The Abap 1 paradigm

Abap Cloud, SAP BTP and Steampunk

The technical vehicle for the S/4 transformation is the Abap Cloud development model, which is closely interlinked with the Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP). In this context, the term „steampunk“ has changed from an unofficial community code name to a strategic cornerstone.

Steampunk, officially the BTP Abap environment, offers developers a platform-as-a-service solution to realize cloud-based side-by-side extensions completely decoupled from the actual ERP core S/4.

However, to enable customers to make system-related adaptations, SAP also established „Embedded Steampunk“ (the S/4 Hana Cloud Abap Environment), which allows on-stack extensions directly in the S/4 system, albeit under the relentless restrictions of Abap Cloud. For developers, this means a painful cut: direct database access, modification of SAP standard code or the use of obsolete commands are strictly prohibited; instead, only APIs and extension points explicitly approved by SAP may be accessed.

Release capability, uncontrolled growth and refactoring process

From a critical perspective, this approach is a double-edged sword: on the one hand, strict regulation guarantees the much-needed release capability and prevents the system from being suffocated by a proliferation of technical debt.

On the other hand, it forces existing customers into a massive and expensive refactoring process of their old code, requires a fundamental retraining of IT staff and ultimately cements a deep vendor lock-in into the SAP BTP ecosystem, which is subject to a fee.

After Clean Core: CAP or RAP

SAP provides two key answers to the burning question of which programming models existing SAP customers will use in a clean-core world: CAP and RAP. The SAP Cloud Application Programming Model (CAP) is aimed at developers who prefer open standards such as Node.js or Java and offers a highly flexible, service-oriented framework for building cloud applications and microservices on the BTP.

For the traditional SAP basis, however, the Abap RESTful Application Programming Model (RAP) is the inevitable standard of the future. RAP is the evolutionary development of Abap programming and is essential for creating transactional, cloud-enabled business objects and SAP Fiori apps.

The model bundles Core Data Services (CDS) for data modeling with behavioral definitions for business logic and automates standard processes such as OData handling. As powerful as RAP is, the steep learning curve and strict architecture pose enormous challenges for many traditional developers, as programming shifts from pure „coding“ to declarative and model-based orchestration.

Joule-for-Developers: SAP-Abap-1 and AI

In order to cushion this enormous pressure to innovate and at the same time monetize the lucrative hype surrounding artificial intelligence, SAP has positioned its own AI foundation model, SAP-Abap-1. In contrast to generic language models, SAP-Abap-1 was trained on the basis of SAP's gigantic Abap code pool to provide developers and systems with immediate, highly specialized access to in-depth Abap knowledge.

The constructive added value for existing SAP customers is immense: using tools such as the digital assistant Joule-for-Developers, this AI can provide massive support in code generation, the creation of boring test cases (boilerplate code) and, above all, in the highly complex migration of old legacy custom code to clean-core-compliant RAP architectures.

Nevertheless, skepticism is warranted: SAP is cleverly using this technical brilliance as leverage. SAP's existing customers are being encouraged to modernize their ERP landscapes with the help of AI, but are becoming increasingly dependent on the SAP AI Foundation and the premium licensing models.

AI worries for the SAP share

Two days ago on Tuesday, Handelsblatt wrote in a stock assessment: „AI concerns are weighing on SAP shares. JP Morgan downgraded the software group and significantly lowered the price target. In its reasoning, the bank referred to a decline in the cloud business. The share price fell by five percent at its peak, dropping to its lowest level for more than two years. Over the course of the day, it recovers slightly to 3.7 percent.“

SAP CEO Christian Klein is caught between a rock and a hard place: Cloud no longer works and AI doesn't yet. Why? SAP has stuck to an unrealistic cloud-only strategy for far too long and still has no stringent and consistent AI strategy. Existing SAP customers will find plenty of good and valuable AI tools in the SAP portfolio (such as SAP Abap-1), but SAP has yet to develop a holistic and coordinated AI roadmap.

Abap is alive!

The future of Abap is therefore by no means a museum of software history, but a highly regulated, AI-supported cloud reality. The language is transforming from an anarchic tool for maximum individualization to a standardized instrument for the BTP platform economy.

For existing SAP customers, this means that sticking to classic Abap dogmas is a strategic dead end. The path to a future-proof composable ERP inevitably leads via steampunk, RAP and the discipline of clean core, flanked by generative AI such as SAP Abap 1. Companies that do not have the courage now to radically restructure their developer expertise and release the investments for this cloud transformation will simply lose their digital competitiveness in the dawning AI age.

Past and future with SAP-Abap-1

For over four decades, the Abap programming language has been the undisputed centerpiece of SAP landscapes and orchestrates billions of business-critical ERP transactions worldwide. Time and again, critics have prematurely declared the proprietary SAP language dead, but the global ERP market leader SAP from Walldorf is currently staging an unprecedented technological renaissance of its language foundation.

However, this rebirth is not a nostalgic return to the golden days of the SAP R/3 era, when developers were allowed to modify the ERP system core deep in the Z namespace at will, but marks a radical and forced paradigm shift for existing SAP customers.

The SAP community can experience this paradigm shift at the Steampunk and BTP Summit 2026 in Heidelberg on April 22 and 23 in an exclusive AI experience workshop. There will also be an „Abap keynote“ by Professor Christian Leubner, who published a highly acclaimed Abap article in the April issue of Heise magazine iX (page 144). Now to the Summit with Professor Christian Leubner and the Snap AI experience workshop register here.