If you have been in any enterprise technology conversation in the past two years, you have almost certainly encountered Rise with SAP. SAP’s flagship cloud migration offer has become one of the most prominent and most discussed enterprise software commercial vehicles in the market, and SAP has invested heavily in making it the default answer to the question of how organisations should move their on-premises SAP ERP estates to the cloud.
The partnership between SAP and Microsoft Azure has added a specific dimension to this conversation. Azure has emerged as one of the primary hyperscaler environments for Rise with SAP deployments, and the integration between SAP systems running on Azure and the broader Microsoft ecosystem, including Microsoft 365, Azure Data Services, and Microsoft AI, has become a genuine commercial and architectural consideration for organisations with significant investments in both vendors.
But there is a gap between how Rise with SAP is positioned commercially and what it actually represents as a business decision. That gap is where many organisations are making commitments that they have not fully evaluated, on timelines that are driven more by SAP’s commercial calendar than by organisational readiness, and under cost assumptions that do not reflect the full picture of what a Rise with SAP migration on Azure actually involves.
This blog addresses that gap directly. We will explain what Rise with SAP is, why the Azure dimension matters, where the commercial complexity sits, and what a genuinely informed approach to this migration decision looks like.
What Rise with SAP Actually Is
Rise with SAP is a bundled offer that packages SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition, the cloud infrastructure to run it, SAP Business Technology Platform services, SAP Premium Engagement support, and ongoing access to SAP’s clean core methodology and tools. The packaging is designed to simplify the procurement conversation by presenting a single commercial vehicle that covers the major components of a cloud ERP migration rather than requiring separate agreements for each element.
The key distinction that organisations sometimes miss is that Rise with SAP Private Edition is not a multi-tenant SaaS product. It is a single-tenant deployment of S/4HANA that runs in a managed cloud environment. SAP manages the infrastructure and application layer on behalf of the customer, but the customer has a dedicated instance. This is different from S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, which is a true SaaS product with standardised processes and faster release cycles.
SAP’s official Rise with SAP product pages describe the offer components, the deployment models, and the commercial terms in detail. Organisations evaluating Rise with SAP should review the SAP Rise with SAP offer and product information carefully alongside independent commercial analysis, because understanding what is and is not included in the bundled price is essential before modelling the total cost of a Rise with SAP deployment.
The Rise with SAP pricing model is subscription-based, billed annually, and typically sized based on the organisation’s current ERP licence footprint and user count. The subscription covers the cloud infrastructure and managed service component. It does not necessarily cover all the SAP add-on products the organisation currently uses, custom developments that need to be re-evaluated for cloud compatibility, or the implementation partner fees for the actual migration project, which are separate and often substantial.
Why Azure Matters in the Rise with SAP Conversation
SAP offers Rise with SAP deployments across multiple hyperscaler environments including Azure, AWS, and Google Cloud. Microsoft Azure has become particularly prominent in the Rise with SAP landscape for several reasons that have genuine commercial implications for enterprise technology teams.
The first is the breadth of integration between SAP on Azure and the Microsoft technology stack. Organisations that are already running Microsoft 365, Azure Data Factory, Power BI, and Azure AI Services have a natural architectural advantage when their SAP system is also hosted on Azure. Data integration between SAP and Azure-native analytics services is architecturally cleaner than cross-cloud connectivity, and the operational tools and skills needed to manage Azure infrastructure are often already present in the organisation’s IT function.
The second is the Microsoft Azure credit dimension. For organisations with significant Azure monetary commitments under their Microsoft Enterprise Agreement, there is a potential pathway to applying Azure credits toward the infrastructure component of a Rise with SAP deployment. The mechanics of this require specific commercial structuring and are not automatically available, but for organisations with large Azure footprints, the integration of SAP infrastructure into their existing Azure commercial relationship can create genuine cost efficiency.
SAP News published the original announcement of the SAP and Microsoft partnership and the commercial framework for Rise with SAP deployments on Azure infrastructure. The SAP and Microsoft partnership announcement and Rise with SAP resources provide background context on the commercial relationship between the two vendors and the specific capabilities that the partnership enables for organisations running Rise with SAP on Azure.
The Commercial Complexity Organisations Miss
The Rise with SAP commercial conversation has a tendency to focus on the subscription price and the total cost of ownership comparison with the current on-premises licensing model. That comparison often looks favourable for Rise with SAP because the on-premises model includes infrastructure maintenance, licensing, and support costs that are visible and growing, while the Rise with SAP subscription presents as a single, comprehensive number.
The problem is that the comparison is usually incomplete. The Rise with SAP subscription covers the managed cloud infrastructure and S/4HANA application layer. It does not cover the following costs that most migrations will incur: the implementation partner fees for the actual migration, which for a large complex SAP estate can be substantial and will run for two to four years. The cost of addressing the custom developments and integrations that need to be rebuilt or replaced as part of a clean core migration. The SAP add-on licences for products that are not included in the Rise with SAP bundle, which may include SAP SuccessFactors, SAP Ariba, SAP Analytics Cloud, or SAP Concur depending on the current estate. And the operational changes, retraining, and process redesign that a move to cloud ERP requires.
When these costs are included in the total cost comparison, the financial case for Rise with SAP is often much less clear-cut than the headline subscription price suggests. For some organisations the migration still makes commercial sense over a five to seven year horizon. For others, the business case depends heavily on assumptions about future on-premises cost increases that may not materialise at the rate projected.
CIO Dive covers enterprise ERP cloud migration decisions and the commercial and operational considerations that determine whether Rise with SAP delivers the expected business case. Their CIO Dive enterprise ERP and SAP cloud migration analysis provide independent analysis of how organisations are approaching Rise with SAP adoption, the implementation challenges they encounter, and the commercial outcomes that differ from initial expectations.
The Pressure Tactics Worth Knowing About
SAP has been applying significant commercial pressure to its on-premises ECC and S/4HANA on-premises customer base. Mainstream maintenance for SAP ECC will end in 2027 for most customers, creating genuine urgency for organisations that have not yet migrated. SAP has used this deadline as a lever in commercial conversations, positioning Rise with SAP as the solution and framing the decision timeline around the maintenance end date rather than the organisation’s readiness.
It is worth being clear that the maintenance end date creates real commercial risk that organisations need to address. Running SAP ECC beyond 2027 without a support pathway is a compliance and security risk that cannot be ignored. But the response to that risk does not have to be Rise with SAP on SAP’s preferred timeline. The options include Rise with SAP at a pace the organisation can manage, S/4HANA on-premises with a planned cloud migration later, extended maintenance options, or a broader ERP platform review.
Organisations that allow SAP’s commercial calendar to drive their migration timeline often make architectural and commercial decisions under pressure that they would have made differently with more time. The maintenance deadline is real. It is also not imminent enough that most organisations need to rush into commitments without thorough commercial and technical evaluation.
Getting the Migration Decision Right
The organisations that navigate the Rise with SAP decision most effectively are those that conduct a genuine total cost of ownership analysis that includes all migration costs, not just the subscription price. They engage independent advisory support to challenge the assumptions in SAP’s commercial modelling. They evaluate the Azure dimension specifically in the context of their existing Microsoft commercial relationship. And they negotiate Rise with SAP commercial terms with the same rigour they would apply to any other major enterprise software commitment.
Deloitte’s SAP practice publishes research on Rise with SAP adoption and the commercial and operational preparation that produces the best migration outcomes. Their Deloitte Rise with SAP and cloud ERP migration research provide practical frameworks for evaluating the Rise with SAP commercial case, scoping the implementation investment accurately, and building the business case that justifies the migration timeline and commercial commitment.
Conclusion
Rise with SAP and the Azure expansion dimension represent a genuinely significant commercial decision for most large SAP customers. The right answer is not yes or no to Rise with SAP. It is a carefully modelled, independently verified assessment of whether the migration makes commercial sense at the right pace, on the right terms, with the right partner, in the right Azure commercial context for the specific organisation. The organisations that approach it this way will make better decisions and negotiate better terms than those who allow either SAP’s maintenance deadline urgency or the appeal of a clean cloud narrative to bypass the rigour that a decision of this scale deserves.
