As the VP of SAP Service Delivery at Rimini Street, I’ve seen the chaos that upgrades can bring to an organization. IT leaders understand upgrades are more than just technical exercises – they can introduce potential downtime, compatibility issues, and unexpected disruptions. As a real-life situation, after upgrading SuccessFactors, one of our large utility clients in North America was told by the vendor that they also needed to update their GRC solution for the two systems to be compatible.
After having just finished the SuccessFactors upgrade, they weren’t exactly excited about the idea of yet another upgrade – and all the risk that comes along with it. And The only reason this client was even considering the GRC upgrade was the compatibility issue. The application was running fine, and they didn’t need any of the features in the new release.
Instead, our client skipped the GRC update, and our managed services team and product support team collaborated to provide a custom solution for them so that they wouldn’t have to go through another upgrade project. This is where we get to the beauty of our approach: it’s really being about introducing stability into an otherwise chaotic ecosystem. Watch the video below to see how we did it.
Staying focused on innovation
This client’s situation is the reality for many organizations that embark on mandatory upgrades or migrations to continue vendor support. Instead of focusing on innovation or strategic growth, IT teams have to scramble to fix new problems caused by an upgrade they didn’t even want. As SAP customers ponder the move to S/4HANA, they’ll have to weigh the value of a massive migration to a new platform including the potential risk, cost, and disruption with staying on their existing software that works just fine and investing in innovation.
For this client, the answer was forgoing the pain and potential issues resulting from an unneeded upgrade. For a client like Jae-Hoon Jung, Information Strategy Team Leader for Korean tire manufacturer, Nexen, the solution was alleviating vendor pressure and making business-driven decisions on their own schedule. After evaluating the S/4HANA platform, “…we found no cause to undertake such an excessive, expensive project,” said Jung. “…We want to make smart IT decisions on our own timeline, supported by the right partner. Rimini Support™ for SAP allows us to continue to drive value out of our existing Business Suite/ECC 6.0 system for at least 15 additional years, which includes more responsive service guarantees and service coverage not provided by SAP in its mainstream support – all at a substantial savings compared to SAP Annual Support and Maintenance. Rimini Street is that right partner for us.”
Delivering the power of choice
IT leaders shouldn’t have to choose between stability and modernization. With Rimini Street, you get both. That’s why I’m proud to lead the service delivery team that empowers organizations to maximize the value of their existing SAP systems while gaining the flexibility to modernize on their own terms – without vendor-imposed timelines and unnecessary upgrades.
The expertise and responsiveness of our support and solutions for SAP give you extra time to evaluate upgrades and migrations so that you can build an IT roadmap aligned with business needs. You can come to us, continue using your current version, and continue to function as you do today while getting extraordinary support that includes customizations, tax, legal, and regulatory updates, and access to a portfolio of services to help support, optimize, and transform your ERP environment. See how we’ve helped other SAP clients avoid disruption and innovate at their own pace.
