The SAP Business Suite is back!

The fourth generation of SAP ERP was launched on the market in 2015. With SAP S/4 Hana, the market leader from Walldorf wants one thing above all: future-proofing and relevance - for itself and its customers. For customers, this means new functionalities and new possibilities that cannot be implemented with the 20-year-old technology of an ECC. This does not mean that every ECC system is outdated or bad per se, but that the technological foundations of ECC have already peaked. 

Incidentally, the topic of future security and relevance for SAP has a very long-term focus. With Christian Klein as sole CEO, the strategy of how SAP will become a cloud-first (cloud-only?) company with a cloud-first (cloud-only?) offering will also become clearer.

Improved with Grow

In 2021, that was still a bit vague. We remember a coronavirus-related kick-off meeting in which Christian Klein presented Rise with SAP. A novelty in the SAP cosmos, because for the first time, various solutions, services and credits were to be offered to customers as a pre-packaged offering.

The goal? To get as many customers as possible onto SAP S/4 Hana in the SAP Cloud as quickly as possible - whether private or public didn't matter at first. But that was precisely the crux of the matter, because SAP generally caused confusion with this very broad offering with many (sometimes unsuitable) parts. 

It was not the topic that was missed, but the communication of such a complex topic that was awkward. Two years later, improvements were made and Grow with SAP was announced. It was now clear: Rise with SAP is aimed at existing customers who cannot introduce a public cloud (for regulatory or individual reasons) and has S/4 Hana in the private cloud (hosted by Hyperscaler) as its core. Grow with SAP, on the other hand, is aimed at new customers or existing customers with a public cloud fit or their subsidiaries and contains SAP S/4 Public Cloud at its core, hosted by SAP itself as Software as a Service (SaaS). 

But what does this have to do with the Business Suite? Both Rise and Grow with SAP are now the established paths to the promising Business Suite, which is characterized by integration, extensibility, real-time and end-to-end processes - the classic cornerstones at SAP. 

Some of you may be familiar with it: the illustration of the SAP portfolio using the affectionately named "burger" as an example. Until now, the ERP was always in the cucumber of the burger - at the center of the portfolio. Recently, it has been replaced by the Business Data Cloud. And that also makes sense, because with the platform concept and the opportunities that SAP and customers can leverage through AI, it is precisely this that needs to be at the center and the ERP around it. In other words, you need a uniform basis on which data and systems can talk to each other.

Basis for end-to-end

SAP Business Suite tends to be the exception in this context because the term has special nuances in the SAP ecosystem. With the revival of the Business Suite, however, it is all the more important that we take a closer look under the hood.

I think what SAP is doing is right and important - SAP is breaking with some paradigms by opening up systems, platforms and processes, thus creating a foundation for customers to integrate their software even better. Ideally, it doesn't matter to the user which system they are using - the main thing is that the process runs and the results are right. The basis for this is "Intelligent Enterprise" - a concept that, in simple terms, ensures genuine end-to-end processes based on a smart data strategy, low-touch and automation. Systems in areas such as procurement, HR, ERP, sales and analysis are connected in such a way that processes are run through in order to make intelligent, data-driven decisions. Ideally with the help of artificial intelligence.

End-to-end future music

What needs to happen for this to happen? Systems must be able to communicate with each other - speak one language. If they don't, end-to-end is just a vision. In technical terms, however, this is still partly a dream of the future. Not necessarily in the distant future, but before tackling such scenarios, many companies first need to tidy up: current releases, clean up data, (re)evaluate relevant processes and bring them up to standard. This is all homework that will not be completed overnight, but which is essential in order to realize "real" end-to-end. This is exactly what the Business Suite describes. 

A few important questions remain: Is the Business Suite the new Intelligent Enterprise? Certainly in parts. Does the Business Suite (new) refer to the Business Suite 7.0? No. That is a coincidence. We can argue about the naming: Does the Business Suite describe the vision? Yes. 

Could you still have chosen a different name to avoid confusion? Yes. Because the fact remains: ECC and the Business Suite 7.0 are a discontinued model. Is the Business Suite a technical or a commercial model? So far, the Business Suite is primarily a go-to-market. We may know what commercial tricks are coming in May, when SAP will certainly reveal more about this at the Sapphires. 

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