BDC Connect

BDC Connect is the layer that answers the question every Business Data Cloud sales conversation eventually hits: "I already have data in Snowflake, in Databricks on my own cloud account, in an Iceberg lake on object storage, or shared to me by a partner as a Delta share — do I have to move all of it into Business Data Cloud first?" The answer BDC Connect gives is no. It federates and, where needed, ingests from those external sources and exposes them as first-class catalog objects that Datasphere views, Joule agents, and access-control rules can govern exactly like SAP-native data. Without BDC Connect, Business Data Cloud would be a closed platform that only works if a customer migrates everything into it first; with it, Business Data Cloud becomes the semantic and governance hub sitting over a genuinely heterogeneous data estate, which is the more realistic starting point for almost every enterprise customer.

The Four Integration Patterns

Why it matters

• A typical 2026 customer holds 30% non-SAP data across Snowflake, Databricks, and Iceberg — without BDC Connect that layer stays siloed in a parallel BI tool.
• Delta Sharing inbound and Iceberg federation both mean zero lift-and-shift — existing data lakes stay put and become Catalog objects instead of migration targets.
• Snowflake federation runs live query with source-side compute consumed — no copy, no duplicated storage cost, but source-system load must be accounted for.

Key points

• Four patterns: Delta Share in/out · Iceberg federation · Snowflake federation · Databricks-outside.
• Federated objects are first-class Catalog citizens — DAC + lineage + Data Products apply.
• Customer doesn't migrate non-SAP data; they federate, BDC becomes the semantic + governance hub.
• Federation cost is paid in source-side compute (Snowflake credits, DBU, S3 reads) — track separately from BDC CU.
• Replicate high-volume facts to BDC HANA/Delta; federate only dims and slow-changing reference data.
• DAC on federated objects fires at query-rewrite time, same 3-5 ms as native.
• Schema drift handled same as native — wire source CI to BDC Connect REST API.
• Roadmap: BigQuery + Fabric OneLake federation in preview, Polaris Apache catalog deeper integration.
• BDC Connect is mastered only when it changes a named buyer decision.
• Start with the semantic contract and control model before demonstrating the tool.

Terms used on this page

BDC Connect

Cross-stack integration layer letting BDC consume from non-BDC sources without migration.

Delta Sharing inbound

Subscription pattern — external publisher's Delta tables appear as BDC Catalog objects.

Iceberg federation

Live read of Apache Iceberg tables from S3/ADLS/GCS via the Iceberg catalog (Glue, Polaris, Unity).

Snowflake federation

Federated SQL push-down to a Snowflake warehouse — live query, source-side compute consumed.

Databricks-outside connector

Connection pattern for Databricks workspaces in customer's own cloud account, separate from BDC's managed Databricks.

External-bill attribution

TCO modeling that tracks federation cost on the external system separately from BDC CU consumption.

Outbound Delta Share

BDC publishes governed Delta tables for external partner consumption — DAC rules propagate.

Cross-stack DAC

DAC rule defined at BDC Catalog scope that applies to federated external objects at query-rewrite time.

Sources

1. SAP BDC — BDC Connect docs
2. Delta Sharing protocol — Linux Foundation
3. Apache Iceberg + AWS Glue catalog patterns
4. TechEd 2025 — recorded sessions
5. BDC + Snowflake federation reference architecture
6. Databricks Lakehouse Federation comparison
7. SAP News Center — Accelerate the Autonomous Enterprise with SAP Business Data Cloud
8. SAP News Center — SAP Unveils the Autonomous Enterprise
9. SAP Datasphere — Help Portal
10. SAP Datasphere — official product page
11. SAP Analytics Cloud — Help Portal
12. SAP Analytics Cloud — official product page
13. SAP BW/4HANA — Help Portal
14. SAP S/4HANA — Help Portal
15. SAP News Center
16. SAP Community
17. SAP — industries overview
18. Gartner — research & analyst site
19. BARC — BI & Analytics research
20. TDWI — data & analytics research
21. DSAG — German-speaking SAP user group
22. ASUG — Americas' SAP User Group
23. Databricks — official site
24. SAC Performance optimisation guide
25. SAP Knowledge Graph announcement Q1 2026
26. SAP Business Data Cloud – Central catalog feature revealed — SAP Community (Technology Blog Posts by SAP)
27. SAP Integration Suite – Connect Everything FEATURING Snowflake — SAP Community (Technology Blog Posts by SAP)
28. Moving data between Snowflake and SAP Integrated Business Planning — SAP Community (Supply Chain Management Blog Posts by SAP)
29. Connect ABAP Cloud with Databricks via SQL Service — SAP Community (Technology Blog Posts by Members)
30. Import External Datasets to SAP Data Intelligence Catalog — SAP Community (Technology Blog Posts by SAP)
31. Data Federation between SAP HANA Cloud and Amazon S3 to Blend Business Data with External Data — SAP Community (Technology Blog Posts by SAP)
32. Your SAP on Azure – Part 17 – Connect SAP Vora with Azure Databricks — SAP Community (Technology Blog Posts by Members)
33. Connecting SAP BI Platform to Snowflake — SAP Community (Technology Blog Posts by SAP)