What is the HANA appliance delivery model or SAP HANA Appliance ?

With SPS 07 you can decide to implement SAP HANA using the appliance delivery model, meaning preconfigured software and hardware bundled by an SAP hardware partner, or you can opt for the SAP HANA tailored data center integration approach, which allows you more flexibility when integrating your SAP HANA system with your existing storage solution.

SAP HANA Appliance 

SAP HANA comes as an appliance combining software components from SAP optimized on proven hardware provided by SAP’s hardware partners. This approach offers you well-defined hardware designed for the performance needs of an in-memory solution out of the box. The appliance delivery is the first choice if you are looking for a preconfigured hardware set-up and a preinstalled software package for a fast implementation done by your chosen hardware partner and fully supported by both, the partner and SAP

Now the question comes about role and responsibility. please refer below table to get more information about the same. 

(*) The customer is generally responsible for the maintenance of the SAP HANA system. If the customer has a special support agreement with the hardware partner, maintenance may be the responsibility of the hardware partner.

(**) SAP is the main point of contact and distributes all issues within the support organization by default, as is the case for other SAP applications. If the customer has defined special support agreements with the hardware partner, the customer should contact the hardware partner directly in the case of obvious hardware or operating system issues. If no agreements have been made neither SAP nor the hardware partners are responsible for the installation, maintenance and possible adjustment of external software installed on the SAP HANA system.