BENCHMARK REPORT

RISE with SAP

Robert Holland
November 2021

REPORT SPONSORS
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Executive Summary ......................................................................................................... 1

Required Actions......................................................................................................... 5
Chapter One: RISE with SAP and Transformation Overview ...................................... 7
Best Practices Model – DART ..................................................................................... 7
What Drives Transformation and RISE with SAP? ................................................... 9
How Do SAPinsiders Address Their Drivers? ......................................................... 10
Key Takeaways .......................................................................................................... 11
Chapter Two: How Do SAPinsiders Approach Transformation and
RISE with SAP? ................................................................................................................ 13
Top Transformation and RISE with SAP Requirements ....................................... 13
Which Technologies Do Respondents Use For Transformation? ....................... 14
Key Takeaways .......................................................................................................... 16
Chapter Three: Required Actions................................................................................. 17
Steps to Success........................................................................................................ 17
Methodology .................................................................................................................. 19
Appendix A: The DARTTM Methodology ..................................................................... 20
Report Sponsors ............................................................................................................ 21

i | SAPinsider Benchmark Report

Executive Summary

R
ISE with SAP was announced by SAP in January 2021. RISE with SAP is not a product, but an
offering that initially combined SAP’s newly acquired business process intelligence solution
with SAP S/4HANA Cloud, technical services to smooth the transition process, cloud
infrastructure, and consumption credits for the SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP) in a
single contract. SAP describes RISE with SAP as a holistic Business Transformation-as-a-Service
(BTaaS) offering that goes beyond Infrastructure-as-a-Service or Software-as-a-Service to provide all We see the Business

the components needed to implement its intelligent enterprise in one bundle. Transformation-as-a-Service as
part of RISE with SAP as perhaps
Since the initial release, SAP has expanded the offering to include industry and line-of-business- the biggest enabler for
specific extensions and RISE with SAP for Human Experience Management. While the offering has innovation for an enterprise,
generated intense interest from the broader SAP community, much of that interest has been powered by SAP BTP.
focused on trying to understand what RISE with SAP means for their organization. For many, this
has started with how it impacts their existing plans for SAP S/4HANA, but others are looking at RISE ~ SAP Application Manager
with SAP more from the perspective of what it can offer in terms of business transformation. Food Service Company

To learn more about what SAPinsiders are thinking about RISE with SAP, we surveyed 238 members of
our community in October and November 2021. The first question we asked was how much they knew
about the different components of the RISE with SAP offering. As shown in Figure 1, the component
that respondents knew most about was SAP S/4HANA Cloud.

Figure 1: Knowledge of RISE with SAP components

36%

34%

32%
31%
30%

29%
27%
26%
26%
25%
24%

24%
23%

23%
21%
21%
21%

20%
19%
17%
16%
15%

15%
12%

11%

8%

5%
4%

3%

2%

SAP S/4HANA BUSINESS EMBEDDED INDUSTRY SAP BUSINESS SAP BUSINESS

CLOUD PROCESS TOOLS (CODE EXTENSIONS FOR TECHNOLOGY NETWORK
INTELLIGENCE MIGRATION APP, RISE WITH SAP PLATFORM STARTER PACK
SAP READINESS CONSUMPTION
CHECK, DATA CREDITS
MIGRATION,
ETC.)

No knowledge Some knowledge Intermediate knowledge Moderate knowledge Expert knowledge

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

1 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

More than half the survey respondents indicated that they had at least an intermediate level of
knowledge of SAP S/4HANA Cloud (66%), business process intelligence (62%), and the embedded tools
and technology services (54%) that SAP provides with RISE with SAP. However, more than half the
respondents said that they had at most some knowledge about the industry extensions for RISE with
SAP, the SAP BTP consumption credits, and the SAP Business Network starter pack. And at least a
quarter indicated that they had no knowledge of these components. So while SAP has made discussion Moving forward with RISE with
of RISE with SAP a priority since it was released, there is still much that needs to be done to educate SAP would be a cost-based
users about exactly what RISE with SAP is and what it includes. decision for us. We currently
have good relationships with
While a significant proportion of respondents said that they only had limited knowledge about some of vendors so there is no real
the components of RISE with SAP, the features that respondents identified as most interesting were push for single contract. But
cost (46%), SAP S/4HANA Cloud (39%), BTaaS (36%), a single contract (33%), and industry-specific we do plan to redesign
functionality (32%) (Figure 2). process areas where there is
identified value in doing so in
Figure 2: What about RISE with SAP is most interesting to your organization?
our move to SAP S/4HANA,
which interests us in Business
Transformation-as-a-Service.
COST 46%
~ IT Manager
SAP S/4HANA CLOUD 39%
Manufacturing Company

BUSINESS-TRANSFORMATION-AS-A-SERVICE 36%

SINGLE CONTRACT 33%

INDUSTRY SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY 32%

CHOICE OF IMPLEMENTATION PROVIDER 28%

CONVERTING EXISTING LICENSES TO CLOUD
CREDITS 27%

EASIER ACCESS TO DEPLOYMENT PARTNERS 22%

WE ARE NOT INTERESTED IN RISE WITH SAP 10%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% 50%

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

Lowering costs is a primary focus for organizations as they move SAP workloads to the cloud as seen in
SAPinsider’s recent research on Enterprise Cloud Deployment. It is also extremely important to those
deploying SAP S/4HANA, so it makes sense that this is the biggest area of interest to respondents. And
while SAP has positioned RISE with SAP as a BTaaS offering, more respondents see it as being
associated with SAP S/4HANA Cloud.

Examining what role respondents saw RISE with SAP playing in their SAP S/4HANA projects, the biggest
was that of process transformation (49%). This was followed by data transformation (42%) and change
management (37%), while 18% of respondents did not plan on using RISE with SAP, as seen in Figure 3.

2 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Figure 3: Roles RISE with SAP will play in SAP S/4HANA projects

PROCESS TRANSFORMATION 49%

DATA TRANSFORMATION 42% Everything that can improve

CHANGE MANAGEMENT the business is required so
37%
Business Transformation-as-
PROGRAM MANAGEMENT 32% a-Service is very interesting to
us. It would help us to
INFRASTRUCTURE ENVIRONMENT 30%
become more agile as well as
QUALITY ASSURANCE 29% being able to react faster to
changing demands and
TRAINING 27% market conditions.

TESTING 25%
~ Portfolio Manager
WE DO NOT PLAN ON USING RISE 18% IT Services Company

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

SAP should be encouraged because the top three roles that respondents see RISE with SAP playing
within their broader SAP S/4HANA projects are related to transformation. When asked what goals they
perceived RISE with SAP enabling from their strategic initiative portfolio, more than half (54%) said that
business transformation was the initiative most likely to be enabled (Figure 4).

Figure 4: What goals will RISE with SAP enable from your strategic initiative portfolio?

54%
47%
44%
41%

17%

Business Business Infrastructure Financial We are not looking at

transformation responsiveness/ agility RISE to enable
strategic initiatives

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

3 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

However, respondents also identified several concerns about the RISE with SAP offering. The biggest
concern was support for mixed vendor landscapes (38%). With 90% of the respondents to our recent
integration report saying that they were supporting non-SAP-to-SAP integration scenarios, the vast
majority of SAP customers now have these mixed landscapes. Other concerns were project
transparency (30%) and deployment models for SAP S/4HANA (29%), as seen in Figure 5. While some
At the moment we are not
of these concerns may stem from limited knowledge of the solution, SAP will need to educate
interested in RISE with SAP.
customers on these and other topics around RISE with SAP if it is to achieve its goals for the offering.
We need to see more
Figure 5: Concerns in the RISE with SAP offering maturity in what is being
offered. What we are looking
to see from RISE with SAP is
cost reductions, operational
SUPPORT FOR MIXED VENDOR LANDSCAPES 38%
fit, easy access to technical
competencies, standardized
PROJECT TRANSPARENCY 30%
software lifecycle
management, and improved
DEPLOYMENT MODELS FOR SAP S/4HANA 29%
flexibility and performance of
solutions.
IMPLEMENTATION ROLES 26%

~ Architect
BUSINESS PROCESS DESIGN 25%
Financial Services Company

LARGE ENTERPRISE SUPPORT 23%

CONNECTIVITY TO OTHER CLOUD SOLUTIONS 23%

DATA MANAGEMENT 20%

NONE 12%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45%

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

Regardless of the concerns that organizations may have around RISE with SAP, one of the key decisions
that must be made is around partners. Even though RISE with SAP is purchased from SAP via a single
contract, partners play an important role in the offering. From hosting the deployment to
implementation and application management, there are multiple roles that partners will need to play.

One of the first things that must be specified is where the implementation will be hosted. The big three
hyperscalers are likely top of mind in this category, but the choice is up to you. However, even if an
organization already has a relationship with one of the hyperscalers, remember that the RISE with SAP
deployment will be hosted in SAP’s environment with that provider and not your own. This means that
connectivity will need to be configured if you want to use data from your RISE with SAP deployment in
your other cloud-based or on-premise applications and environments.

Even though the hosting provider may seem like the biggest partner role in the offering, a partner
must also be selected in advisory, implementation, and application management roles. Determining
which partner will assist with your deployment can also potentially impact migration costs if the
implementation partner you choose already works closely with your selected hosting company.

4 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Application management is also important since only some Basis functions in RISE with SAP are
included by default by SAP. If you have an experienced Basis team, this may not be an issue; however,
it could be for organizations with limited internal resources. Other RISE with SAP partners may offer
extensions and applications that are built on top of the SAP BTP.

Beyond the more technical aspects of the offering, SAP also identifies partners that can help
organizations with business transformation by redesigning their business processes. There are also
multiple organizations that have already developed applications that help organizations within
different industries or lines of business to build and enhance their intelligent enterprise. Many of the
partners that fit into these categories are SAP’s largest partners that it generally refers to as global
solution service providers (GSSPs), but SAP offers the flexibility for organizations to work with partners
that they are already familiar with as part of the implementation or transformation process.

This year’s survey revealed other trends regarding respondents’ integration plans:

• While transformation was one of the top choices in both questions about the impact RISE with
SAP will have on what it can help organizations achieve, 41% of respondents said that they
don’t know if their organization is interested in BTaaS. An additional 21% said that their
organization was not currently interested in BTaaS.

• Respondents were split on whether RISE with SAP would potentially limit their choices around
other enterprise solutions — a connection to the concern around support for mixed vendor
landscapes. Thirty-seven percent said that they believed it would limit their choices, while 33%
said they didn’t know if their choices would be impacted, and 30% did not believe their choices
would be limited.

Required Actions
Based on the survey responses, organizations should take the following actions regarding RISE with
SAP:

• Educate your teams on the solutions that make up RISE with SAP and how they can be
leveraged within your organization. While nearly half the survey respondents said that they had
moderate or expert knowledge of SAP S/4HANA Cloud, for most other components in RISE with
SAP there is less knowledge. Whether or not you will implement RISE with SAP, set up plans to
educate your teams on technologies such as SAP BTP, business process intelligence, and the SAP
Business Network. These are technologies that you can use without needing to purchase RISE with
SAP, but you will need to have knowledge in place to fully leverage them.

• Bundle your technology and process transformation plans together. Many organizations see
transformation primarily from a technology perspective. While it is important to update technology
platforms to reduce legacy debt and decrease costs, greater operational success can be driven by
doing technology transformation in conjunction with process transformation. Business process
intelligence tools, like those available from SAP, can help with the redesign process, but most
SAPinsiders point to doing a thorough evaluation of their existing systems and processes as the
foundation for making these changes successfully. The move to SAP S/4HANA is the perfect
opportunity to complete this evaluation and drive both technology and process transformation at
the same time.

5 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

• Push SAP and RISE with SAP partners on how they support specific scenarios such as multi-
vendor landscapes. Only slightly more than one in ten (12%) survey respondents said that they
did not see any gaps in the RISE with SAP offering. Whether you are concerned about mixed
vendor landscapes, project transparency, the deployment models that are available for SAP
S/4HANA, or how you will manage data within the solution, push your SAP contacts for the
answers to these questions. This will be crucial to the success of your own initiatives and choices
when it comes to the offering, so make sure that your questions are answered to your satisfaction.

• Gain a clear picture of how RISE with SAP will impact your plans for SAP S/4HANA and your
existing cloud deployments. Nearly nine in ten (88%) of those who responded to SAPinsider’s
recent cloud deployment research said that they were running at least one SAP workload in either
a private, public, or hybrid cloud environment. And most of those were running more than one
workload in the cloud. While SAP’s data states that approximately 11,500 customers are live on
SAP S/4HANA, at least three times that many existing enterprise ERP customers have yet to make
the move. It is critical to understand where you are in your SAP S/4HANA transition, what RISE with
SAP offers from a contract and technology standpoint, whether it makes sense to use the offering,
and what that means from the standpoint of integrating with your existing SAP workloads that
may be running in another cloud environment.

6 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Chapter One: RISE with SAP and Transformation
Overview
SAP describes RISE with SAP as a BTaaS offering, and the roles that respondents see RISE with SAP
The value of data is
playing within their SAP S/4HANA projects involve primarily transformation. But transformation means
huge, and it is imperative to
different things to different organizations. At a macro scale, business transformation means
have processes and technology
fundamental changes to how a business is run. This can include people, processes, and technology.
that create good data. Another
But many organizations refer to transformation as primarily digital- or technology-focused
transformation. Others are also doing business process transformation or organizational necessity is the ability to

transformation. With SAP positioning RISE with SAP as providing the basic components of the conduct business anywhere at

intelligent enterprise in a single contract, evaluating what is driving respondents around any time. Successfully
transformation and SAP S/4HANA is key to a broader understanding of RISE with SAP. combining data and mobility
and using these tools requires a
mindset change from the top
down. Most businesses have
been doing the same thing for
Best Practices Model – DART many years. Effective use of new
technology requires rethinking
SAPinsider grounds all its research insights in our proprietary DART model. This research model all that, which is where business
provides practical insights that connect business Drivers and Actions to supporting Requirements and and process transformation is
Technologies. Drivers represent internal and external pressures that shape organizational direction. important to organizations.
Organizations take Actions to address those Drivers. They need certain people, processes, and
capabilities as Requirements for those Actions to succeed. Finally, they need enabling Technologies to ~ Director
fulfill their Requirements. Professional Services Company

In this report, the top drivers were the need for business transformation requiring technology
capabilities that support process improvement, pressure to transition from existing ERP systems due
to upcoming end of maintenance, and the business demanding updated systems and processes that
better fit current needs and regulatory requirements. To satisfy these drivers, respondents indicated
that they are redesigning their IT platform and architectures to lower costs and increase flexibility,
architecting a unified IT landscape including data movement and integration between systems,
evaluating and adjusting business processes across the organization as part of broader
transformation, and implementing transformed and standardized end-to-end processes for core ERP
users.

To support their integration strategies, survey respondents identified several requirements, including
business process models that meet regulatory requirements for data management, best practice
compliance checks that avoid outages, a partner with experience managing transactional and historical
data, and the ability to use the implementation and service partner of their choice. Respondents also
use or plan to use a wide range of tools and technologies to support these requirements for
integration.

7 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Respondents’ answers to our survey and interview questions revealed clear trends that are
summarized in Table 1 and will be examined throughout this report.

Table 1: DART model framework for business transformation and RISE with SAP

Drivers
Actions Requirements Technologies

• Need for business • Redesigning IT platform • Business process • High availability and
transformation and architectures to models that meet disaster recovery (45%)
requiring technology lower costs and increase regulatory
• Managed infrastructure
capabilities that flexibility (52%) requirements for
on-premise (38%)
support process data
• Architecting a unified IT
improvement (36%) management • Software-as-a-Service
landscape including
(82%) deployments (34%)
• Pressure to data movement and
transition from integration between • Best practice • Virtualization and hyper-
existing ERP system systems (52%) compliance converged infrastructure
due to upcoming end checks that avoid (26%)
• Evaluating and adjusting
of maintenance outages (77%) • Business process
business processes
(30%) transformation tools
across the organization • A partner with
• Business demanding as part of broader experience (25%)
updated systems transformation (48%) migrating • Cloud database and data
and processes that transactional and services (24%)
• Implementing
better fit current historical data
transformed and • Cloud-based ERP (21%)
needs and regulatory (75%)
standardized end-to-
requirements (30%)
end processes for core • Ability to use the • Big data and real-time
ERP users (46%) implementation analytics (21%)
and service • Business process
partner of my redesign tools (14%)
choice (71%)
• Artificial intelligence and
machine learning (12%)

8 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

What Drives Transformation and RISE with SAP?
The need for business transformation requiring technology capabilities that support
process improvement (36%) was the most important driver of transformation and RISE
with SAP for survey respondents. The pressure to transition from an existing ERP system As part of our
due to upcoming end of maintenance (30%) was slightly less important, followed by the transformation process there
business demanding updated systems and processes that better fit current needs and was a realization that there had
regulatory requirements (30%) (Figure 6). to be an investment in
technology equal to the growth
Figure 6: Top drivers for transformation and RISE with SAP
of the business, otherwise we
wouldn’t be competitive.

~ CIO
36%
Business Services Company
30% 30%

Need for business Pressure to transition from Business demands updated

transformation requires existing ERP system due to systems and processes that
technology capabilities upcoming end of maintenance better fit current needs and
supporting process regulatory requirements
improvement

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

Respondents are looking for technology capabilities that will help them support process
improvement within their organizations. An example of a technology that provides these
capabilities is process intelligence. Process intelligence works by automatically collecting
data that can be used to analyze business processes and workflows to improve process
efficiency. The SAP Business Process Intelligence solution is one of the key components of
RISE with SAP and is part of what allows it to define the offering as BTaaS. But with
respondents looking for technologies that will help them perform their business
transformation, RISE with SAP is well positioned to help organizations with
transformation.

Another significant challenge for organizations today is the fact that they face pressure to
transition from their existing ERP systems due to the upcoming end of maintenance. For
most SAP customers, this means the end of mainstream maintenance for older ERP
systems like SAP ECC and SAP Business Suite. As they decide how and when they will
make the move to SAP S/4HANA, this can represent transformation within the enterprise.

Just as important for respondents was the business needing updated systems and
processes that better fit current needs and regulatory requirements. Respondents look

9 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

for these capabilities either with a move to SAP S/4HANA that includes transforming
existing processes or evaluating RISE with SAP as a means of acquiring the updated
systems and process transformation that it offers. Having systems and process that better
fit current needs is a crucial part of moving to SAP S/4HANA for many organizations.
Our aim is to renew
our entire landscape in the next

How Do SAPinsiders Address Their Drivers?

three years. And we are working
against this blueprint because
we have to change our behavior
More than half the respondents (52%) said that their top action is to redesign their IT
from reacting to acting.
platform and architectures to lower costs and increase flexibility, as seen in Figure 7.

Figure 7: Top strategies taken to address the top drivers ~ CIO

Manufacturing Company

52%
51.5%

48%

46%

Redesigning IT platform Architecting a unified IT Evaluating and Implementing

and architectures to landscape including adjusting business transformed and
lower costs and data movement and processes across the standardized end-to-
increase flexibility integration between organization as part of end processes for core
systems broader transformation ERP users

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

Redesigning IT platforms and architectures to lower IT costs and increase flexibility is the
main strategy organizations moving to the cloud are taking and was equally important to
respondents of this research around transformation and SAP S/4HANA. Putting in place
new infrastructure and architecture will help organizations support the driver of having
technology capabilities to support process improvement. It will also support the driver of
providing updated systems and processes that better fit current needs.

Almost as important, 51.5% of respondents said that they were architecting a unified IT
landscape including both data movement and integration between systems. This is
needed to not only have the technology capabilities that organizations need to support
process improvement, but also to implement processes that will help a future ERP
transition as the end of mainstream maintenance approaches.

Nearly half the survey respondents (48%) are evaluating and adjusting business processes
across the organization as part of a broader transformation. This will support business
demands for updated systems and processes that better fit current needs and regulatory

10 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

requirements. It also shows that many organizations are exploring more than just
technological transformation. Adjusting existing business processes will require significant
preparation work to understand and document current functionality and map that into
updated processes.

In addition to evaluating and adjusting business processes across the organization, 46% of
respondents said that they were implementing transformed and standardized end-to-end
processes for core ERP users. This was the top strategy that was being implemented by
respondents whose organizations’ annual revenue exceeded $1 billion, with 54% pursuing
that strategy. This demonstrates that larger organizations are even more interested in
ensuring that their ERP systems have transformed and standardized processes in place.
Interestingly, this was also the top strategy being used by those who currently have no
plans for SAP S/4HANA.

Key Takeaways
Based on our research with respect to integration, the following takeaways are clear:

• Leverage process intelligence technologies to evaluate and support process

improvement. Whether or not you are implementing a process intelligence solution,
you should leverage technologies like process intelligence to help evaluate, update,
and standardize your business processes. This may involve working with a partner
that can help analyze existing processes and capabilities but should involve a
thorough evaluation of existing IT infrastructure to determine whether it is sufficient
to support the most important process improvements.

• Determine your strategy for SAP S/4HANA and how this may intersect with
potential RISE with SAP benefits or challenges. Although almost a third of the
respondents to this research (31%) said that they had already deployed SAP S/4HANA
or SAP S/4HANA Cloud, many existing SAP ERP customers have yet to determine their
final plans for the solution. With 2022 just around the corner, organizations are
reaching a similar place to where they were in early 2020 when SAP initially extended
mainstream maintenance. The effort involved in moving to SAP S/4HANA can be
significant, and it can be a valuable opportunity for organizations to standardize,
update, and transform existing processes. Therefore, you should determine what
your plans are for SAP S/4HANA and what role that move may play in organizational
transformation moving forward.

• Ensure that your updated IT platform and architecture support your future
transformation needs in addition to reducing cost and improving flexibility. The
focus on reduced costs and increased flexibility is important to organizations
transforming their infrastructure and reducing legacy debt. However, care must be
taken to ensure that this updated platform not only provides the connectivity that is
needed to other systems in the enterprise, but also must support the new technology
capabilities that are required as part of process transformation. This should start with
an evaluation of existing systems and needs but must also include how the
implementation of solutions like RISE with SAP will impact your connectivity —
especially since moving data in and out of RISE with SAP can be more complex than
other cloud environments.

11 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

• Put in place the appropriate training and education to make sure that your
teams are ready for process and technology transformation. Whether you are
deploying SAP S/4HANA or undergoing a broader transformation across that
enterprise, make sure that your teams are educated and ready to support those
changes. For some changes, this may only involve a time commitment, but for new
infrastructure platforms training and certification may be needed to fully leverage the
solutions. Although this can pull scarce resources away from existing commitments,
making sure your teams are ready for transformation will help drive long-term
success.

12 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Chapter Two: How Do SAPinsiders Approach
Transformation and RISE with SAP?
Transformation at every level is a part of today’s business environment, although not We have to ramp up
every organization is necessarily undergoing transformation at all levels. For SAP
our team and get the right
customers, much of the focus on transformation today is centered around SAP S/4HANA,
partners, consulting partners,
but moving other SAP workloads to the cloud can also be a major transformation project.
and change management
Taking advantage of these transformation projects to implement process transformation
aspects in place. Change
as well as technological transformation necessitates that organizations understand
management and the adoption
requirements they face as part of the move, as well as the technologies that they will use
of the business processes is
to make the project successful.
really key from a change
perspective.

~ VP IT
Top Transformation and RISE with SAP Agriculture Company

Requirements
Evaluating and adjusting business processes across the organization and implementing
transformed and standardized end-to-end processes for core ERP users were two of the
four strategies that respondents said that they were implementing today in their SAP
S/4HANA and transformation projects. Supporting these actions, more than four in five
respondents (82%) said that they needed business process models that meet regulatory
requirements for data management, as seen in Figure 8.

Figure 8: Top requirements for transformation and RISE with SAP

82%

78% 77%
75%

Business process A proven partner with Best practice A partner with

models that meet experience compliance checks that experience migrating
regulatory implementing SAP avoid outages and managing
requirements for data S/4HANA transactional and
management historical data

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

The next most important requirement identified was a proven partner with experience
implementing SAP S/4HANA (78%). Securing a partner that has the experience not only
implementing SAP S/4HANA but also performing transformation and standardization is

13 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

critical to a successful transformation. However, securing these partners may become
more difficult as 2027 approaches, as more organizations are looking to make progress
on their broader transformation and SAP S/4HANA initiatives.

Best practice compliance checks that avoid outages was identified by more than three-
quarters (77%) of the survey respondents as being important or very important to We started with the
business transformation and SAP S/4HANA. These are necessary as part of a redesigned premise that we needed to get
IT platform and architecture as well as a unified landscape that includes data movement rid of 80% of our custom
and integration between systems. Addressing high availability issues and reducing functionality and see where that
downtime is one of the key reasons organizations are moving SAP workloads to the cloud. goes. We focused on asking
This is very much part of SAP’s goal with RISE with SAP.
teams what they were trying to
do rather than challenging them
Another part of a successful move, whether to the cloud or with new ERP systems, is a
on why they needed specific
partner with experience migrating and managing transactional and historical data (75%).
features. This allowed teams to
Migrating data (50%) and business transformation (43%) are the two biggest ways that
put a lot of thoughtful effort into
respondents plan on leveraging system integrators within their organization, which
the process.
connects directly with this requirement.

~ CIO
Business Services Company

Which Technologies Do Respondents Use For

Transformation?
According to 45% of survey respondents, high availability and disaster recovery is the
most used technology when it comes to supporting digital transformation and SAP
S/4HANA (Figure 9). A further 15% are implementing these technologies now, while 12%
say that they will do so within the next 12-24 months.

Figure 9: Tools and technologies currently used to support transformation and RISE
with SAP

HIGH AVAILABILITY AND DISASTER RECOVERY 45%

MANAGED INFRASTRUCTURE ON-PREMISE 38%

SOFTWARE-AS-A-SERVICE DEPLOYMENTS 34%

VIRTUALIZATION AND HYPER-CONVERGED
26%
INFRASTRUCTURE
BUSINESS PROCESS TRANSFORMATION TOOLS 25%

CLOUD DATABASE AND DATA SERVICES 24%

CLOUD-BASED ERP 21%

BIG DATA AND REAL-TIME ANALYTICS 21%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% 50%

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

14 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Those who had already deployed SAP S/4HANA were far more likely to be running high
availability and disaster recovery technology, with nearly two-thirds (63%) of that
respondent group reporting that was the case. Larger organizations were also more likely
to be using these technologies, with 65% of organizations with annual revenues higher
than $10 billion and 63% of organizations with annual revenues higher than $1 billion
having high availability and disaster recovery solutions in place.

Managed infrastructure on premise is in use by 38% of survey respondents. While this is

the second most used technology today, it is last of those being implemented,
demonstrating that organizations are not looking at this as transformative for their IT
landscapes (see Figure 10).

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is the third most used technology today, though it is one of
the lowest on the list that respondents are implementing. SaaS solutions, such as SAP
S/4HANA Cloud, allow organizations to quickly adopt new solutions with minimal
investment and administration requirements. It is also the core of the RISE with SAP
offering, with the goal being for organizations to adopt SAP S/4HANA Cloud as the core of
the SAP intelligent enterprise.

Figure 10: Tools and technologies being implemented

Currently implementing Planning to implement in 12-24 months

CLOUD DATABASE AND DATA SERVICES 18% 21%

BUSINESS PROCESS TRANSFORMATION
TOOLS 15% 18%
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND MACHINE
LEARNING 14% 18%
VIRTUALIZATION AND HYPER-CONVERGED
INFRASTRUCTURE 13% 19%

BIG DATA AND REAL-TIME ANALYTICS 13% 18%

BUSINESS PROCESS REDESIGN TOOLS 16% 15%

SOFTWARE-AS-A-SERVICE DEPLOYMENTS 16% 14%

CLOUD-BASED ERP 14% 15%

HIGH AVAILABILITY AND DISASTER
RECOVERY 15% 12%

Source: SAPinsider, November 2021

Technologies that respondents are most likely to be implementing to support

transformation are cloud database and data services (37%), business process
transformation tools (33%), artificial intelligence and machine learning (33%), virtualization
and hyper-converged infrastructure (32%), and big data and real-time analytics (32%).

Cloud database and data services play a significant role in supporting moving SAP
workloads to the cloud as was seen in the Enterprise Cloud Deployment report. They
provide an opportunity for organizations to create a centralized data repository that can

15 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

help drive critical decision making. Business process transformation tools, like the
business process intelligence component of RISE with SAP, are a way for organizations to
update not just the infrastructure they are using but also their internal processes.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning are often implemented after cleansing and
harmonizing data as part of a broader transformation process to drive insights into data
and operations. They combine well with big data and real-time analytics, which also
facilitate critical decision making. Many cloud providers offer the ability to store large
volumes of data in the cloud and merge that with data from third-party sources to provide
a data source on which planning and analytics solutions can contribute to key decisions in
real time.

Technologies that are being evaluated by organizations today include business process
redesign tools (37%), big data and real-time analytics (36%), and artificial intelligence and
machine learning (36%).

Key Takeaways
When it comes to equipping organizations with the capabilities and technologies required
to implement an effective transformation, consider the following:

• Lock in your implementation partner or system integrator and ensure they will
be available in the time frame you need. Partners and system integrators are
mostly used for migrating data, according to the respondents of this research. But
whatever role they play, determine whether your transformation projects or move to
SAP S/4HANA needs the support of a system integrator, and what role they will play in
the project. It is also important to plan for their availability since many organizations
are concerned about resource issues over the coming five years as more SAP
S/4HANA projects get underway.

• Explore technologies that will help support your transformation projects such
as business process transformation tools and business process redesign tools.
While only a quarter (25%) of survey respondents are using business process
transformation tools today and only 14% are using business process redesign tools, a
third of respondents are implementing these tools. Putting these technologies in
place will provide the starting point for turning a simple move to a broader
transformation project that can update and improve your processes as well as your
infrastructure.

• Verify whether your overall resilience requirements will be met by your existing
transformation plans. In any transformation plans, organizations are looking to
improve their technology resilience with any new infrastructure that they put in place.
This is reflected by the fact that avoiding outages was the second most important
requirement for respondents, and high availability and disaster recovery was the
most frequently used technology. Many organizations are looking at the cloud to
resolve their high availability needs, but it is crucial that you verify whether your
resilience requirements will be met by your plans for organizational transformation.

16 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Chapter Three: Required Actions
Ten months on from the launch announcement, RISE with SAP remains one of the most
discussed topics in the SAP space. With its combination of SAP S/4HANA Cloud and
business process intelligence, RISE with SAP is the central focus of SAP’s messaging
around the intelligent enterprise. SAP said that it expects more than 1,000 RISE with SAP Regarding RISE with
customers by the end of 2021, ensuring that the solution will remain a key point of SAP, we are interested in
discussion for SAP customers. collecting as much information
as possible to help contribute to
For many this interest remains just that—only interest. While only 10% of respondents our organization’s decisions. We
said that they are not interested in RISE with SAP, SAP needs to do more to help are not currently interested in
organizations understand some of the components of the offering. SAP S/4HANA Cloud, Business Transformation-as-a-
business process intelligence, and some of the supporting technologies that are offered Service, but want to learn as
like the code migration app and SAP readiness check are relatively well known. But much as we can.
components like the industry extensions, SAP BTP consumption credits, and the SAP
Business Network starter pack are less well known in the community.
~ Project Manager

In addition, SAP must address the concerns that organizations have around the offering. Resources Company
Some may simply represent a knowledge gap that, once addressed, will no longer be
concerning. But more details on how RISE with SAP will function in mixed vendor
landscapes, who does what in the RISE with SAP project, and what deployment models are
available for SAP S/4HANA Cloud need to be provided. Organizations also have questions
about how RISE with SAP will work with their existing cloud deployments. With most SAP
customers running at least some SAP workloads in the cloud, connecting these with data
running in RISE with SAP may appear to add significant complexity.

On a more positive note, many members of the SAPinsider community already identify
RISE with SAP with transformation. Process transformation, data transformation, and
change management are the most important roles that respondents see RISE with SAP
playing within their SAP S/4HANA project. More than a third of respondents are also
interested in the BTaaS role that RISE with SAP plays, even more than those who are
interested in the single contract. And while more respondents overall said that they did
not know whether their organization was interested in BTaaS than those who said it was,
the difference was small. SAP can continue to use these points to build knowledge and
momentum in the community.

Steps to Success
Our research reveals that SAP customers should apply the following key steps around
transformation and RISE with SAP:

• Investigate whether it makes sense to change your SAP S/4HANA plans to

include RISE with SAP and whether that includes the intelligent enterprise. One
of the first questions that many customers implementing SAP S/4HANA asked when
RISE with SAP was released was whether it would impact their current plans. While
organizations that have already deployed SAP S/4HANA or are currently in the
process of doing so probably cannot change their plans, for those who are running
proof of concepts or pilot projects or who are building the business case time should

17 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

 be taken to determine whether it makes sense to switch to RISE with SAP. It may not
be the right fit for every project, but even organizations that are leaning towards
running SAP S/4HANA on premise may still find an option that works for them using
SAP S/4HANA Cloud, private edition, customer data center option. Take the time to
see whether what is in RISE with SAP works for your project, especially some of the
options that SAP provides to help enable more than just SAP S/4HANA in your
organization.

• Ensure your teams are educated on what business and process transformation
means and can achieve in your organization. While not every organization is
focused on learning more about RISE with SAP as it may not be part of their SAP
S/4HANA transition picture, everyone should take the time to educate teams about
transformation. This should include what both business and process transformation
mean from an execution standpoint and what impact these transformations can
achieve within the organization. Evaluate and explore technologies supporting
transformation and build a map of your existing processes to see how they can be
adjusted to provide both higher levels of standardization and a better fit for current
needs and regulatory requirements.

• Identify where you have concerns or knowledge gaps about RISE with SAP and
press SAP to answer them. Only a small proportion of respondents to this survey
said that they had no concerns about the RISE with SAP offering. Even if you are only
considering RISE with SAP as part of your move to SAP S/4HANA, determine where
you have concerns and press your SAP team to get the answers to those questions.
Whether that involves integrating data in RISE with SAP with existing workloads
running in other cloud environments, deployment models for SAP S/4HANA, or
understanding who is responsible for which parts of the RISE with SAP project, take
your questions to SAP as they are invested in getting you answers.

• Explore how the goals for your SAP S/4HANA deployment can be expanded to
include process as well as technology transformation. Many customers that
SAPinsider has interviewed have described the benefits of making their move to SAP
S/4HANA part of a broader transformation project. While choosing to perform a
system conversion will allow you to implement SAP S/4HANA without needing to
make significant changes in your existing environment, there are benefits to adjusting
and standardizing processes as part of a broader transformation. While this may
require a greater investment of time from business and IT teams, having a platform in
place that is more compliant, is better suited for automation, and can be more readily
updated has the potential for much greater long-term benefits. Exploring whether
this is an option at the beginning of your process is much easier than doing so in the
middle of your deployment.

18 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Methodology
In October and November 2021, SAPinsider examined the experiences of business and
technology professionals about how they are approaching RISE with SAP. Our survey was
administered to 238 members of the SAPinsider community and generated responses
from across a wide range of geographies, industries, and company sizes. Respondents
completed an online survey and provided feedback in customer interviews that
questioned them on topics such as:
LATAM
• How much do you know about the components of RISE with SAP? 5%

• What about RISE with SAP is most interesting to your organization?

APJ
• What goals do you perceive RISE with SAP enabling from your strategic initiative 20%
portfolio? EMEA
43%
• Where do you see gaps in the RISE with SAP offering?

The demographics of the respondents included the following:

North
• Job function: Functional areas reported by respondents include: Information America
Technology (70%); Finance (9%); Business Development (3%); Customer Experience 32%
and Customer Service (3%); GRC (3%); and Manufacturing (3%).

• Market sector: The survey respondents came from every major economic sector,
including: Industrial (38%); Software and Technology (36%); Retail and Distribution
(12%); Healthcare and Life Sciences (8%); Financial Services and Insurance (7%); Public
Sector (6%); Hospitality, Transportation, and Travel (3%); and Media and
Entertainment (1%)

• Geography: Of our survey respondents, 43% were from Europe, the Middle East, and
Africa (EMEA); 32% were from North America; 20% were from Asia-Pacific, Japan, and
Australia (APJ); and 5% were from Latin America (LATAM).

19 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Appendix A:
The DARTTM Methodology
SAPinsider has rewritten the rules of research to provide actionable deliverables from its fact-based
approach. The DART methodology serves as the very foundation on which SAPinsider educates end
users to act, creates market awareness, drives demand, empowers sales forces, and validates return on
investments. It’s no wonder that organizations worldwide turn to SAPinsider for research with results.

The DART methodology provides practical insights, including:

• Drivers: These are macro-level events that are affecting an organization. They can be both
external and internal and require the implementation of strategic plans, people, processes, and
systems.

• Actions: These are strategies that companies can implement to address the effects of drivers
on the business. These are the integration of people, processes, and technology. These should
be business-based actions first, but they should fully leverage technology-enabled solutions to
be relevant for our focus.

• Requirements: These are business and process-level requirements that support the strategies.
These tend to be end-to-end for a business process.

• Technology: These are technology and systems-related requirements that enable the business
requirements and support the company's overall strategies. The requirements must consider
the current technology architecture and provide for the adoption of new and innovative
technology-enabled capabilities.

20 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

Report Sponsors
cbs Corporate Business Solutions is a global SAP consulting company specialized in complex
transformation projects like Carve-Outs, Post merger integrations, move to SAP S/4HANA,
and global SAP rollouts. A global leader in SAP data migration and founding member of the
Selective Data Transition Engagement group, cbs is the only SAP partner with an end-to-end
portfolio that delivers both technical and functional consulting expertise, combined with
proven transformation software allowing us to deliver such projects out of one hand. Our
consultants across 20 locations worldwide design, optimize and manage digital business
processes for mid-sized industrial corporations, hidden champions, and large enterprises.
For more information, visit https://www.cbs-consulting.com

SNP, the leading software provider for SAP transformation, enables enterprises to respond
quickly to technical and business transformations in their SAP environments to gain
predictive analytics allowing real-time critical business decisions. With its data
transformation platform, CrystalBridge, SAP projects such as transitions to S/4HANA,
mergers and acquisitions, carve-outs, and cloud migrations within the most complex IT
environments are restructured and modernized with automation taking project times from
years to months. For more information, visit https://www.snpgroup.com

As SUSE, we believe in the Power of Many. Our 28 years of open source history tells a rich
story of our customers, partners, communities and teams coming together to transform the
way the world works. It is this culture of collaboration that made us a pioneer of Linux to the
enterprise. This heritage of skills and voices coming together that let us empower those
unafraid to disrupt. As we celebrate how far we have come, we are embracing everything
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door of opportunities. For more information, visit https://www.suse.com

Syniti solves the world's most complex data challenges by uniquely combining intelligent, AI-
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Vertex, Inc. provides tax technology and services to businesses in all industries, of all sizes, in
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21 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP

 SAPinsider comprises the largest and fastest-growing SAP membership group worldwide. It provides SAP professionals with
invaluable information, strategic guidance, and road-tested advice, through events, magazine articles, blogs, podcasts, interactive
Q&As, white papers and webinars. SAPinsider is committed to delivering the latest and most useful content to help SAP users
maximize their investment and leading the global discussion on optimizing technology.

For more information, visit SAPinsiderOnline.com.

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22 | SAPinsider Benchmark Report – RISE with SAP