer also involved insertion of many joins between the tables, detecting and setting up cardinality, creation of various types of joins like inner join, outer join, self restricting joins

Worked on project synchronization during the course of development to ensure the latest copy is always existed in the repository

Created parameterized list of values which were used in the canned reports and ad-hoc reporting.

Created reports in Web Intelligence for navigating through different levels of hierarchy using Drill up – Drill down functionalities.

Defined Hierarchies, Cascading LOVs in the universe, for better filtering of the data in the reports and thereby improving report performance.

Developed canned reports using combined queries with union functionality.

Worked on resolving traps using Aliases and Contexts.

Created reports with Optional Prompts and prompts with some default value.

Implemented Index Awareness to improve query performance.

Used aggregate aware logic in defining summary table objects to pull summary data quickly.

Developed intuitive dashboards using dashboard designer that involved multiple components and charts.

Involved in maintaining existing dashboards built using web services and provided enhancements.

Worked on a proof of concept using Tableau desktop to build dashboards/charts for end users to analyse and understand monthly projections.

Was responsible for maintaining current SAP BI platform by part of support team to handle daily user tickets and troubleshooting and was also involved in applying server upgrades and patches.

Tools used: Information Design Tool (IDT), Universe Design Tool (UDT), Upgrade Management Tool (UMT), Promotion Management, Rich Client, BI Launchpad, Central Management Console (CMC), SAP Lumira, SQL Developer for Oracle

3)Project Name: RMB reporting solution

Client : One of the Fortune 500 fastest growing payment processing company in US

Team Size: 3

Project Role: SAP BO lead developer

Description:

Worked as SAP BusinessObjects developer and involved in creating a reporting solution to the users. The client company acquired a company and there was a need to merge its EDW into Vantiv EDW and the users wanted a reporting solution to extract merged information through reports. The users should be able to pull data through ad-hoc requests. Also few Web-Intelligence (WebI) reports and crystal reports are created which were used by user’s on-demand.

Responsibilities

Interacted with the business users to get the business requirements and functional requirements. Created documentation on the same and got it reviewed from end users. Worked on design of stand-alone report layouts and got them reviewed and sign-off from users.

A single source universe is created using the Universe Designer tool in BI4.0.

Implemented universe linking concept by building a core universe and derived universes on it.

Single relational connection to the oracle 11g database is created and used. The design schema is created on this database which involved many tables, derived tables.

Frequently performed universe import/export and locking mechanism during the course of universe development.

Created universe filters/conditions with @Prompt conditions to filter out data at universe level.

Universe level security was also implemented to restrict unauthorized users to it by managing access restrictions to user groups

Derived tables are created to use the database SQL to create calculated columns and objects on them.

Various joins are created to join multiple tables. The joins include inner join, outer join, self join etc.

Candidate contexts are created to resolve loops, alias table are also created to resolve loops and traps.

Aggregate aware function is used in objects to speed up data retrieval and process time using aggregate tables.

Various designer functions are also used like @select, @prompt, @where etc. in defining objects.

Designed 5 crystal reports using Crystal Reports Designer and delivered them to repository which are used by user’s on-demand.

Tools used: Information Design Tool (IDT), Universe Design Tool (UDT), Upgrade Management Tool (UMT), Promotion Management, Rich Client, BI Launchpad, Central Management Console (CMC), SAP Lumira, SQL Developer for Oracle

4)Project Name: SAP BusinessObjects migration XI3.1 to BI4.0 platform

Client : One of the largest retail food supply-chain companies in US

Team Size: 4

Project Role: SAP BO administration and deployment

Description

This is a SAP BusinessObjects migration project where the BO content (reports, universes, users, schedules etc) from 25 applications are converted from XI3.1 to BI4.0 version using tools like RCT and UDT. The converted content is tested in various stages by the users for validity and finally moved to Production which is in BI4.0 platform.

Responsibilities

Interacted with Business Users and Business Analysts to gather the Requirements and worked on consolidating report information for multiple applications.

Worked on Proof of Concepts for understanding the difference between BO 3.1 and BI4.0 platforms and differences between Desktop Intelligence reports and Web Intelligence reports.

Performed an initial study of the current reporting application, to finalize the data elements required for reporting.

Prepared presentation and training materials for educating users on how to use the new BI4.0 environment like the launch pad UI, how to include external files in the existing reports etc.

Worked extensively on data remediation for all the applications in deciding the complexity of reports conversion for different types of reports which included stored procedures, Free-hand SQL based reports.

Extensively used the Report Conversion tool to convert the Desktop Intelligence reports to Webi Intelligence for all applications. Gathered the logs of all the conversions and worked on validating the reports.

Worked on finding the root causes for the partially converted and not converted reports and provided resolutions and solutions for the reports.

Extensively worked on Upgrade Management Tool to migrate all BO3.1 content to BI4.0. This includes all the reports, related universes, connections, users and groups.

Worked on the reports that had formatting issues due to the conversion like structural changes, missing filters, breaks, sections etc.

Worked on migrating the .Net based custom applications which are running on BO3.1 to BI4.0 but changing the .Net framework versions, establishing the DSNs and repointing them to new servers, hosting the code in new servers and making the connections to the migrated reports

Worked on setting up security for the migrated BO3.1 applications in the new BI4.0 platform where the basic application security is a bit different.

Worked closely with Business users and helped them in testing and validating the reports in the test environments. Provided on time solutions for their queries or concerns

Tools used: Report Conversion Tool (RCT), Upgrade Management Tool (UDT), Central Management Console (CMC), Universe Design Tool (Designer), Life Cycle Management/Promotion Management, Crystal Reports 2008, Web Intelligence Rich Client, Desktop Intelligence, Dashboard designer (Xcelsius), Infoview, Windows Server 2008 R2, SQL Server Management Studio

5)Project Name: STAR2

Client : one of the major beverage company in US

Team size: 3

Project Role: SAP BO developer

Description:

This purpose of the project is to build a universe based on Microsoft SQL Server 2008 database and develop Web Intelligence reports using the universe objects. The data into SQL server come from upstream master data management source. The Web Intelligence reports are built in SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise 4.0 version and these are standard reports which are then scheduled to deliver to users daily at specific time of the day.

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Responsibilities

Gathered, analyzed and documented Business requirements, clarified Business rules, functional requirements and data specifications for Business Objects universes and reports.

Modified Universes with pre-calculated aggregates from summary tables.

Created cascading list of values to enable cascading prompting in the reports using Designer.

Created reports in Web Intelligence for navigating through different levels of hierarchy using Drill up – Drill down functionalities.

Defined Cascading List of Values in the universe, for better filtering of the data in the reports and thereby improving report performance.

Developed canned reports using combined queries with UNION functionality.

Created reports with Optional Prompts and prompts with some default value.

Created local variables with complex logics in the reports for calculating the liquidity amounts.

Created complex formulae in the WebI report to dynamically changing the column that need to be displayed in the table depending on the prompt values.

Used functionalities like Sections, Breaks in the canned reports for sectioning data in the report; this ensured the readability of the reports.

Tools used: Universe Design Tool (UDT), BI Launchpad portal, Web Intelligence Rich Client, Promotion Management, SQL Server Management Studio.

6)Project Name: SAP BusinessObjects split project

Client : major retail food supply-chain firm in US

Team Size: 5

Project Role: SAP BO administrator

Description:

This purpose of this project is to build SAP BusinessObjects BI4.0 platform and XI3.1 platforms from the beginning like acquiring the Windows servers from HP, preparing the servers for BO installation, checking perquisites, installing BO software on each server and clustering them. Migrating the BO content from a different domain to the new servers and performing the same in different environments.

Responsibilities

Involved in verifying and installation of pre-requisite software such as .NET framework, drivers, ODBC setup, SMTP agent, Processmon etc

Worked on estimates for server requirements and sizing, load balancing.

Installation of XI3.1 and BI4.0 server components, client components and explorer components.

Involved in configuring CMS database, clustering, server configurations, APS split, etc.

Configured various authentications on the new servers like Windows AD, SAP authentication etc.

Prepared exhaustive list of documents for reports, universes and users to be migrated/replicated

Worked with application teams to get a confirmation what content needs to be retained or deleted.

Involved in clean-up activities to remove unnecessary content based on user input

Configured different types of connections for all universes such as ODBC, OLEDB, BICS connections using IDT tool etc.

Created schedules and publications for the reports of application teams according to their requirements.

Created an organization level security setup for the BO applications in CMC with User groups hierarchy.

Performed server sizing of the clustered servers and also performed APS split of adaptive processing servers according to the standards.

Worked on various tools as part of administration activities such as CCM, CMS, tomcat manager etc.

Performed various upgrade activities on the existing platform whenever new service pack and patches are released from SAP. The service pack that are upgraded are SP2, SP4 and SP5.

Worked with application teams for new domain and assisted in their testing.

Work on and tickets and enhancements involving various platform errors in accordance with the SLAs defined.

Upgrading the BO platform (servers) with latest service packs and patches released by SAP.

Performing the testing of the platform after each update to ensure platform stability.

Documentation of tickets with error type, root cause and resolution statements.

Tools used: Central Management Console (CMC), Central Management Server (CMS), Central Configuration Manager (CCM), Tomcat manager, Windows 7 OS

7)Project Name : SAP BusinessObjects Production Support

Client : One of the largest retail food supply-chain companies in US

Team Size: 5

Role : SAP BO administrator

Description:

This projects involves continuous support of SAP BusinessObjects platform in BI4.0 and XI3.1 for applications as many as 65. The primary goal in this project is to ensure stability of the BO platform hosting number of applications. Acknowledging tickets raised by users related to administration and solving them according to the SLA. This project also involved performing various platform upgrades released by SAP in different periods.

Responsibilities:

Work on and tickets and enhancements involving various platform errors in accordance with the SLAs defined.

Upgrading the BO platform (servers) with latest service packs and patches released by SAP.

Performing the testing of the platform after each update to ensure platform stability.

Documentation of tickets with error type, root cause and resolution statements.

8)Project Name : PUMA

Client : One of the largest retail food supply-chain companies in UK

Team Size : 6

Role : Senior Systems Engineer

Technologies: SAP BusinessObjects developer

Description:

ARGOS is a one of the leading retails clients in UK spreading its stores across major location in UK and all over the world. The projects involved building universe and reports in BOEXIR2 for one of its functional area. The data source for the project is Oracle 9i. A data model is created according to the client requirements and a universe is built based on this model. Later Desktop Intelligence reports are created and delivered to the clients for their daily use and Ad-hoc reporting.

Responsibilities

Interacted with the clients and understood the requirements and the business logics and reviewed the documentation with the clients in the initial phase and got signoff.

Involved in creating high level and detailed design documents of the application architecture, report specification documents, report mapping documents.

Created detailed design document for the universe design with classes, objects, hierarchies, filters etc.

Created a Star schema universe with multiple dimension tables and applied joins according to the logic.

Performed integrity of the universe for loops, traps, parsing errors, syntax errors.

Created multiple aliases, contexts, derived table for resolving the loops and chasm traps.

Involved in creation of complex objects which included functions like Aggregate_Aware, Drill, etc.

Worked extensively with @Functions (@Select, @Prompt, @Where) to filter the data.

Created cascading prompts with cascading list of values for better filtering of the data in the reports and thereby improving report performance.

Developed canned reports using combined queries with UNION functionality.

Created reports with Optional Prompts and prompts with some default value.

Extensively worked on Desktop Intelligence reports creation from the built universe.

Worked on creation of different types of reports involving cross tabs, drilling, slice and dice functionalities.

Applied different formatting techniques on the reports such as breaks, sections, alerts, ranking, report filters according to business requirements.

Thoroughly performed unit testing as per the test case document and reviewed it with the clients.

Reworked on the reports for ad-hoc change requests made by the clients during UAT and prepared documentation for the changes.

Involved in application go-live activities to production and provided assistance to ensure smooth process.

Worked on change requests, creating CR documents, coding the modifications, etc during the support period and maintained the application.

Tools used: Desktop Intelligence Tool, Import Wizard, Designer, TOAD, Infoview portal, Central Management Console

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