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msanjongco
Advisor
Advisor

Aloha!

Have you seen the latest episode of The Data Migration Guys? If yes, then thank you for your continued support. If not, we still thank you and check it out.

In this ninth episode, Frank and I discuss some of the questions that came up from the OpenSAP course “Implementation of SAP S/4HANA” in regards to data migration when transitioning to SAP S/4HANA.

Some of the questions that came up are:

  • What tools do we use to transition to SAP S/4HANA?
  • Can we still use LSMW?
  • What are the license implications needed in order to migrate to a greenfield SAP S/4HANA?

Watch Episode 9 and get the answers to these questions. And if you’re interested in this free OpenSAP course, it is still available in the OpenSAP site:

https://open.sap.com/courses/s4h4

As a veteran SAP customer or a newbie, you are probably curious as to what SAP S/4HANA offers and how to transition your current applications to the next-generation business suite of SAP.

Here’s the course summary if you are interested:

In the first week, you will gain knowledge into the new SAP S/4HANA and its capabilities and learn how to get up and run quickly with SAP Activate, which is a unique framework in the adoption of SAP S/4HANA. Learn from the implementation experience of customers who already went live whether you want to implement, integrate with other applications, extend the business process or hear some configuration examples.

In the following weeks, you will be familiarized with the different adoption scenarios which contain introduction topics and system demonstration that explains key steps in the transition to SAP S/4HANA. For example, we cover System Conversion, showing you how to move a complete SAP ERP application – and the business processes supported by SAP ERP – from SAP Business Suite running on any database to SAP S/4HANA on premise. We will explore two different scenarios for new implementations and you will see a system demo including the migration of relevant legacy data in both cases.

Here's a video description of the course curriculum:

Now if you’re really interested in a green field approach and you need a little push as to why you should transition to SAP S/4HANA, check out Frank Densborn’s blog “How do you Migrate to SAP S/4HANA?where he explains how to migrate to a new SAP S/4HANA system, independent of your source environment. He also shows the comparison between Data Integrator and Data Services capabilities as it relates to the SAP HANA licenses (runtime “REAB” and full license).

If you already have the SAP HANA license, here’s the instructions on how to request the license key code to migrate to SAP S/4HANA:

License key code instructions

Look forward to hearing about your transition journey into the next-generation business suite of SAP!

Mahalo!

P.S. Here's more Q&A information for your consumption:

Q: How does a customer migrate to an SAP S/4HANA New Implementation?

A: For SAP S/4HANA New Implementations, also known as greenfield approach, customers have to do a legacy data migration, independent of their legacy ERP system (SAP or non-SAP). SAP offers tools and Best Practices content for the migration to SAP S/4HANA depending on the deployment option. For SAP S/4HANA Cloud, the built-in S/4HANA Migration Cockpit is used which comes as part of the full cloud version and includes data migration objects to load data from files. For SAP S/4HANA HEC or on-premise deployments, SAP offers a Rapid Data Migration Best Practices package that provides content for the ETL tool SAP Data Services to migrate directly into SAP S/4HANA. The basic features of the tool can be used without any additional license cost as Data Integrator functionality to load into S/4HANA is part of the customer’s HANA license.

Q: Can you still use LSMW to migrate data to SAP S/4HANA?

A: While LSMW is not available in SAP S/4HANA Cloud, the tool is available in SAP S/4HANA in HEC and on-premise deployments. However, there are certain limitations to the tool and it is not recommended to use transaction LSMW to migrate data into SAP S/4HANA. LSMW might propose incorrect migration interfaces that cannot be used in SAP S/4HANA anymore. LSMW uses standard interfaces like BAPIs, IDocs, Direct Input and Batch Input programs and recordings. Due to this nature, the use of LSMW is restricted for migrations to SAP S/4HANA as many of the interfaces have changed. Instead, the use of SAP Data Services with the Rapid Data Migration content is the right approach. The content is free of charge and the basic Data Integrator license included in the customers HANA license for loading into SAP S/4HANA.

Q: Is there a license required to use SAP Data Services for migrating to SAP S/4HANA?

A: No, for a data migration to SAP S/4HANA in HEC or on-premise deployments, there is no separate SAP Data Services license required for basic data migration tasks. While the Rapid Data Migration content for SAP S/4HANA can always be downloaded for free, there is the Data Integrator functionality as a basic feature of the tool that can be used without any additional license cost to load into SAP S/4HANA directly. With this basic data load functionality of SAP Data Services and together with the Rapid Data Migration content, legacy data can be loaded into SAP S/4HANA (HEC or on-premise) including data validation but without further Data Quality (de-duplication, data cleansing) and reporting capabilities. To add the Data Quality features, the full SAP Data Services license is required that might come at an additional cost.

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