Mastering SAP Transformation: How T-Systems Elevates RISE with SAP with Clean Core and Cloud Flexibility

For enterprises operating complex, highly customized SAP landscapes, operational inefficiencies and rising costs have become significant barriers to innovation. Managing fragmented systems and executing updates is not only resource-intensive but can slow down the ability to adapt to market demands. 

RISE with SAP offers an opportunity to change this trajectory. By providing a comprehensive, cloud-based model, RISE enables organizations to consolidate, modernize, and simplify their SAP environments. Yet while RISE delivers a strong foundation, many companies require additional flexibility and expertise to fully realize its benefits. 

This is where T-Systems, a RISE with SAP premium supplier, plays a critical role—adding customization, hybrid system integration, and transformation services that align SAP modernization with broader business goals. 

Tailoring SAP Transformation to Business Needs 

Although RISE with SAP offers a standardized, all-inclusive package covering infrastructure, SAP software, services, and support, its “one-size-fits-all” approach can leave gaps for organizations with more complex requirements. 

T-Systems enhances the core RISE offering by providing tailored extensions that allow companies to fully integrate SAP and non-SAP systems, manage hybrid cloud environments, and customize applications through the SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP). This ability to adapt and orchestrate hybrid ecosystems—across both RISE and non-RISE landscapes—ensures that transformation strategies are flexible and business-specific, rather than constrained by technical limitations. 

Clean Core: Building a Sustainable, Future-Ready SAP Landscape 

Central to successful SAP modernization is the adoption of a clean core strategy. Rather than customizing the SAP ERP core with bespoke modifications, companies can keep the system standardized while building extensions on SAP BTP. This approach minimizes complexity, reduces technical debt, and allows organizations to innovate rapidly without the burden of maintaining heavily customized systems. 

By embracing clean core principles, businesses benefit from faster and more reliable system maintenance, reduced total cost of ownership, and quicker access to SAP’s latest innovations, including AI-driven capabilities. Clean core also supports the consolidation of redundant SAP systems, creating a more agile and cost-efficient IT landscape capable of responding quickly to evolving business demands. 

T-Systems actively supports this model by helping clients architect clean core environments from the outset, providing guidance to ensure that only essential functions reside within the SAP ERP core, and that additional capabilities are developed through modern, scalable extensions. 

Cloud Flexibility and Data Sovereignty: Strategic Choices for Hosting 

Hosting strategy plays a vital role in the success of any SAP transformation. T-Systems offers enterprises the flexibility to deploy RISE with SAP on leading hyperscaler platforms or on its own secure, Germany-based private cloud. 

The T-Systems private cloud stands out for its adherence to strict data protection regulations, including GDPR and BaFin standards, and provides an ideal environment for organizations requiring high compliance and security assurances. It also offers a unified platform for managing SAP and non-SAP systems alike, promoting operational simplicity and sustainability through energy-efficient data centers. 

This multi-cloud capability allows enterprises to run workloads wherever it makes the most business sense, ensuring the right balance between agility, control, and compliance. 

Looking Ahead: Preparing for SAP’s 2030 Deadline 

With SAP planning to end support for legacy ECC systems by 2030, the urgency for modernization has never been greater. Organizations that act now can turn SAP transformation into a strategic advantage, leveraging the full value of RISE with SAP while positioning themselves for greater agility, innovation, and competitiveness. 

Partnering with an experienced provider like T-Systems—offering end-to-end services, flexible hosting options, clean core expertise, and comprehensive data management solutions—enables companies to navigate complexity with confidence and maximize the long-term return on their SAP investments. 

What This Means for SAPinsiders 

Prioritize a clean core strategy early in your SAP S/4HANA transformation to simplify future upgrades and accelerate access to innovation. Adopting a clean core approach minimizes customizations in the SAP ERP environment, reduces technical debt, and ensures that your organization can seamlessly integrate emerging SAP capabilities—such as AI enhancements—without costly rework or system instability. 

Design a flexible, compliant cloud architecture that supports both SAP and non-SAP systems while meeting data sovereignty requirements. Choosing a multi-cloud strategy, including secure private cloud options like those from T-Systems, allows enterprises to balance agility, regulatory compliance, and operational control, providing a more resilient foundation for digital transformation. 

Implement a data optimization program before migrating to SAP S/4HANA to reduce costs and improve system performance. Services like application retirement and document management are critical to shrinking data volumes ahead of migration, ensuring that modern in-memory databases such as SAP HANA remain cost-effective, efficient, and aligned with business needs.