SAP's ECC to S/4HANA migration narrative is built on a powerful premise: modernise your ERP, gain real-time analytics, simplify your data model, and set yourself up for the cloud era. What SAP does not emphasise in its RISE with SAP and Clean Core messaging is that SAP S/4HANA on-premise — the version thousands of enterprises chose to control their own destiny — carries the same 22% annual support fee structure as every other SAP product. Your £5M–£30M+ migration investment does not buy you a discount on ongoing support. It buys you a different product on which SAP continues to charge 22% of net licence value every year until you capitulate to SAP Business Suite 4 SAP HANA Cloud.
Third-party support for SAP S/4HANA — covering S/4HANA 1709 through S/4HANA 2023 — cuts that ongoing support cost by 50–65% per year. It covers your current S/4HANA version without forcing you onto SAP's Cloud upgrade cycle, and without SAP's RISE with SAP bundling model that embeds subscription cost into every line item. Organisations on S/4HANA that have stabilised their core ERP landscape are the natural TPS cohort — and there are now tens of thousands of them.
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SAP S/4HANA 1709 and 1809 reached end of mainstream maintenance in December 2020 and 2021 respectively. SAP S/4HANA 1909 mainstream maintenance ends December 2024. S/4HANA 2020 and 2021 are in mainstream maintenance until 2025/2026. S/4HANA 2022 and 2023 extend to 2027/2028 under SAP's current published schedule — though SAP has a documented history of compressing maintenance windows to accelerate cloud migration. For any S/4HANA release in extended maintenance, the case for TPS is immediate. See our SAP TPS complete guide for the full maintenance lifecycle analysis.
SAP RISE with SAP — The Cloud Migration Pressure Tactic
RISE with SAP is SAP's attempt to bundle every component of your ERP landscape — the application, HANA Cloud database, BTP middleware, upgrade services, and cloud infrastructure — into a single subscription. It is a compelling pitch for a greenfield implementation or a business without a functioning ERP landscape. For organisations with a working SAP S/4HANA on-premise environment that serves their business adequately, RISE with SAP is a £2M–£12M+ annual commitment that replaces an existing asset with a subscription and hands SAP control of every future cost vector.
SAP account teams use RISE with SAP as leverage at S/4HANA support renewal time. The typical tactic: present RISE with SAP as the "strategic" path, position S/4HANA on-premise as the "transitional" platform, and allow the customer to feel that continuing on-premise is somehow off-strategy. This is a sales motion, not a technical reality. Your SAP S/4HANA on-premise licence is a perpetual asset. SAP's support fees are a commercial choice. Third-party support is the mechanism that lets you exercise that choice without paying SAP's 22% annual maintenance tax on an asset you already own.
SAP S/4HANA On-Premise Version Matrix — TPS Eligibility
| S/4HANA Version | SAP Mainstream Maintenance | SAP Extended Maintenance | TPS Available |
|---|---|---|---|
| S/4HANA 1709 (FPS00–FPS03) | Ended Dec 2020 | Ended Dec 2022 | ✓ Yes — ideal TPS candidate |
| S/4HANA 1809 (FPS00–FPS03) | Ended Dec 2021 | Extended to Dec 2023 | ✓ Yes |
| S/4HANA 1909 (FPS00–FPS03) | Ended Dec 2024 | Extended to Dec 2026 | ✓ Yes — largest on-premise TPS cohort |
| S/4HANA 2020 (FPS00–FPS02) | Mainstream to Dec 2025 | Extended to Dec 2027 | ✓ Yes |
| S/4HANA 2021 (FPS00–FPS02) | Mainstream to Dec 2026 | Extended to Dec 2028 | ✓ Yes |
| S/4HANA 2022 (FPS00–FPS01) | Mainstream to Dec 2027 | Extended to Dec 2029 | ✓ Yes |
| S/4HANA 2023 (FPS00–FPS01) | Mainstream to Dec 2028 | Extended to Dec 2030 | ✓ Yes |
| SAP S/4HANA Cloud (RISE) | Subscription — always current | N/A | N/A — subscription product |
What GoVendorFree TPS Covers for SAP S/4HANA
GoVendorFree's SAP TPS covers the full SAP S/4HANA application stack — the core ERP application modules, the HANA database tier, Fiori UX, and integration components. Coverage includes:
- S/4HANA Core ERP Modules: Financial Accounting (FI/GL/AP/AR), Controlling (CO), Materials Management (MM), Sales & Distribution (SD), Production Planning (PP), Plant Maintenance (PM), and Human Capital Management (HCM/SuccessFactors integration points)
- SAP HANA Database: HANA 2.0 SPS 04 through SPS 07 database support — separate from S/4HANA application support and covered under a unified TPS contract (see our SAP HANA DB TPS guide for full HANA version matrix)
- SAP Fiori and UI5: SAP Fiori launchpad, SAP UI5 version support, Fiori apps catalogue troubleshooting, and Fiori for iOS/Android configuration support
- SAP Basis (BASIS/BC): SAP kernel patching alternatives, ABAP stack stability, system copy and refresh support, transport management (TMS/CTS), and background job management (SM36/SM37)
- SAP S/4HANA Embedded Analytics: CDS views, VDM (Virtual Data Model) queries, SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) integration troubleshooting, and BW/4HANA embedded analytics bridge
- Integration and APIs: SAP Integration Suite (CPI/HCI) interoperability, IDOC/BAPI troubleshooting, OData service stability, and SAP RFC/BAPI compatibility under S/4HANA 2020+ simplified data model
- Security and Compliance: Independent security advisory for known S/4HANA CVEs, SAP Security Patch Day alternative analysis, and regulatory compliance documentation (SOX, GDPR, GxP) for on-premise S/4HANA environments
RISE with SAP vs. S/4HANA TPS — The Commercial Comparison
SAP's RISE with SAP pricing is deliberately opaque — bundling application, infrastructure, HANA Cloud, BTP, and professional services into a single subscription that varies by industry solution, user count, and negotiation leverage. Published starting points for mid-market RISE with SAP (1,000 users, core ERP only) begin at approximately £600K–£1.2M per year. For the large enterprise (5,000+ users, S/4HANA Industry Cloud), RISE with SAP sits at £3M–£12M+ annually.
By contrast, TPS for a S/4HANA 1909 on-premise environment covers the application and HANA database licence you already own at 50–65% less than your current SAP standard maintenance fee — without replacing your infrastructure, without re-platforming to HANA Cloud, and without locking every future cost decision to SAP's subscription pricing model. The SAP Cloud Migration Cost Guide models the full RISE with SAP total cost of ownership over five years against TPS on existing S/4HANA infrastructure.
Clean Core and TPS — Are They Compatible?
SAP's "Clean Core" principle advocates for moving all extensions and custom code outside the S/4HANA kernel layer — using BTP, side-by-side extensions, and public APIs rather than traditional ABAP modifications. This is sound architectural advice for greenfield S/4HANA implementations. For organisations with existing S/4HANA landscapes that have followed clean core principles (no kernel modifications, all extensions via BTP or stable APIs), TPS is entirely compatible — there is no architectural conflict between third-party support and a clean-core S/4HANA environment.
For S/4HANA environments with ABAP modifications, customer enhancements (CMOD/BADI implementations), or industry add-ons (IS-Banking, IS-Utilities, IS-Retail, S/4HANA for Life Sciences), TPS covers the base platform and standard modules. The modifications remain supported as customer-owned code assets — which is precisely the same position as under SAP standard support, where SAP explicitly excludes customer modifications from its support scope. Our SAP Basis cost reduction guide covers the practical support boundary in detail.