Performing Just the Technical Portion of Upgrade Allows Enterprises to Keep Costs and Resource Utilization Lower Now, Maintain Full-support Level

MILWAUKEE – April 5, 2010 –After a recent announcement from SAP reminding customers of upcoming deadlines for the end of mainstream maintenance, many enterprises are keenly aware that unless they upgrade, they will soon move to the more costly "extended maintenance" mode and have to pay an annual surcharge in order to continue receiving support. Enterprises running the oldest versions are in danger of losing support altogether. Yet given the current economy, performing a full SAP ECC 6.0 upgrade to avoid these issues is beyond the budgets of many organizations.

To answer both concerns, Symmetry Corporation, a leading provider of technical managed services for SAP applications and an SAP^®-certified hosting partner, is advising enterprises of another approach: Perform a technical upgrade to the new platform now, and finish the functional upgrade at a later date.

"Most organizations tend to think moving from one version of SAP to another is an all-or-nothing proposition," said Frank Powell, Chief Operating Office at Symmetry. "Yet the reality is the technical and functional pieces are really separate operations, often performed by different SAP partners. By limiting the upgrade to just the technical side, enterprises can keep their ERP platforms current, which prevents them from falling out of maintenance or paying for extended maintenance. It also reduces their upgrade costs significantly since the bulk of the work comes with upgrading functionality. And, it minimizes the time and involvement required of the internal team, which is important while IT organizations continue to run lean. It's an SAP upgrade strategy that really makes sense right now."

Even with a technical-only upgrade, there will be a need for some functional work, primarily to remediate any issues the move to the new platform may have caused. That is an important step in assuring the success of a technical upgrade, according to Powell.

"Every enterprise does a lot of custom coding when it installs SAP," he said. "When a company upgrades, though, the code reverts to SAP-standard. One way Symmetry accounts for this issue is by running a series of tests as part of its standard operating procedure to be sure enterprises maintain all the capabilities they had via custom code before the upgrade. That is a best practice that should be followed anytime there is a platform change."

Another reason to separate the technical from the functional upgrade is to remove timeline issues. Typically, Symmetry can complete a technical upgrade in three to four months. Functional upgrades, however, have many more variables. When the two are paired, enterprises essentially introduce unknowns into the technical upgrade which can delay completion of that phase while driving costs and the amount of involvement required of internal resources significantly higher. By separating the technical and functional upgrades, the technical timeline can be maintained more reliably, which means a fixed-fee structure can be introduced.

One recommendation for a concurrent project that Powell did make is refreshing hardware at the same time the technical upgrade is being performed.

"When organizations bring in new hardware, they have to test it," he said. "When they perform a technical upgrade, they have to test it as well. Doing both projects together allows all the testing to be done at once, saving time and resources."

Powell did caution enterprises about trying to perform the technical upgrade themselves versus engaging with an outside firm, such as Symmetry. He said the amount of work involved over an extended period of time is likely more than most IT organizations can absorb in the current economic environment, and it could end up delaying other, more mission-critical projects. Bringing in an outside specialist with extensive background and expertise provides the most cost-efficient path to upgrade in the long term.

Whatever they decide, enterprises will be smart to take advantage of the option of performing a technical upgrade soon.

"A lot of companies are thinking they will take the penalty rather than trying to push an upgrade through," Powell said. "There's no reason to do that. By focusing on the technical upgrade now, they can avoid the penalties and set themselves up to finish the functional upgrade at a later date when they have more resources available. That's the 21st century approach to upgrading SAP."

About Symmetry Corporation

Symmetry Corporation, an SAP hosting partner, provides technical managed services, security administration and project consulting for SAP® customers in the U.S. and around the world. Based at Symmetry's Center of Excellence in Milwaukee, Wis., our large staff has extensive experience in Basis, SAP NetWeaver® and SAP security consulting. With a proven methodology for delivering SAP technical managed services, Symmetry delivers flexible, high-quality solutions that help reduce the total cost of ownership and enable high-performing, secure, stable SAP environments. For more information, go to www.sym-corp.com.

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