SAP S/4HANA Cloud Reviews

We primarily use the solution for data governance. It is a lot of mastering data and depends on the organization and how the organization is structured. There can be more centralized data or data structured for the organization. You can work on the localization where it's an expanded version of oversight for data governance. It varies, however, it's really driven by master data maintenance and product compliance behind that maintenance, managing, and governing of master data.

The flexibility is a very valuable aspect of the solution for us. That said, it depends on the client. Clients who would like quality with that core control over security will like this product. Clients who prefer more process-driven governance rather than more agile setups can also easily work with it. 

The tool selection is really robust and scalable for multiple scenarios.

Technical support is very good.

The initial setup can be complex, depending on the environment. 

I've been dealing with the solution for a long time. It's likely been about 20 years. I started using it when I first started out.

The scalability is great. Companies can use it in various ways and there's a large too selection that makes it very scalable. 

Technical support is quite helpful and responsive. I would rate them at an eight or nine out of ten. We are very satisfied with the level of support we receive.

The complexity or straightforwardness of the setup depends on the implementation scenarios. It's all driven by how complex the current environment is and what they want to do - including which components they want to use. The product offers deluxe flexibility for multiple complicated or simplified scenarios.

How many people a company will need for deployment and maintenance all goes back to the scope of the work and the types of organizations and then what the rollout looks like. From my previous experience, an organization might need anywhere from one to 100  people. It depends on if it's a global company versus a local regional company.

The cost of the solution depends on the licensing agreement between SAP and the company and that changes all the time. It can vary.

We are just a customer and an end-user.

We are likely using the latest solution. The product goes back to an earlier SAP version before they had the data governance. They had this thing called MDM. Now, it's a more recent version. It's called data intelligence, which is an all-data product package. It's the same product, just a different release with a few different options.

I would advise those considering implementing the solution to make sure the solution's setup
is driven from the business approach and is process-driven before looking into the data governance. They need to start from the source profiling data for source mapping.

I'd rate the solution at a nine out of ten.

I like that SAP allows one to put in other APIs to be linked, especially in its function of plant maintenance. There is a module called SAP PM. The advantage of this is its role in plant maintenance. The part which is free and accessible to all employees encompasses the logging in of plant defects and the receipt of work orders. This feature is competitive when compared with other standalone CMMS solutions, such IBM's Maximo. 

The solution links everything and allows us to integrate into our entire supply chain. We can integrate the entire business. Employee leave management resources can be linked and our employees can arrange time for doing work orders for maintenance completion ratios. In the materials section, when someone takes out a spare part or asset, asset life-cycle management can be undertaken within the same system. So, it allows for seamless integration of processes that we have in our process plants.

I feel the solution is expensive when it comes to what can be obtained with open source software. I have not explored all of its components. The price is higher than alternate solutions. There should be greater editing API capabilities, which could help to reduce the overall cost implementation and the OPEX cost for CAD which the end-user would incur in licensing fees.

While I give the solution points for its usage and ability to be interfaced with other third-party sites, the costs and licensing fees bring down its rating. 

Furthermore, when it comes to the SAP PM material's module, it would be nice to see the inclusion of predictive analytics. This would help with the optimization of maintenance processes. Where batch two is involved it should be able to automatically change the frequency of a preventative maintenance schedule. This would save a person from having to invest in a search for predictive maintenance solutions since this feature would already be embedded or there would be machine learning capabilities.

Moreover, in respect of the RPA processes, a close look at the entire S/4HANA and SAP process will demonstrate, by its nature, the involvement of many clerks, meaning those who do clerical work that involves checking input, entering a particular system, verifying and getting reports. For some processes, the inclusion of soft bots would minimize intellectual assistance and allow for things to be automated. This would reduce the head count of the people who are needed as SAP administrators.

There are other applications which exist that, while employed in the organization, I do not interact with directly. They touch on GIS, which is already embedded and allows for remote identification of assets and interfacing with other process documents. I believe the solution offers this feature, but its implementation takes some effort and it is not very user friendly. Its use requires a certain level of skill-set. This means that when rolled out in the context of an organization which is in the process of upgrading it can pose a challenge to do so without having to incur high costs through the inclusion of parties needed to provide assistance without the use of one's internal results. 

It would be preferable to be able to rely on one's own internal resources instead of needing outside assistance. From a business point of view, it is better to have something and to undertake upgrades, add patches and make changes and modifications. 

We have only recently started using SAP S4HANA Cloud, but the previous version, SAP, I've been using for nearly seven years. 

The solution is stable. 

The solution is scalable. 

The complexity of the solution's setup can vary. If an organization has much unstructured data then this can impede the rolling out of the solution. If, on the other hand, the organization equips itself in advance with many spreadsheets of data, this can make the roll out of the solution easy to implement. As such, the pre-implementation preparation is key. 

Take a traditional organization which lacks a system, but uses an Excel spreadsheet for its processes. This equates itself with some structured data. When rolling out SAP S4HANA Cloud it is easy to incorporate this into the existing interfaces. The web base with which one starts means that it would be very difficult to accomplish this without using the solution. 

The price of the solution is a bit higher than the competition's.

The version we use is S/4HANA Cloud. 

I rate SAP S4HANA Cloud as a seven out of ten. 

The business suite that I have got the most experience with is SAP, but they are making that transition into S/4HANA. With S/4HANA, they got both an on-premise and a cloud-based solution, so you can buy it in the cloud on a subscription service or you can have it on-premise. On-premises allows you to manage your own site solution, which a lot of big companies might prefer to do. But then Microsoft Dynamics 365 is also a cloud-based solution that you pay a monthly subscription per person fee — or whatever arrangements you can work out. I think NetSuite is the same way.  

Unfortunately, I have not been directly involved in developing any larger use cases for S/4HANA or 365 or NetSuite. That has been a frustration for me over the last seven or eight years. My move to do an independent consultant was actually to get back into the ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) environment and the opportunities just have not been there to further explore the possibilities. It has been kind of frustrating because I have had to focus mostly on continuous improvement and other areas. But even though I spent 10 years in the SAP space, it seems like now I am too far away from where I should have been in working with the product. When I look at these cloud-based solutions in comparison, I have been following SAP and S/4HANA since it started. At least from my point-of-view, SAP is leaps and bounds ahead of anybody else in that space by far.  

They are not going to be a perfect ERP solution for everyone, but they look like they are going to try to stay as close to that as anyone can. What they are doing as a total ERP package can support the whole enterprise.  

The SAP online help is excellent. Their guidance and what they offer in terms of a roadmap for your implementation is a huge benefit from my perspective. I have gone through the Microsoft side as well on their Dynamics approach trying to work with 365, but what S/4HANA offers is a much more clear pathway towards implementation to me.  

When you start looking at IoT (Internet of Things), these cloud-based environments and analytics that those cloud-based solutions offer are unmatched and on the leading edge. It is going to be transforming for a lot of companies.  

It is my understanding — and not my experience — that they were having problems around the supply chain management. Some of the clients who bought it may have had some problems getting things to work properly, but whether it was the product or the users, I am kind of fuzzy on that. The claim was there was an issue with the supply chain management on the manufacturing side. There were a few hiccups that some customers may have experienced with the newer S/4HANA solution. I think all of that has been resolved over the past year. I have not looked back at that issue much recently, but that is because I have pretty much written off that I am ever going to fall back into that particular space in my business as I go forward.  

I have been working with products like this over the past 10 years. My work with SAP has just been spreading out over the last eight years. I work with it in the training environment and using the training version has different components of the system. I have gone through training courses on the parts that I use. Really, a problem management piece of it has gotten in the way of actually implementing the system in projects.  

From my experience and understanding, it has been pretty reliable for me and I haven't heard much at all about stability problems from people I talked to directly. The only supposed problem I had seen or read for anyone having to do with reliability was the supply chain issue some people claimed to have.  

In all, it seems to be a reliable solution.  

Scalability of SAP and any of the other products competing against them head-on should not really have any scalability issues unless it comes to budget.  

I have had no direct hands-on contact with the technical support other than what they provide online. I find what they provide online for technical support is pretty straightforward, to the point, and it solves any issues I might have. The guidance they built into implementing the systems is pretty clear.  

In the instances that I have dealt with personally, there is never an issue, but I have not been deploying on a larger scale.  

This category of products are all pretty much in the same price range. It would be hard to say that lowering the price would be an improvement for any one of these companies because they are all kind of comfortably competing in that range.  

The price of SAP S/4HANA varies based upon what you are implementing and what you are planning to turn on. I do not know the exact pricing right now as I have been looking at it over the last couple of years, but I have seen some pricing in the $129 to $159 range per user per month with the cloud-based solution.  

I have worked with all three of what I consider the major competitors. With S/4HANA, SAP is playing against Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Oracle's NetSuite.  

The advice that I would give to others looking into implementing the S/4HANA cloud is to prepare your organization on the front-end before you even go down the path of any ERP implementation. Get your organization right-minded in the beginning, then go down the path. You need buy-in and training. Companies talk about doing that, but they do not do that. That lack of follow-through is why they end up failing with their implementation.  

On a scale from one to ten, where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate the S/4HANA Cloud as a good, solid eight or nine. Choosing between the two, I go with eight. That gives them something more to shoot for.  

Our company deploys the solution for our customers as a business ERP for daily operations. We work primarily in the construction, service, and manufacturing industries. 

Our company has 120 users, administrators, and developers who use the solution. 

The solution is versatile with various integrated tools such as connecting with finance modules, controlling parameters, and creating universal journals.

The solution's speed and dashboard could be improved. 

The setup offers many integration options but could be less complex. 

I have been using the solution for one year. 

The solution is stable. 

The solution is scalable. 

Technical support is very helpful and I rate it an eight out of ten. 

Positive

Our company has never used another solution. 

The setup takes a couple of hours and can be complex because the solution offers various integration options. 

One engineer handles maintenance of the solution. 

Our company implements the solution for customers.

I recommend the solution and rate it a nine out of ten. 

It's an information management system and can have all your company's information.

I like that it saves every transaction, so anything is traceable.

It's a huge software, and they need to make it look less complex and more user friendly. They need to work on user stories and user experiences.

Better documentation would be great to have too.

I've been using it for one year.

I would give the stability of the solution a rating of ten out of ten.

I think it is scalable and can manage millions of data.

The initial setup is complex. If I were to rate the initial setup on a scale from one to five with one being the most complex and five being the easiest, I would rate it at one.

The deployment takes about a year. A team of about five to a team of 20 maybe needed to deploy and maintain the solution.

Pricing wise, SAP S4HANA Cloud is very expensive. The licensing cost can be 100,000 euros per year, depending on the number of users in your company.

If possible, use simpler solutions, particularly if your business is not complex.

Overall, I would give SAP S4HANA Cloud a five out of ten.

We use it for our manufacturing and sales.

It is stable and scalable. In the S4HANA plain version, they have new dashboards and things like that.

They can improve the interface. It has a client-server kind of interface, which is kind of old.

I have been using this solution for one year.

Its stability is really good.

It is pretty good. It is scalable in the cloud and on-premise deployments. If I need more resources, I can add to it. We have around 2,000 users.

Their technical support is very good. I would give them an eight out of ten. The response time is long. If I make a request, I have to wait for seven days before they start working on it. They can improve the response time.

It is really hard. You need a team of specialists to implement this solution. I was told that deployment was going to take six months, but it took one year.

Make sure that you realize the impact that it is going to have on the business. It is a really good product. When you have a private deployment and you want to make a change, it will take you one hour. When it is in the cloud and you want to make a change, it will take 15 days. If you are going for cloud deployment, make sure you take into account these timeframes.

I would rate SAP S4HANA Cloud an eight out of ten.

The primary use cases of SAP S/4HANA Cloud include working with a mining company, an automotive company, and a project-based company.

As an implementation partner, we work with customers who are already using SAP and are moving them to Quick Cloud. This makes the system less customized and easier to use.

For supply chain management, we are using WMS. When you go to public cloud, you get a full-fledged EWM. In terms of analytics, the real-time analytics capabilities are also valuable.

Variant configuration is needed. It is currently not available. More continuous updates based on customer feedback are required to make it a full-fledged system.

We have been working with SAP S/4HANA Cloud for almost two years.

The support team is good and offers significant help, but there is room for improvement. There are gaps that require escalation to the next team level, and sometimes R&D is needed from their side.

Neutral

We were previously working with SuccessFactors.

For larger companies, the cost is manageable. However, for smaller companies, the cost is quite high because it is a subscription model. The cost is almost twice to three times higher due to high yearly investments.

For smaller companies, we suggest going for SAP with a lesser license.

Generally, new businesses can move in for one thing. They should consider the costs due to the SaaS model. The cost can be reduced if SAP allows smaller FEU packages, which would also benefit smaller companies.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten.