Why should I invest in Neptune instead of SAP Fiori
After the announcement that Fiori is now included with the SAP Software at Sapphire 2014 in Orlando, we have had several questions about why customers should invest in the Neptune Application Designer.
First of all, it is very important to understand that Fiori is a set of applications built on top of the SAPUI5 framework and that the Neptune Application Designer is a development tool for ABAP’ers wishing to utilize their existing skills creating HTML5 applications and mobile Hybrid apps with native features.
So this is a bit of an apple and oranges comparison.
Anyhow, if we look at the architecture behind the Fiori applications we can compare the two solutions. Note that you can run Fiori and Neptune applications side by side with the exact same user experience, so the two solutions are not mutually exclusive.
Competence
The major difference is the way you develop or enhance the applications. Neptune is specifically targeting the ABAP developers whereas Fiori/Eclipse based UI5 applications require both Web Developers and ABAP developers. Our implementation partners report a huge reduction in development/enhancement effort using Neptune. Some as high as a 70% reduction in development time.
Architecture
Fiori requires Gateway and the oData protocol which, from our experience (Especially when the services are built on the old Enterprise Service Repository (ESR) solutions), is low performant and make the applications sluggish. Neptune, on the other hand, is using native json and a direct data selection from the ABAP attributes, giving you the most performant SAP web solution on the market. Also, networking optimization is part of the Neptune solution where all communication is compressed. Fiori requires the latest Enhancement packages and in 70% of the applications, HANA is also a requirement (See this blog by John Moy). Neptune has been installed on systems down to 4.7 (Although our SAINT installation package requires NW 7.X). You can of course also utilize HANA using Neptune if you wish.
Offline
Neptune applications have great offline capabilities which you will not find in any existing Fiori application.
Mobile Apps
Fiori is designed as web applications and requires a browser (Yes you do have a Fiori app, but that is more or less a browser with caching capabilities). Neptune has a tight integration with Adobe Phonegap which enables you to build your own Hybrid Apps for different devices and use native capabilities and plugins such as camera, bar-code scanners, geolocation, Push Notifications etc.).