Gartner questions value of SAP Premium Support

SAP has come under fire from Gartner for "missing an opportunity" with its launch of a premium support offering that is "unlikely to sway users" because they can receive many of the benefits without paying extra.

The analyst firm today expressed doubts about SAP's Premium Support service, and predicted that few customers would pay the five per cent maintenance premium which comes with the offering.

"Even though SAP's fees for standard support are among the lowest in the industry, the new support offering is not likely to attract many users in the SAP installed base," predicted Yvonne Genovese, a research vice president at Gartner.

The premium plan includes an increase from 17 to 22 per cent of net negotiated licence fees annually over standard maintenance fees in exchange for benefits.

Users can receive technical assessment and a written plan to optimise their technical environments, support infrastructures and/or processes.

They will also be able to call on a support advisor to help them better understand the written plan, conduct periodic reviews of actions against the plan and act as a single support contact.

Guaranteed response times for specific problem levels are also included in the package.

"In some cases, users can obtain the same or equivalent support for new or established implementations without purchasing the packaged solution. For example, users can already obtain the technical assessment and written plan for a consulting fee," said Genovese.

"Furthermore, the addition of a support advisor as a support contact point to help users execute on suggested plans will not benefit users if they don't want to follow SAP's recommendations."

She added that the service-level agreements detailing guaranteed response times are "unlikely to be seen as valuable" because most users with Level 1 issues (meaning the system is down) will find a way to get SAP's attention with or without an SLA.

"SAP has also missed an important opportunity to detail how it will help users set up SAP Core Competency Centers [CCCs] and understand how SAP intends to support the new technical environments that will evolve with enterprise service architectures," added Genovese.

"SAP mentioned "optimising the CCC" in its announcement, but users received no guidance on how to take advantage of the offering other than receiving help from the advisor.

"SAP is promoting new technical and functional environments (such as building composite applications and embracing Powered by NetWeaver partners) through enterprise service architecture, but with little information about how users will receive support.

"Gartner believes that the lingering questions about how SAP will help users in these areas (combined with the five per cent increase annually) will result in few sales for SAP for this offering."

According to the analyst firm, SAP customers should evaluate this optional service agreement, but keep in mind that some of the elements of SAP Premium Support may be available without the "packaged" approach.