Why SAP S/4HANA Migrations Fail: Quality Engineering is Key

Summary

More than 60% of SAP S/4HANA migrations report deviations in budget, schedule, and quality, according to a Horváth survey of over 200 executives. The causes are well-documented: fragmented quality processes, late defect detection, and insufficient governance. Structured quality engineering keeps SAP migrations on time, within budget, and free of post-go-live defects.

What happens when digital transformation programmes skip quality assurance

SAP S/4HANA is fast becoming the new standard for enterprise resource planning (ERP). Since its launch, more than 90% of SAP-using organisations have begun their migration to the next-generation cloud-based platform. But according to the Business Transformation Unlocked survey by consultancy firm Horváth, the migration journey is proving more difficult than anticipated for many companies.

Drawing on responses from over 200 executives involved in SAP projects, the survey paints a sobering picture: more than 60% of companies report deviations in budget, schedule and result quality. 90% of completed SAP S/4HANA migrations exceeded the original schedule. In a quarter of transformed organizations, the budget was heavily exceeded. And just as worrying: in 65% of the migrations, major quality defects were detected after go-live.

65% of SAP S/4HANA Migrations Miss Quality Targets, and Consequences Go Beyond Go-Live

One of the most striking findings from Horváth is that 65% of respondents said they missed their initial quality targets. These are not minor deviations. Quality gaps in ERP migrations can lead to serious consequences, including system instability, user frustration, costly rework and delayed realisation of business value. These issues underscore the importance of embedding quality assurance into every SAP S/4HANA migration phase.

Horváth found that, on average, SAP S/4HANA implementations take 30% longer than originally anticipated. This time lag creates a domino effect, increasing the risk of integration failures, driving up costs, and eroding stakeholder trust. More than half of the companies surveyed by Horváth (65%) reported spending more than their planned budget. Meanwhile, 60% admitted to significant planning overruns, citing expanded project scope, evolving blueprints and poorly managed data transitions among the leading causes. These findings highlight why S/4HANA migrations require not only robust project planning but also strong quality engineering practices to mitigate overruns.

These challenges are alarming in any project but are even more disquieting in SAP environments, where large data sets, system dependencies and complex organisational structures converge. ERP migrations are among the most complex transformations of any kind due to their multi-year time span, organisation-wide impact and the titanic impact they have on the entire IT infrastructure as well as data landscape.

Poor Governance Causes as Many SAP S/4HANA Migration Failures as Technical Issues

Beyond the technical and logistical hurdles, Horváth points to a lack of alignment, governance and soft skills as contributing factors to disappointing outcomes. Many companies, especially large enterprises, run multiple transformation initiatives in parallel. This creates interdependencies that can spiral into misaligned targets and conflicting priorities.

Meanwhile, change management and end-user enablement are frequently under-emphasised. The report highlights that while end-users are ultimately the ones expected to work with the new system, efforts to prepare them — through training, communication and leadership alignment — are often insufficient. Without user readiness, even the most technically sound migration will underdeliver.

Quality Engineering Addresses Root Causes of Migration Failure

At TTC Global, we specialise in software testing, quality assurance and quality engineering, with deep experience in SAP environments. Our approach to SAP S/4HANA migrations is grounded in proven quality assurance principles. Over the years, we have been involved in over 250 SAP projects, including S/4 migrations for numerous Fortune 500 companies. Our mission is simple: to help companies migrate to SAP S/4HANA without compromising on quality, speed or control.

We begin every SAP S/4HANA engagement with a Quality Maturity Assessment, a structured evaluation of your organisation’s quality processes, readiness and risk areas. This allows us to identify gaps early, define a clear testing strategy, and tailor our approach to your specific business and technical context. We have performed over 100 of these QMAs and found that helping organisations move from Level 3 to Level 4 can reduce costs by 15%, while also improving the software quality and customer experiences.

Unlike off-the-shelf frameworks, our methodology is bespoke to SAP migrations. These projects pose unique challenges — from migrating historical data to aligning cross-functional business processes — and we’ve built a toolkit designed specifically to address them. This includes robust test planning, scenario-based testing aligned with SAP Activate methodology, enabling structure, repeatability and transparency throughout your SAP implementation. Our expertise in change management in a QA environment allows us to ensure that all stakeholders remain aligned throughout a SAP S/4 migration.

Early Risk Identification and Continuous Testing Prevent Failures That Derail SAP Migrations

Effective quality assurance during S/4HANA migration begins with setting realistic expectations and identifying risks early. One of the major reasons companies fall behind in their migrations is poor planning and shifting requirements. At TTC Global, we place a strong emphasis on upfront alignment. We help our clients define realistic scope, identify dependencies across portfolios and set achievable milestones. This strategic approach is designed to reduce surprises midstream and keep projects on time and within budget.

We also understand the importance of continuous testing throughout the migration lifecycle. By embedding quality checks at every phase — from blueprint to go-live — we help detect and resolve issues before they become costly disruptions.

Tricentis Tosca Increases SAP Test Coverage While Reducing Manual Effort

TTC Global is Tricentis’ preferred strategic partner thanks to our years of consultative experience, collaboration, and award-winning expertise across their portfolio, including their market-leading test automation tool, Tricentis Tosca. Tosca’s model-based testing enables us to automate tests across SAP and non-SAP systems, increasing test coverage while significantly reducing manual effort.

This test automation is about more than speed; it’s also about confidence. By continuously validating critical business processes through automated regression tests, we help ensure that changes don’t break what was working yesterday. This is particularly valuable in SAP projects, where a single process often touches multiple systems and user roles. Impact analysis through the use of Tricentis LiveCompare further reduces risk, while also facilitating more efficient testing.

Clean, Validated Data Is a Prerequisite for SAP S/4HANA Migration Success

Data quality is an essential element of S/4HANA migration success, and poor data quality is one of the main reasons projects go off track. With Tricentis Data Integrity, TTC Global enables comprehensive SAP data migration testing and real-time data validation to ensure accuracy before, during, and after your transformation.

Our data quality engineering expertise ensures that what goes in is what comes out — clean, complete and compliant. We create real-world data environments to align testing and development with data needs, ensuring more reliable software and helping organizations avoid costly data quality issues. Think of it as quality control for your data pipeline: detecting and resolving issues before they impact performance, compliance, or business continuity..

Trusted Partnerships Accelerate Delivery and Reduce Escalation Risk

Our close partnerships with both SAP and Tricentis mean we go beyond following best practices; we help shape them. We stay ahead of roadmap changes, understand the nuances of tool integration and can escalate issues quickly when needed.

These partnerships allow us to deliver a higher level of assurance to our clients, leveraging deep product knowledge and collaborative innovation to drive success. It also means we can align our testing and QA strategies with your broader SAP strategy, creating coherence across your digital transformation initiatives.

The road to SAP S/4HANA is undeniably complex and, as the Horváth report shows, many organisations are struggling to navigate it successfully. Missed quality targets, time overruns and budget inflation are common, but they are not inevitable.

By putting quality assurance and quality engineering at the heart of your SAP S/4 HANA migration strategy, you can avoid the pitfalls that plague so many transformation efforts. TTC Global is here to help you do just that with the right tools, the right methodology and a relentless focus on outcomes.

When you get quality right, everything else follows.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the biggest causes of failed SAP migrations?

Horváth research drawing on responses from over 200 executives found that 90% of SAP S/4HANA migrations exceed their original schedule and 65% miss quality targets. The most consistent causes are inadequate planning, untested integrations, poor data quality and quality engineering introduced too late in the programme lifecycle.

What is risk-based testing for SAP and how does it work?

Risk-based testing directs validation effort according to process criticality and business impact rather than broad coverage targets. In SAP environments, this means identifying the business processes where failure carries the greatest operational or financial consequence and prioritising test design and automation around those processes first.

What does a comprehensive SAP S/4HANA testing strategy look like?

A comprehensive SAP S/4HANA testing strategy covers data integrity validation, end-to-end business process testing, integration testing across connected systems and performance testing under realistic load conditions. It is built around business risk rather than system coverage, introduced at the planning stage rather than late in delivery, and supported by automated regression testing that can sustain quality through every subsequent release cycle.

How can we reduce hypercare after SAP go-live?

Hypercare overruns are a symptom of insufficient pre-go-live testing rather than an inevitable feature of complex migrations. Shifting testing left, replacing implicit business user testing with professionally designed test cases and applying risk-based automation using Tricentis Tosca and Tricentis LiveCompare consistently reduces hypercare from months to days.

How does quality engineering reduce SAP go-live risk?

Quality engineering reduces SAP go-live risk by embedding validation earlier in the delivery lifecycle, directing testing effort toward the highest-risk business processes and ensuring integration testing covers the boundaries between SAP and connected systems. Forrester research found that organisations with a structured SAP quality engineering approach reduce production errors by up to 93% and hypercare costs by up to 90%.