Cloud Does Not Equal Simple

During a fantastic keynote at the DSAG Technology Days 2020, DSAG’s Steffen Pietsch proclaimed: Cloud doesn’t equal simple. He had the guts to go on stage and say what so many SAP customers had to learn the hard way.

Cloud computing is one of many successful business models. Contrary to popular belief, cloud isn’t a sure-fire success or a cure-all remedy. It doesn’t completely eliminate cost and it doesn’t make everything simpler. In fact, cloud computing can sometimes complicate things, and migrating SAP systems to the cloud should only be done with the support of a partner.

SuccessFactors shows that SAP itself has not yet mastered the challenge that is cloud computing. For SuccessFactors, SAP promises availability of 99.38 percent, which equals roughly 4:28 hours of unplanned downtime per month. These numbers are not exactly great for cloud deployments – and SAP didn’t even deliver on them! According to Steffen Pietsch, there were even more/longer unplanned downtimes of SuccessFactors in the past.

Cloud doesn’t equal simple. Many SAP customers seem to have come to that conclusion as well. Hybrid models promise relief, but SAP has many construction sites to take care of first. In his keynote during the Technology Days of the German-speaking SAP user group DSAG, Steffen Pietsch criticized the inconsistency of on-prem and cloud APIs.

Technically, S/4 on prem and S/4 in the cloud are two completely different worlds. DSAG’s Steffen Pietsch demanded consistent and sustainable harmonization of SAP. But what’s the rush? Christian Klein still has until 2030 to take care of SAP’s cloud-related problems, right?