SAP has unveiled its latest initiative, the RISE with SAP Migration and Modernization program, in response to consistent user concerns regarding the complexities associated with cloud migration. Over the past year, SAP users have voiced apprehensions about the ever-necessary transition to the cloud, highlighting the transitional challenges and costs as a main concern.
At last year’s UKISUG event, these concerns took center stage, with Paul Cooper, UKISUG chair, echoing the sentiment of many SAP users. “The bottom line is customers that have moved to on-premise or hosted implementations of S/4HANA feel misled. From a UKISUG perspective, this is a significant percentage of our membership.”
Ryan Poggi, managing director UK and Ireland, promised SAP’s commitment to maximizing value for its customers while encouraging cloud deployments. Poggi stated that SAP’s focus was on: “How do we maximize the value for as many customers as we can?”
With this new program, SAP is putting its money where its mouth is by addressing two primary challenges faced by businesses during cloud migration – scope and cost. By streamlining processes, eliminating custom code and breaking down data silos, SAP aims to build confidence among business leaders to transition even the most intricate ERP systems to the cloud.
One key aspect of the program is the provision of financial incentives and support to offset the costs associated with migration and transformation. To recognize the investment made by SAP customers and to help offset the cost of migration and transformation, SAP announced a limited-time offer that may reduce the cost of migration up to 50 percent and shorten the time to value. Up until the end of 2024, SAP S/4HANA and SAP ECC customers will have access to credits that can be applied to offset maintenance, cloud services or subscriptions, encompassing various SAP solutions and line-of-business offerings.
To drive predictability in project timelines and ensure quality in implementations, SAP has also introduced the RISE with SAP Methodology. This framework offers transparency in project progress, with milestone checks from discovery through go-live. SAP is actively training and validating partners on the methodology to maintain consistency and quality across implementations.
For customers requiring additional time for migration, SAP introduces its SAP S/4HANA Cloud Safekeeper service. This service facilitates system readiness for upgrading to the latest version of S/4HANA, providing upgrade services, infrastructure optimization and business continuity measures for older systems.
UKISUG’s Cooper praised this new program, stating: “We’re pleased to see that SAP has listened to the concerns of our members and has engaged with us over the challenges its new cloud innovation strategy creates for on-premise customers.
“The RISE with SAP Migration and Modernisation Programme is a welcome first step and the financial incentives will help current ECC customers make the business case for moving to the cloud. We will be canvassing the opinion of members who made the move to S/4HANA on-premise, to see if the financial incentives offset the additional costs they will incur from moving to the cloud in order to access the latest innovations.
“We look forward to understanding the details, but this is definitely a move in the right direction.”
