Kyndryl Moves Alpina to SAP Cloud ERP on AWS, Showcasing a Full-Stack RISE with SAP Model

On June 10, 2026, Kyndryl announced a new agreement to modernize the core IT infrastructure of Alpina Colombia, a flagship dairy company within Grupo Alpina, migrating the organization to SAP Cloud ERP Private running on Amazon Web Services (AWS). The deal extends a decade-long managed services relationship into a full cloud transformation, bundling SAP migration, hybrid infrastructure operations, and a data factory build-out under one engagement. For SAP customers watching the 2027 ECC end-of-mainstream-maintenance deadline close in, the Alpina deal is a working blueprint for what a coordinated, end-to-end RISE with SAP migration looks like in practice.

Kyndryl holds the designation as a RISE with SAP implementation partner. Rather than handing off the SAP workload to a hyperscaler and managing the rest separately, Kyndryl is delivering the SAP migration alongside hybrid infrastructure management, Kyndryl Bridge for observability and automation, and Kyndryl Consult for multi-disciplined program guidance. That integration across layers reflects a broader modernization philosophy that the company has been formalizing since early 2026.

What Kyndryl Is Delivering for Alpina

The Alpina engagement covers three interlocking workstreams. First, the RISE with SAP migration to SAP Cloud ERP Private on AWS, Alpina’s selected hyperscaler, replaces the company’s existing SAP environment and introduces industry-specific capabilities. Second, Kyndryl will operate Alpina’s hybrid infrastructure, managing both SAP and non-SAP on-premises systems alongside the new cloud environment. Third, a data factory will support Alpina’s analytics and AI strategy, with Kyndryl Bridge providing automation and proactive systems management across all technology operations.

Gerardo Osio, Managing Director of Kyndryl Colombia, described the work as leveraging Kyndryl’s “consulting services and deep applications expertise to support the company’s RISE with SAP journey.” Nicolás Forero, Vice President of Transformation and Technology at Alpina Colombia, framed the decision in competitive terms: “We are convinced that the combination of cutting-edge technology, access to global innovation through the cloud, and the expertise of our people will transform the way we operate.”

The Alpina project sits within Kyndryl’s wider SAP practice, which includes an SAP Center of Excellence (CoE) and a Clean Field modernization approach. Clay Caldwell, SVP of SAP Growth at Kyndryl, has described Clean Field as “a ‘Goldilocks’ option between Brownfield and Greenfield SAP transformations,” accelerating migrations by customizing SAP code while maintaining Clean Core compliance. The approach uses Nova Intelligence AI agents to analyze and remediate custom code, reducing manual work and speeding timelines. In one documented engagement, it delivered 100% Clean Core compliance for a European industrial food company migrating from SAP ECC to SAP S/4HANA.

Why This Migration Matters Now

The Alpina announcement lands at an inflection point. According to SAPinsider’s RISE with SAP 2025 benchmark report, 30% of RISE with SAP adopters are fully live, up from 19% the prior year. Generative AI now influences 43% of RISE adoption decisions, compared to just 14% in 2023. Kyndryl is positioning Nova Intelligence agents and Kyndryl Bridge as accelerants within that AI-influenced decision cycle, not as afterthoughts.

The broader migration picture reinforces the stakes. SAPinsider’s ERP Migration and Transformation 2026 report found that 55% of organizations have deployed SAP S/4HANA or an SAP cloud solution, but only 34% have fully transitioned. That 21-point gap is where projects stall, most often because hybrid infrastructure and data readiness were not addressed in the original migration scope. Kyndryl’s bundled approach for Alpina is a direct structural answer to that gap.

What This Means for SAPinsiders

An organization’s cloud and SAP strategies need a single spine. The Alpina model pairs AWS, the hyperscaler, with Kyndryl, the integration layer above it, rather than managing those two relationships separately. With 70% of CEOs in Kyndryl’s own research saying their cloud environments evolved by accident rather than by design, locking in infrastructure architecture and SAP implementation under shared accountability before the first workload moves is the cleaner path.

34% full-transition should be the real benchmark, not deployment. More than half of SAP customers have engaged with SAP S/4HANA or a cloud ERP product, but only a third have completed the transition. The stall happens in the hybrid period. Kyndryl’s explicit inclusion of hybrid infrastructure operations as a contract deliverable for Alpina formalizes accountability for that phase. SAPinsiders should audit whether their current implementation partner owns the hybrid period or treats it as out of scope.

Clean Core compliance is now a prerequisite for AI readiness. Caldwell was explicit that Clean Core principles during migration position customers for continuous innovation after go-live. With an increasing number of RISE with SAP decisions now influenced by generative AI, a heavily customized core will bottleneck AI adoption at the worst possible moment. Require a documented Clean Core strategy from any implementation partner, not just a migration roadmap.