SAP Sales: Big Versus Small

There is a very old statement by former SAP CFO Werner Brandt in which he explains that no two existing SAP customers have the same license agreement. It is a long-standing tradition in SAP sales to define unique terms and conditions for each existing customer. Even as the cloud era has dawned, SAP has failed to harmonize and consolidate its contract structures. My regulars at the pub share all sorts of anecdotes from license negotiations. Only one strategy seems to remain constant: Large, high-profile SAP existing customers get better terms. They even get a million BTP credits that don’t expire at the end of the year!

Behind the glossy brochures and visionary keynote speeches by SAP CEO Christian Klein lies a turning point for existing SAP customers in terms of licensing and business operations—one that, on the one hand, ushers in necessary modernization, but on the other hand tightens the shackles of dependency more than ever before. A quick look at the current SAP portfolio reveals that the supposed shift to the cloud and the age of AI is, in reality, characterized by a rigid policy of isolation and complex licensing and development models. To avoid completely losing their digital sovereignty, existing customers—both small and large—must thoroughly understand the technical and commercial mechanisms behind terms such as Clean Core, API Policy, ABAP Cloud, and Business Data Cloud.

However, as a large corporation, reining in developer freedom is a very different matter for us than it is for many of my colleagues from small and medium-sized businesses: For decades, ABAP was a playground for in-house developers and partners. Z-modifications allowed for deep intervention into the standard code. This era of boundless freedom has finally come to an end with the new ABAP Cloud development model—which also has far-reaching consequences for our personnel policies! SAP has mandated an educational initiative known as “Clean Core.” The primary goal is undoubtedly sound: separating core business logic from custom extensions. That SAP’s enforcement of Clean Core is driven not only by technical elegance but, above all, by strategic market control became clear in late April 2026 with the publication of the new SAP API Policy. Under the pretext of minimizing security risks and ensuring system stability, SAP has drastically restricted direct access to the ERP system—my Head of CCoE was horrified!

From the perspective of my CCoE leaders, this policy constitutes a direct attack on the interoperability and innovative capacity of existing SAP customers. The fine print of the policy prohibits systematic mass data extractions into external data warehouses or data lakes unless this use case has been explicitly documented by SAP. Even more controversial: API usage is drastically restricted when it comes to integration with third-party (semi-)autonomous or generative AI systems.

Our DSAG is strongly opposing this dictate: It warns of massive risks to existing end-to-end processes, the creeping erosion of established partner business models, and incalculable cost risks associated with contract renewals. SAP is attempting to establish a “closed shop” here to prevent the direct outflow of data to powerful AI platforms operated by hyperscalers.

The commercial imperative established by the API Policy seamlessly extends into SAP’s data strategy. The former flagship of data management, the Data Warehouse Cloud, has been replaced by Datasphere, which now functions as a semantic layer within the overarching solution bundle called Business Data Cloud (SAP BDC). Although Datasphere is intended to enable seamless federation and virtualization of SAP and non-SAP data as a Business Data Fabric, and touts partnerships with companies like Databricks and Snowflake, The reality of licensing, however, clouds this picture. BDC is derisively referred to as “Business Data Complexity” within the global SAP community and by our DSAG.

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