Concept card

SAP AI Launchpad

As of 2026-09-25

Edited by Cédric-Olivier Mâry, sole editor and publication director — 27 years in the SAP ecosystem. How these pages are produced, and where automation is used.

What is SAP AI Launchpad?

SAP AI Launchpad is a multitenant SaaS management layer on SAP BTP for AI use cases across multiple AI runtime instances, including SAP AI Core — it does not include the runtimes themselves. Its Generative AI Hub app (prompts, deployments, orchestration, monitoring/comparison views) requires SAP AI Core's Extended service plan; the Standard plan does not unlock it, and there is no downgrade path from Extended.

A management layer, not a runtime

SAP's own documentation is precise about what SAP AI Launchpad is: a multitenant software-as-a-service application on SAP Business Technology Platform that lets customers and partners manage AI use cases across multiple AI runtime instances — including, but not limited to, SAP AI Core. The AI runtimes themselves are not included in the Launchpad subscription; Launchpad is the cockpit, not the engine. That distinction matters for scoping: a client asking "do we need AI Launchpad" is really asking whether they need a management layer across one or several SAP AI Core tenants, not whether they need compute. SAP AI Launchpad runs exclusively in the SAP BTP Cloud Foundry environment.

Six documented capabilities

SAP groups what AI Launchpad does into six areas: connecting to and switching between multiple AI runtime instances; interacting with SAP AI Core resource groups and their assets (models, executions, deployments); managing the generative AI lifecycle — prompts, experimentation, administration — through the Generative AI Hub app inside Launchpad; managing the AI use-case lifecycle from training through deployment; tracking consumption statistics and resource utilization; and handling authentication and operational administration for the connected AI runtimes. Resource groups are managed from Launchpad itself: create, edit and delete a resource group (a separate flow exists specifically for a resource group intended for AI data management), then use it to scope models, executions and deployments the same way you would from SAP AI Core's own API.

Why it matters

AI Launchpad manages runtimes, it does not provide compute itself — scoping 'do we need Launchpad' is a different question from 'do we need AI Core capacity,' and confusing the two derails a proposal.
The Generative AI Hub inside Launchpad is licensing-gated on SAP AI Core's Extended service plan, not a Launchpad setting — a client on the Standard plan will not see it no matter how Launchpad is configured.
The upgrade from Standard to Extended is one-way: data and models carry over, but there is no documented downgrade path, which changes how conservatively a plan decision should be made.

Key points

AI Launchpad is a multitenant SaaS management layer on SAP BTP, running exclusively in the Cloud Foundry environment; AI runtimes (e.g. SAP AI Core) are not part of the subscription.
Six documented capabilities: multi-runtime connection, resource-group interaction, Generative AI Hub lifecycle management, use-case lifecycle management, consumption/utilization analytics, and runtime administration.
Resource groups are created, edited and deleted directly from Launchpad, including a dedicated flow for AI-data-management resource groups.
Generative AI Hub access requires SAP AI Core's Extended service plan (Standard does not include it); upgrade Standard→Extended is supported, downgrade is not; a 30-day free trial exists for exploration.
Documented flows include creating deployments (including specifically for the orchestration service), creating/deleting prompts, prompt optimization, and monitoring via compare-executions, compare-models, compare-runs and compare-model-metrics.

Terms used on this page

AI runtime: An execution engine such as SAP AI Core that SAP AI Launchpad connects to and manages, but does not itself include in the Launchpad subscription.
Extended service plan: The SAP AI Core production plan that includes Generative AI Hub access, as distinct from the Standard plan, which does not.
Resource group (AI Launchpad view): The same SAP AI Core isolation unit for models, executions and deployments, created/edited/deleted from within Launchpad.
Prompt optimization: A documented AI Launchpad flow for refining a saved prompt inside the Generative AI Hub's prompt registry.
Compare executions/models/runs/metrics: AI Launchpad's monitoring views for evaluating generative and predictive AI work side by side rather than reading separate outputs.

Sources

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