Is RISEwithSAP the END of SAP BASIS?

What is (was?) SAP Basis?

Having been in the SAP game now for over 12 years, I have seen various name changes applied to the role that I started in, as an SAP Trainee or Junior ‘SAP Basis Analyst’.

For me at least, the “SAP Basis Analyst/Consultant” role has always implied that you handled the installation and maintenance of the technical components of SAP systems, well – with varying degrees of responsibility, depending on the customer or organisation at the time. But in the main, most ‘Basis’ folk would have some interaction with the Operating System (O/S), File System, Database and SAP Application.

Naturally, one becomes more au fait with different SAP systems and leads more complex projects, so progresses towards a senior position, something like “Senior SAP Basis Analyst”.

By that time came around for me, “SAP NetWeaver” consultant roles were popping up, due to the internal components of the SAP application stack evolving from SAP Basis to SAP NetWeaver. (SAP_BASIS components still exist inside SAP NetWeaver, though!) There is a great blog post about this naming phenomenon, if you are interested in the painful experience SAP consultants must grapple with to this day!

Moving towards the main point of this article:

Is RISEwithSAP the end of SAP Basis?

Since the announcement of RISE with SAP, back in 2021 its fair to say that there was initial confusion about what exactly this ‘new’ offering from SAP was. A re-branded HEC, a Business-Transformation-as-a-service (BTASS ??), a new SAP licensing framework, all of the above?

Initially, an all-encompassing service from SAP including the hosting, maintenance, and support of all of your SAP systems sounded like a traditional Basis consultant would be out of a job!...

…and you’d probably be right if those types of transactional services are what your Basis-employee/supplier provides, as SAP provide MOST of this traditional on-premise-Basis activity, such as the installation of the system.

However, there are many exclusions in the contract, depending on the RISE flavour you choose.

Take a look at the following passage from an #S4HANA PCE (S/4HANA Private Cloud Edition) contract (publicly available -> here): The peach-coloured rows are Excluded Tasks….

In my experience, SAP are transparent about the exclusions that must be addressed by customers to ensure the success of the initial project and the long-term supportability of the customers SAP systems. Some of the exclusions are significant, and what you would usually call, “Basis” – Server Management, Disaster Recovery, Storage Management, Certificate Management… there are many more exclusions.

Moving on to the additional or packaged services that are not included as standard; Performance Tuning, Application Upgrade projects, Security Note Patching, User Maintenance….are just a few examples, again, managed and/or executed usually, by your friendly neighbourhood Basis-team.

Maybe the word ‘Basis’ is no longer suitable, and to be honest, maybe it never has been suitable, as we provide a much broader and deeper scope of ‘services’, act as a technical authority and bridge between many other technologies/systems, and usually end up managing technical teams and tasks across all elements of SAP-projects. At least in my experience from the Basis guys and girls I have worked alongside over the years, the word basis rarely does the role justice, or maybe I am biased!

Final thoughts

So, does #RISEwithSAP mean the end of “SAP Basis” – if you use my traditional analogy of “installs and maintains SAP systems”, then yes – your RISE contract will cover this and much more, it has to be said….However, that has been the case for probably 20 years now, with managed service providers and offshore delivery models – RISEwithSAP can bundle the associated TCO into one contract, if that is of value to your organisation.

However, it doesn’t mean that you do not need the technical leadership and ‘Basis’ knowledge/skills on your projects, in your SAP CoE, or from your SAP service providers…

Being deployed on multiple ‘RISE’ projects (as they are fast-becoming known), across multiple streams such as, Technical Architecture, Security & GRC, Release Management etc, enables Aliter Consulting to share our experiences and learnings with customers who are embarking or planning to embark on their RISEwithSAP transformation, whether that is customer-side or SI-side, to ensure you have a solid basis for the future.

Thanks for reading.

P.S – I’d love to know what you think is a better ‘role title’ instead of SAP Basis Consultant, I think we have it about right, with “SAP Technical Consultant or Architect”, of course SAP G.O.A.T is fine too. ??

Andy