Everyone is trying to create their digital footprint. Don’t get left behind; migrate to a better future!
With SAP announcing its 2025 deadline for users, businesses worldwide focus on their migration before the deadline. On the other hand, organizations that were too comfortable working with their traditional platforms are finding it hard to migrate to the latest SAP platform.
With enterprises trying to move to a more upgrade of the SAP platform, they’re surrounded with questions around migration to a greater extent. Further, with very few organizations experiencing the latest SAP HANA migration, most users are considering it to be a risky trade.
If you’re one of those business owners that have similar concerns, it’s time you had a clear overview of the entire migration process. This piece guides you through the best ways that ensure a seamless migration process; let’s get started!
SAP HANA is one of the most innovative business management solutions from SAP; when appropriately implemented, it is one of the most convenient tools to scale operations. The steps to migration are a bit critical, and there are a few steps that need to be followed before the migration to ensure that it is done in the proper intended way.
The following steps will help you in guiding your enterprise to a smooth migration process:
1. Properly Size your HANA Landscape - Sizing the HANA landscape is very beneficial as it will allow you to understand how beneficial the migration will be for your company. This will also let you understand the long-term costs that this migration might require and help you come up with ideas to overcome those costs.
Sizing your HANA landscape depends on three main steps: the system sizing for dynamic and static memory, sizing of the disk for reliable storage, and sizing of the CPU for queries and calculations.
The sizing has to be as close to the actual value as possible, so if the estimated landscape is much larger than the actual one, then very bloated hardware will be created. If the estimation is very low, then it will be a slow and weak system.
2. Choose the Right Platform - Post sizing the landscape, the next task is to choose the kind of migration you are willing to undergo
Remember, this choice should be made in such a way that it fits your business model, financial condition, and the results that you are aiming to get after migration. The migration platform can be either an on-premise infrastructure that is costlier but easy to acquire or a cloud infrastructure that is more flexible and powerful.
Using on-premise deployment, you will be able to use the SAP HANA in-memory database’s real-time power and use a pre-configured package to help you deliver a validated solution. Existing hardware can be improved to meet the current SAP HANA requirements, which will make the process even more affordable.
Among the different cloud deployment scenarios, SAP has its cloud by the name SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud, including the software license and the framework as a collection. Other than this, you also can choose a third-party cloud service like AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, etc.
3. Choose the Right Migration Strategy - Choosing the migration strategy is the next step. Since there are many different migration methods, you have to choose the one that best suits your enterprise to reduce the amount of time required during the technical migration process.
Classical migration is the most favorable one as it uses classical tools like R3load, SWPM, and Migration Monitor. If your SAP HANA requires no version update, it will perform the actual migration process without the requirement of any other additional component.
And if there are a lot of technical issues with the existing system, we advise you to go for the Greenfield approach. It allows users to export selective data to the SAP HANA platform. However, Greenfield migration is an approach for organizations with a relatively more minor presence and are planning to move to a more robust platform.
4. Cleanse your Data - Cleansing your data is one of the easily overlooked steps during major migration processes. Cleansing your data helps in reducing the data footprint by getting rid of unnecessary data and indirectly reduces the infrastructure and licensing cost.
Further, having reduced data size helps in decreasing the migration time to a great extent. The system efficiency also increases as all the data that is being migrated are all essential data, and there is no buffer data present.
5. High Implementation Standards - The migration process is a sensitive topic, and no shortcuts should be taken during this process. The entire IT and technical team should set high standards during the migration process to ensure that everything is done perfectly so that the result is also perfect.
The team should be adequately trained before the migration process to ensure that even if something goes wrong during the technical migration process, they will take the necessary steps to undo the mistakes.
6. Create a Proof of Concept - This is the last step before your technical migration step; here, a proof of concept is required to validate all the previous steps and provide enough confidence to the enterprise that this migration process will benefit the entire company.
The other importance of developing a proof of concept is that it gives an idea of the amount of time required for the migration process and helps make last-minute changes to the plan to improve its productivity.
Once you’ve successfully followed all these steps, you are now ready to begin the technical migration to the HANA platform.
The SAP S/4 HANA migration is a complicated process, but if done correctly by following the above guidelines, it can be a compelling addition for the company. Before deciding to migrate, the company should be well aware of its goals and its financial and infrastructural condition.
Remember, many SAP Consulting Companies out there only rely on the best to get the most desirable results. All the best!
