One Click

Moving multiple heterogeneous legacy systems, typically not from one single manufacturer to a new centralized and modern solution inevitably entails data migration projects. The associated workload for large companies very quickly adds up to 5,000 man-days and more. The better the data quality and smaller the volume of migrated information is, the greater the benefits of data migration are. Duplicates, incomplete or erroneous data records, such as those concerning long-sold or closed parts of companies and business units, already cost storage space and maintenance in the legacy systems. A new and central solution’s potential to create value is reduced accordingly if these legacy issues are also transferred to the new environment. SAP has also recognized the challenge of historical data and documents when companies are transforming themselves into an “Intelligent Enterprise”. This is why the Walldorf-based firm – within the framework of its SAP Movement program for faster implementation of SAP S/4HANA or SAP C/4HANA – recommends meeting this challenge. It advises companies to undertake an intelligent –meaning selective – transfer of historical information to the new environment and treat it from the outset as part of the transformation project.

Another obstacle that’s at least as big is insufficient data quality following a migration. After all, digitalization is based on data. If the data is incorrect, highly automated processes between man and machine, as well as between machines, are impaired and error-prone. Analyses of incorrect data will lead to companies drawing wrong conclusions, which may have a fatal effect on the ongoing development of their business model. The transformation of their company to an Intelligent Enterprise would be in danger of failing.

Data harmonization is key to preventing overreliance on the legacy systems and reducing the data volume for the new application environment, while enabling an unrestricted and complete view of the data.

A further point is that continuing to run SAP legacy systems may expose companies to a legal risk if they have not been adapted to meet GDPR deletion requirements. However, this adaptation comes with a heavy technical and financial burden, assuming it is even possible. In addition, many legacy systems are exposed to cyber risks due to the lack or unavailability of the necessary security patches, maintenance and updates.

5.1. Massive data reduction
The JiVS IMP turbo loader enables massive reductions in data volume, reducing SAP relational databases by 85 percent. Companies can also reduce the data stored in ADK archives by at least 80 percent and then transfer it to the platform. In addition, the new systems can be kept permanently lean and can therefore be operated more cost-effectively by continuously moving information generated and processed there to JiVS IMP on a specific date, such as one year after generation. By storing and managing historical data on an in-memory database like SAP HANA or on JiVS IMP, the operating costs are reduced by a factor of 100 to 1,000. This is made possible by our innovative technology for the turbo transfer of ADK data to our platform, which takes anything from a few days to a maximum of several weeks, even for a compressed volume of 100TB – a process that could have taken several months in the past.

Up to 20TB of existing SAP data can also be transferred from legacy systems to JiVS IMP within one hour. 

5.2. Migration into the future
Whether it’s greenfield, brownfield or bluefield, JiVS IMP supports any migration approach that customers choose. For this purpose, JiVS IMP follows the same business object-focused approach as conversion and migration tools from SAP (e.g. Migration Cockpit) or third-party vendors. This support is directly reflected at the JiVS IMP repository level. As a result, JiVS IMP is able to map the business objects of the legacy systems as well as the new software generations and their further developments at database level. Using JiVS IMP, auditors can display customer data and documents as they were created in SAP ECC 6.0. However, a customer adviser working with SAP S/4HANA receives a view of the customer in JiVS IMP, as if the customer had been created in the new software generation. Finally, life cycle management also means the ability to support future changes to business objects and completely new business objects.

5.3 The Intelligent Enterprise: resilient, flexible and individual

Greater resilience essentially means being able to respond better to changes. This requires the loose coupling of all areas of the IT stack, from the infrastructure to the data layer and the applications, and dynamically linking and combining these areas depending on the requirements.

The company’s IT is considered flexible when it is able to support a wide range of scenarios and helps to achieve several goals simultaneously. In other words, all short-term measures leaning towards greater resilience need to fulfill the sense and purpose of greater flexibility.

In the digital economy, companies will become increasingly differentiated through digital services. IT will play a permanent role in value creation. The vast majority of these developments will not be in the form of large application packages but instead will be functions and functionality that cloud native creates and will be provided as containers and microservices. As a result, they can be flexibly reused depending on the context. This is where flexibility moves seamlessly into individuality, which is the most valuable differentiating factor in the digital platform economy.  

Companies can enjoy massive benefits by deploying our platform for information management JiVS IMP for the management of their historical data. The operating costs generally drop by 80 percent compared to the cost of continuing to run the legacy systems which can be completely closed down. At the same time, the transformation workload when migrating to SAP S/4HANA is halved and the overall operating costs are realistically reduced by 25 percent. Companies can also continuously optimize the quality of their data and support agile business scenarios more quickly and with less effort. JiVS IMP allows for greater legal and IT security, while also allowing companies to avoid the dilemma of cost optimization versus innovation.   

5.4 Objective: the Composable Enterprise – loose coupling of data and applications

The Composable Enterprise can continue to re-compose and develop its structures and processes on the basis of coupled application modules, analysis functions and data packages in a way that optimizes both costs and resources, and thus can also respond quickly and resiliently to unexpected changes, including external shocks, without threatening its existence. A Composable Enterprise is resilient, flexible and individual. With our platform, we provide the necessary managed data fabric, thereby contributing towards the industrialization of IT.