SAP Landscapes in Transition: a Glimpse of the Status Quo

There is no doubt that the SAP landscape is (once again) in a state of transformation. SAP S/4HANA, Business Transformation Platform, cloud computing, IoT, automation, and digitalization are changes that are having a fundamental impact on SAP installations and business processes.

How are users dealing with these trends? How far have they progressed on their path toward cloud computing, SAP S/4HANA, and digitalization? Do they even want to go down this path?

To find out more, PAC and German E-3 magazine launched a survey. An early review of the preliminary results (about 80 participants at the time of writing) revealed some surprising, but also some predictable findings:

Focus on S/4HANA migration – A small majority of participants in our survey so far have opted for on-prem execution of SAP S/4HANA as their target platform. Fewer than one in eight has opted for SaaS execution. A remarkably high number of participants are not aiming for SAP S/4HANA migration, but will implement an alternative platform instead.

Focus on the cloud – Although public and private cloud use keeps increasing, there are persistent concerns: More than one in three of the IT directors and business managers surveyed cannot see any advantage of SAP in the cloud – which, in turn, means that the vast majority certainly expects and appreciates benefits such as agility, continuous optimization of the software, and cost savings from cloud use. Nevertheless, a look at C-level participants’ responses makes you sit up and take notice: a majority of them said they were unable to estimate the costs and risks of a cloud migration, or that they expected costs and risks to rise – both are toxic for C-level executives.

Focus on data and analytics – The preliminary results of the survey show that there are tools but (often) no strategy. Most participants use the tools offered by SAP. However, there is a significant number of participants who rely on analytics solutions from other vendors when it comes to evaluating business data. Worryingly, between 30+ and 50 percent (depending on the job profile) said they were aware of the importance of data but had not implemented a strategy to date. In view of the growing wealth of data, this is a cause for concern.

However, as mentioned before, these are preliminary results of our current survey. You are welcome to confirm or reject the above findings. Click here to access the survey. The questions can be answered in a few minutes, and your contribution will help provide more market transparency.