Don’t replace PI/PO. Leave it behind.
PI/PO was built for files and EDI, in a different age. Your next years are about AI agents, automation and real time. Why a like-for-like migration is not enough, and the two steps we advise.
TL;DR
PI/PO was built for files and EDI, in a different age. Your next years are about AI agents, automated processes, real time and data products. A like-for-like PI/PO migration gives you a new platform with the same old limits.
Our advice is two steps. First, move from PI/PO to SAP Business AI Platform (BAIP) in a controlled way. Then push BAIP hard: agents under control, automation, real time and data products.
Your integration platform is the natural place to govern AI. Every call from an agent to your business systems passes through it.
Table of Contents
PI/PO was built for files and EDI, in a different age. It moves messages between systems on-prem. That was enough then.
It is not enough now.
Your next years are about AI agents, automated processes, real time and data products. PI/PO was never built for that. A like-for-like migration gives you a new platform with the same old limits.
SAP knows this. BTP is now part of SAP Business AI Platform (BAIP), together with SAP Business Data Cloud and SAP Business AI. The name says where integration is going: from moving messages to powering AI.
An AI agent that can’t reach your systems is a demo
Integration decides whether your AI works in production or stays in a pilot. It also decides how much of your business you can automate.
An AI agent that nobody controls is a risk
When agents read your data and trigger your processes, you need answers to hard questions:
- Which agent is allowed to do what?
- Which data can it see, and which can it never touch?
- Who approved the action, and where is the log?
- Who stops it when something goes wrong?
That is the governance layer, and for AI it is critical. Your integration platform is the natural place to build it. Every call from an agent to your business systems passes through it. That makes it the place to set access, apply policies, monitor behavior and keep an audit trail.
Governance is not a brake on AI. It is what lets you give AI real work with confidence.
Our advice is two steps
1. Move from PI/PO to BAIP
Do it in a controlled way. Drop what you don’t need. Automate the rest. Set clear standards for APIs, events, security and monitoring.
2. Then push BAIP hard
- Agents, under control. Open your business systems to AI agents with clear rules for access and actions, for example with the MCP Gateway in SAP Integration Suite.
- Automation. Remove manual steps from order to cash, procure to pay and approvals.
- Real time. React when something happens, not when a batch job runs.
- Data products. Make your core data something teams and AI can use.
Real time: one business event reaches every system that needs it, the moment it happens
And connect it to how your people work
S5 links your SAP system with your systems of work in Microsoft, like Teams, Outlook, Excel and Copilot. We also link it with your data warehouse. SAP stops being an island. AI and automation reach people where they already work, and your analytics run on the same trusted data as finance and operations.
Many companies stop after step 1
They get a working platform, close the project and keep a cost center.
Don’t stop. Done right, integration becomes a profit center. It speeds up every new project, cuts manual work and gives you AI you can trust.
PI/PO is on borrowed time. Have you decided what replaces it, or is your platform vendor deciding for you?
