SAP heading for the cloud

Half of SAP enterprise workloads will be migrated to the cloud over the next two years, according to a study of EMEA enterprises commissioned by Lemongrass, a software-enabled services provider synonymous with SAP on cloud that specialises in the migration, operation and automation of enterprise workloads on hyper-scale public cloud.

Better performance, increased stability, and substantial cost reduction are cited as the main benefits for doing so. 

The study, conducted by Norstat polled senior SAP users in EMEA enterprises that are yet to migrate to the cloud, as well as those that have already made the move, to understand whether their dreams of enterprise cloud computing were aligned with reality. 

Security was reported as a key concern among organisations who had yet to migrate to the cloud, along with difficulties in determining the right cloud provider, integration to the broader non-SAP estate and uncertain decision making around SAP S/4 HANA. 

Highlighting a diverse set of opinions, the research also found that more than half of enterprises (55%) plan on migrating their SAP workloads to the cloud in the next 12 months, believing it will help them achieve better agility (80%), security (78%) and a reduction in operating costs (73%). 

Mark Hirst, Managing Director for EMEA and APAC at Lemongrass, commented: “This research shows a clear maturing of the SAP on cloud marketplace. The earliest migrations of SAP workloads to the public cloud were completed less than a decade ago. At that time, it was seen as a novel approach for early adopters and generally regarded as something risky to do with your core SAP applications. It is now clear that SAP on cloud has become the mainstream platform. It’s also great to see that the business case is both readily built and relatively easily delivered.”    

Interestingly, almost half (41%) of respondents at organisations that had already migrated their SAP workload to the cloud did not state cost reduction as a benefit they had seen. Concern over legacy applications, a lack of in-house skills and clarity on the right cloud services provider were listed among their top concerns. 

Hirst added: “While some of the old concerns around SAP on cloud, such as security, still exist, they are now very much seen as one the major benefits as well. It’s also interesting that, although most of those surveyed realised significant cost reduction, a not insignificant proportion of those surveyed had not seen their costs reduced. In our experience, that’s usually down to poor post-migration management and low levels of automation which are key to achieving business outcomes in the cloud.”