Why Security Timing Determines Success in RISE with SAP Transformations

The move to RISE with SAP is often framed as a lift-and-shift, or technical move, from an existing SAP ECC or SAP S/4HANA deployment. That approach can have the impact of bringing significant technical debt or unknown risks into the new environment. This leaves newly completed implementations vulnerable to attack.

Shared responsibility, continuous change, and cloud exposure push risk discovery into active execution, where issues discovered late in the implementation process trigger redesign, retesting, or delay. This pattern explains why security concerns account for a large share of stalled SAP transformations.

Secure-by-design approaches—spanning early risk assessment, in-flight change validation, and continuous monitoring through capabilities such as Onapsis Assess, Control, and Defend—exist to surface risk while decisions remain reversible. In practice, security shapes RISE with SAP outcomes by shaping execution discipline.

How Lift-and-Shift Undermines RISE with SAP—and Creates Late-Stage Risk

RISE with SAP is often executed as an infrastructure move rather than an opportunity to transform and update. Custom code, configuration assumptions, and governance gaps carry forward into the new environment.

These elements were often manageable in traditional SAP landscapes. They can expose critical vulnerabilities under cloud operating models.

For example, new capabilities in SAP S/4HANA such as the Universal Journal and the Business Partner model are best utilized when organizations take the time to transform rather than make the minimum possible changes to utilize this functionality.

While evaluating and remediating existing capabilities takes time, this work often becomes the foundation for far more effective use of the new system.

Some of the most disruptive issues surface only once migration is underway.

Master data inconsistencies appear when records are consolidated and validated at scale. Personally identifiable information embedded in non-production systems creates similar exposure as shared responsibility and regulatory boundaries take effect. These conditions are rarely new. They persist quietly until testing or cutover forces them into view.

At that point, remediation becomes expensive and disruptive. Onapsis Assess is relevant here because it surfaces inherited data and configuration risk while architectural choices remain adjustable, rather than after they have hardened into schedule constraints.

Why Migration Is Where RISE with SAP Execution Often Breaks

The migration phase places the greatest strain on RISE with SAP programs. Change volume accelerates as parallel workstreams span finance, supply chain, and extensions. Custom code, configuration changes, and third-party transports move simultaneously across systems. Traditional SAP governance models were not built for this level of concurrency.

Under these conditions, manual security review becomes a bottleneck. Teams either slow delivery to preserve control or accept risk to maintain momentum.

This is where security must function as execution infrastructure. Capabilities such as Onapsis Control integrate security checks directly into SAP development and transport workflows, allowing issues to be corrected before changes advance. This ensures risks are addressed before they cutover, rather than forcing late rework under delivery pressure.

Why Post–Go-Live Security Determines Long-Term RISE with SAP Value

Once RISE with SAP goes live, change does not slow. It accelerates. Integrations expand. New roles, extensions, and configurations enter production on an ongoing basis. Risk does not stabilize. It compounds.

Traditional SAP security models struggle here. Periodic reviews, manual log analysis, and patch-centric controls assume stable systems and predictable windows for remediation.

Under RISE with SAP, exploit timelines compress faster than patch cycles, and abnormal behavior often appears between scheduled checks.

This is why runtime security must focus on signal, not inspection. Onapsis Defend brings SAP-specific threat activity into existing SOC workflows, allowing teams to detect and respond to misuse, unauthorized change, or exploitation as it occurs.

Meanwhile, as regulatory pressure increases, Onapsis Comply becomes relevant for the same reason: continuous technical validation replaces point-in-time assurance. RISE with SAP delivers durable value only when security operates continuously.

What Secure-by-Design Looks Like in Practice

In practice, secure-by-design RISE with SAP programs look less dramatic than many expect. They are defined by fewer surprises, faster remediation cycles, and steadier delivery under pressure. A Fortune 500 utility provides a useful illustration.

Operating under regulatory scrutiny and modernizing a decades-old SAP landscape, the organization embedded security across planning, migration, and run:

• Inherited risk was assessed early, before architectural decisions were finalized.
• Security validation was embedded into change and transport workflows during migration.
• Post–go-live monitoring shifted security from periodic review to continuous signal.
• Mean time to remediate and investigation cycles fell sharply.
• The program delivered on time and on budget, despite regulatory constraints.

The takeaway is that aligning assessment, execution, and monitoring changes how teams make decisions under delivery pressure. That alignment, not added oversight, is what keeps RISE with SAP programs moving.

What This Means for SAPinsiders

• Security timing determines transformation optionality. When risk insight arrives late in the project, executives lose flexibility to adjust architecture, scope, or sequencing without disruption. Early risk visibility preserves decision flexibility before delivery pressure hardens trade-offs.
• Operational risk compounds faster than technical debt. Custom code, data quality gaps, and access assumptions accumulate silently as change accelerates. Onapsis helps expose this risk before it collides with delivery commitments, preventing design issues from becoming cost and schedule escalations.
• Continuous assurance replaces episodic oversight. Cloud-based SAP operating models outpace periodic reviews and static controls. Onapsis enables continuous visibility into risk and compliance, allowing leadership to assess transformation resilience in real time rather than after formal certification cycles.