Unlike most risks in a transformation program, this one has a fixed date. Mainstream maintenance for SAP Business Suite 7 is running out — and with it goes the comfort of tackling a project "sometime later." Knowing the key dates means planning backward from the deadline, not in a panic.

The facts about the deadline

  • 31 Dec 2025: mainstream maintenance for SAP ERP 6.0 with Enhancement Packages 0–5 — already ended.
  • 31 Dec 2027: mainstream maintenance for SAP ERP 6.0 with Enhancement Packages 6–8.
  • through 31 Dec 2030: extended maintenance at a surcharge — for EHP 6–8 only, with technical prerequisites across the entire landscape.
  • after that: customer-specific maintenance — no regular security updates, no regulatory adjustments, no functional enhancements.
  • S/4HANA: support committed by SAP until at least 2040, across all deployment models.

What the deadline really forces

The obvious reflex is to read the date as a technical problem: switch systems, migrate data, done. But the real bottleneck is rarely the technology. It's that a fixed deadline leaves no buffer for the human side — and that's exactly where it's decided whether the rollout realizes the promised value.

A fixed date forgives no hidden risks. It only brings them to light later — at go-live.

Why time pressure sharpens the risks

The tighter the schedule, the stronger the typical rollout patterns become:

  • Key-user overload: under time pressure, a few key people carry even more load — and become the single point of failure.
  • Adoption under pressure: when training becomes a box-tick before cutover, the gap between "trained" and "used" grows.
  • Data distrust: those who don't trust the migration quietly keep shadow records — and carry the old chaos along.

None of these signals appears in the project plan. They live in the heads of the people who carry the rollout every day.

Planned backward from the date: measuring the human side 6 to 12 months before the planned go-live leaves time to course-correct. Wait, and you learn the truth only when the deadline no longer allows one.

The deadline as an opportunity

A fixed date is uncomfortable — but it's also the best argument to set a project up cleanly instead of postponing it again. The question isn't whether you migrate, but whether you walk into every steering meeting with data or with a gut feeling that 31 Dec 2027 won't forgive.