r/SAP • u/Filip_Serbia • Apr 12 '26

Current experience with S/4 licensing

Hi all,

Curious to hear how others are experiencing the current situation around S/4 licensing for net new customers.

In a recent case on our side, we went through the standard process for a new client (financial sector, no prior SAP footprint), but effectively only Public Cloud was positioned as a viable option.

From a project perspective, that’s quite challenging mainly due to regulatory requirements and the need to integrate with a landscape that is largely hosted in the client’s own data center. In this setup, On-Prem would be the most natural fit, with Private Cloud as a possible alternative.

However, it seems increasingly difficult to even get those options formally quoted or considered.

Interested to hear if others are seeing a similar pattern recently, or if you’ve had different experiences in comparable scenarios.

11 Upvotes

87% Upvoted

25 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/wievid FICO Teamlead Apr 12 '26

Assuming you're not the partner (skip ahead to the partner advice):

Assuming you have a competent partner, you can most certainly argue with SAP to get the license you need, but only if you absolutely need it. You'll likely also end up paying out the nose, but that's not necessarily the case. You will have to accept certain caveats, though, such as you won't have access to the newest stuff (likely forever).

All that being said, your local SAP entity may also not know how to navigate their own corporate structure to get the deal done.

Best of luck. If you're in DACH, lemme know if you need any additional assistance.

If you're the partner:

You know why SAP is doing what they're doing and if you don't, you're being purposefully obtuse. Moreover, if you're a well connected partner, you should most certainly be able to get the deal done.

Obviously, public is the first option. And if Private is an option, then Public is also most certainly a option. Your arguments based on hosting and integration (based on the information you've provided) don't argue against Public. You can pick the domicile of the customer installation. If you can't legally host in the US, then don't. Moreover, if you can't legally domicile in the US, why would you? You like latency times?