Stephen Johannes wrote:
I actually wrote a really good explanation once on this(it might have ended up in a book), but having working with the solution since the "dark ages" here are the reasons why:
SAP CRM was focused first only on Mobile Sales and eCommerce. Yep way back in 1999/2000 SAP was trying to provide mobility solutions. These solutions were focuses on offline laptop solutions. You needed a separate database to handle the management of synchronization of data. Thus "mobile sales" or SAP CRM 1.2(correct on on the version number) was in a separate database. Next came ecommerce. The pricing abap engine that SAP used was believed not able to handle internet workloads. Thus yet another database engine for the IPC and separate product catalog and other tools. The idea was that your website engine would not run on ERP in order to handle demanding loads. Yeah pretty outdated idea given the cloud and modern hardware. Let's face it our modern laptops could run the ERP systems of the early 2000's(with a little more RAM).
From those two products SAP built the rest of the SAP CRM solution on that platform. They even threw in another solution not related to CRM on the same platform, but eventually spun that solution off into another separate product line. Bonus points to anyone who knows the solution, which means you have been working with SAP CRM way too long or read it in a book.
All the other reasons are valid for it being separate, so my viewpoint is just on how the software evolved.
Take care,
Stephen
Solution Manager uses CRM - do I get bonus points? 