Hybrid cost model

What could possibly be a concession for the stress-ridden CIOs and CCC managers, however, in turn presents the CFO with enormous challenges: ERP/ECC 6.0 with AnyDB and S/4 with Hana now have to be financed in parallel over a longer period of time. The database licenses that have to be paid for twice are particularly annoying for many existing SAP customers. AnyDB licenses have to be paid to Microsoft, IBM or Oracle for the old system, while SAP already demands licenses for the Hana system. E-3 Magazine asked SAP CTO Juergen Mueller about this double burden on existing SAP customers: He was understanding in this regard and pointed out existing and planned transitional solutions.

It might be possible to split the licenses between Suite 7 and S/4, so that a continuous transition without escalating additional costs could be imaginable. In detail, this solution would be a "breathing" system: In one system, the air is slowly let out, in the other system, the pressure is slowly increased. Whether such a flexible system will be offered by SAP sales to existing customers in practice, however, has yet to be proven. But the SAP community will need a hybrid cost model if agile conversion is to occur in the coming years.