ERP prototypes

Maintenance and ERP end 2040

If the SAP existing customer listens quite conscientiously to SAP, the impression can quickly arise that the ERP world will come to a standstill from 2040 with S/4 Hana. Many existing SAP customers have not yet switched from ECC 6.0 to S/4, which makes the year figure a long way off, and no other IT manufacturer makes a similarly long maintenance promise. SAP is thus giving its existing customers a measure of security with regard to S/4 and Hana. In view of SAP's successful history and the longevity of R/3 and ECC 6.0 (SAP Business Suite 7), the 17 years until the end of maintenance for S/4 are not an eternity either.

View into the glass ball

Nowhere does a prediction seem to be as difficult as in IT - especially when it concerns the ERP future. The current example of ChatGPT has shown how quickly supposedly safe parameters have to be re-evaluated. Who will program an S/4 successor? The developers at SAP or a start-up using ChatGPT? Neither the community nor SAP possess a crystal ball that can provide well-founded answers here - probably not even ChatGPT. This makes a discourse about the future of ERP all the more important, in order to locate arguments and possibilities.

Prototypes

Apple will probably only sell a few 100,000 units of its new data glasses, but it is obviously the most important IT prototype for another evolutionary step. With the well-known holistic Apple approach, not only a pair of data glasses was created, but also a data glasses universe with a matching operating system. The operating system will grow and the data glasses will change shape and optimize. SAP refuses to think about the future in a similarly bold and innovative way, which poses a major threat to existing customers.

Not answers, but possibilities

No one is asking SAP to deliver an ERP specification for an S/4 successor. But showing possibilities, the basis for innovation, and the will to think beyond Hana and S/4 would be future insurance for SAP's existing customers. Similar to the way Apple has by far not answered all questions with its current data glasses, but has initiated a very important discourse, SAP should also have the courage to enter into an ERP discussion about the future.