S/4HANA was released four years ago as an ERP for large enterprises. Since then, the SAP software has been receiving global attention with an accelerating number of large enterprises considering its implementation. Now, Europe and the worldwide SAP user community are gathering to talk about cases and the potential migration.
The event held in Barcelona was organised by SAPinsider, an independent media group, and IDG Communications. It received sponsorship from companies such as Basis Technologies, Deloitte, Everis, Fujitsu, OpenText, SAP and Serrala. The theme of the event was titled “Digital Core and Intelligent Platform Built on SAP S/4HANA.”
Channel Asia shared the highlights of the Barcelona event attended to by more than 300 professionals and filled up the seven rooms booked for the conference. The event’s agenda includes keynotes and sessions that are delivered through cases, lessons and recommendations for SAP S/4HANA based on different departments such as administration, BI analytics, compliance, finance, and infrastructure and platform.
While it was primarily an event for interaction and learning, the gathering also happened at a critical moment for every SAP user, and the attendees’ attention was focused on the migration to S/4HANA and the cloud.
Previously, SAP announced that by the year 2025, it would cease support for the legacy versions of the ERP systems. This decision forced an evolution to the latest technology which pressured large-scale SAP customers with complex implementations to consider moving to the newest system.
Rizal Ahmed, the chief research officer of SAPinsider, took over the stage and presented data that showed a preview of the current state of the worldwide SAP community.
He shared that there is a growing interest in S/4HANA, and the adoption rate is increasing as he flashed a data graphic related to his statement. According to Ahmed, the population of companies that have not yet put to action its plans to implement the new technology is decreasing and that an increasing number of companies are considering the migration or are evaluating a potential shift.
Although the arrival of the new technology because of its promising benefits is a reason to celebrate, this also opens the possibility of opening up questions that need precise answers from companies that may have made the decision not to implement it.
Compared to the earlier data store version of the SAP ERP Systems, the HANA database will enable near real-time analytics, run on-premises or via the cloud and operate in-memory.
SAPinsider stated that out of all SAP user companies, more than 60{8bf2b29f36318f0ac46ab1cc03d7035abce669a1cea16c9ed62389a818fa22fd} are looking to upload HANA to the cloud. 40{8bf2b29f36318f0ac46ab1cc03d7035abce669a1cea16c9ed62389a818fa22fd} are opting to do it on-premise, 13{8bf2b29f36318f0ac46ab1cc03d7035abce669a1cea16c9ed62389a818fa22fd} are considering the public cloud, 17{8bf2b29f36318f0ac46ab1cc03d7035abce669a1cea16c9ed62389a818fa22fd} are looking at hybrid, and 30{8bf2b29f36318f0ac46ab1cc03d7035abce669a1cea16c9ed62389a818fa22fd} are thinking about doing private cloud.
Regardless of each company’s chosen implementation method, it is highly recommended to assess based on their business needs to find the best possible strategy.
Ahmed said that the Barcelona event was an excellent opportunity to do the necessary assessments and encouraged attendees to interact with others. He said:
“Sometimes you have to change your perspective, be open to change it, talk to people you haven’t talked to before.”
