SAP Integration Platform Strategy — S5 Consulting
01 — Integration strategy

Are you tired of SAP partners
that sell you platforms instead of
answers?

SAP integration strategy for S/4HANA — before you choose a platform.

Is your PI/PO landscape on a 2027 deadline and nobody on your team has migrated one before? Talk to S5. Fixed price. Senior integration architect, not a junior team. We get you there in one piece.

Free 2-hour discovery See fixed-price options
Partner expertise across
SAP
Microsoft Azure
Frends
00 — Why this matters now

Why does your SAP integration strategy break down when platform decisions start?

Your architecture changed — did your platform?
Event-driven patterns multiply transaction counts by 5–50× vs classic batch. A single order now touches six systems. Your platform was not sized for this.
AI is generating API calls you never planned for
SAP Joule, Microsoft Copilot, and agentic AI generate API calls without a human clicking anything. Integration has become the meter on the network.
Has your CFO asked why integration costs keep climbing?
Per-message pricing was manageable for batch. It is lethal under event fan-out. BTP IS is the platform where assumed vs actual cost diverges most — amplified for RISE customers.
The decision window
2027
PI/PO end of mainstream maintenance. Migration takes 6–18 months. The time to start is now.
~€8k+/mo
BTP IS before you have built a single integration. Under event fan-out, this number grows fast.
7–10 yr
Integration platform commitment. Most programmes treat it as a sub-decision. That is the mistake.
01 — Where we enter

Do you recognise your situation in one of these?

Trigger 01 · ECC stayer · PI/PO signal
PI/PO is creaking, and we don't want to wait for the S/4HANA project to fix integration.
→ Integration Posture Review. 2 weeks. Fixed price.
Trigger 02 · RISE customer · BTP scope drift
We just signed RISE, and now everything wants to live on BTP. We need a second opinion.
→ Platform Architecture & Roadmap. Vendor-bias free. Named senior architect.
Trigger 03 · FinOps pressure · Event fan-out
Our integration cost is going the wrong way. Volumes are up, predictability is down.
→ Integration Posture Review with TCO modelling.
Trigger 04 · Azure + SAP · Cross-domain
We're Microsoft-aligned. How does that fit with our SAP-side roadmap?
→ Platform Architecture & Roadmap. Azure + SAP done properly.
02 — Your ERP state

Which of these sounds like your situation right now?

Four ERP states, four flavours of advice. Where you are shapes the integration conversation.

A
Staying on ECC
Evaluating, waiting, pacing carefully
The 2030 ECC cliff matters but is not next year. The trap is to defer integration along with the ERP question. PI/PO is creaking now.
S5 advice: Pick an ERP-state-agnostic platform now. Useful on ECC today, useful on S/4HANA tomorrow.
B
S/4HANA on-premise
Or customer-managed cloud (IaaS)
You chose maximum control. Your integration architecture should match — hybrid-capable, on-prem agents, no commercial surprises at scale.
S5 advice: BTP IS for SAP-internal flows. Frends or Azure for the rest. Hybrid runtime is non-negotiable.
C
RISE with SAP
S/4HANA Private Cloud Edition
BTP IS arrives pre-bundled and feels inevitable — but its pricing exposure is real. Most RISE customers who put everything on BTP IS are revisiting that by year two.
S5 advice: Use BTP IS where it earns its keep. Use a second platform for B2B, high-volume, and non-SAP flows.
D
Grow with SAP
S/4HANA Public Cloud Edition
Clean Core enforced, extensions on BTP, SAP-side integration is essentially BTP IS by design. The choice space is what to use for everything outside SAP.
S5 advice: Accept BTP IS for SAP-native flows. Define non-SAP architecture deliberately — Azure, Frends, or both.
03 — How we engage

Three ways to start — each one stands alone.

You can stop after any stage and use the output independently. No staircase pricing. Each engagement produces a standalone deliverable.

Free · 2-hour discovery
Not sure where to start?
A focused diagnostic conversation. We tell you where you are, what the real options are, and which tier fits — or whether none do. No slides. No follow-up pressure.
Cost
Free
Named contact
Senior integration architect
Book discovery call →
Entry · 2 weeks · Fixed price
Integration Posture Review
Do you need a roadmap, but every advisor is also trying to sell you the implementation?
We tell you where you are, what the pressure points are, and what your credible options are — before any vendor enters the room.
Output
Posture report + briefing
Audience
CIO, Chief Architect
Core · 6–8 weeks · Fixed price
Platform Architecture & Roadmap
Has your S/4HANA business case quietly turned into a migration project with no measurable outcome?
Unbiased platform roadmap — paid, vendor-bias free. Discovery, volume modelling, fit-mapping. Board-ready plan, not another 80-slide capability deck.
Output
Architecture + 18-month roadmap
Audience
CIO, CFO, Architecture Board
Delivery · From 8 weeks · Fixed scope
Pilot & Pattern Build
Are you about to build something that three of your competitors already rent for a monthly fee?
A bounded production-grade pilot on the recommended platform mix. Real volumes, real governance, real cost telemetry — before the multi-year programme starts.
Output
Live pilot + reusable patterns
Audience
Integration team + sponsors
Why S5

Nordic SAP expertise. No platform agenda.

We're an independent SAP consultancy. We don't resell licences and we don't have a platform quota. The answer to which integration stack you should use comes from your situation — not from ours.

20+
Years of SAP delivery in Nordic markets
5
Offices — Oslo · Stavanger · Stockholm · Gothenburg · Wroclaw
S5 Labs
Dedicated SAP engineering centre for integration, BTP and custom development
5×faster delivery
Typical vs large system integrators, enabled by our S5 Labs model
SAP Recognised Expertise
Certified SAP partner with recognised expertise across S/4HANA, BTP, and Integration Suite. We operate inside the SAP ecosystem — not around it.
Platform-independent advice
We work with SAP Integration Suite, Azure Integration Services, and Frends. The platform recommendation follows the diagnostic — not the other way around.
Fixed-price entry points
The Integration Posture Review is scoped, priced, and time-boxed. You know what you're buying before you sign. No open-ended discovery phases.
S5 Labs — engineering without overhead
Our capability-first SAP engineering centre in Wrocław delivers at pace. Senior ABAP, BTP, and integration engineers — no juniors on billable work.
Nordic track record
Twenty years of delivery across Norway, Sweden, and Denmark — manufacturing, food & beverage, energy, public sector. We know the compliance context and the procurement culture.
You own the result
We write clean, documented, cloud-ready code. Every engagement ends with a handover your internal team can maintain — or we run it for you on a fixed monthly fee.
Selected S5 references — integration delivery across SAP BTP
Proven in real SAP integration landscapes
The examples below show how S5 delivers across Azure, SAP BTP Integration Suite, EDI and large-scale SAP environments — applying the same platform-independent approach described above.
Retail / Grocery
Coop Norge

Integration platform modernisation with BizTalk-to-Azure migration and SAP integration roadmap workstreams.

Stack: Azure migration · SAP integration roadmap · logistics and process integrations
Consumer electronics retail
Power International

Composable SAP integration architecture with SAP BTP Integration Suite as the backbone for headless commerce and OMS.

Stack: SAP BTP Integration Suite · Omnium OMS · Headless commerce
Distribution / B2B commerce
Modino

Long-term SAP S/4HANA integration partnership covering EDI, trading partners, webshop and 3PL connectivity.

Stack: SAP S/4HANA · Azure Logic Apps · IDoc / EDIFACT
Retail / Books
Ark Bokhandel

Integration platform behind the third-generation webshop, delivered on SAP BTP with frontend and backend scope.

Stack: SAP BTP · Fiori frontend · SAP ERP backend integration
Publishing
Gyldendal

SAP ERP integration with Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM and publishing-side systems on SAP BTP Integration Suite.

Stack: SAP BTP Integration Suite · SAP ERP · D365 CRM · Bibsys
Public sector
DFØ programme

Cloud integration delivery into the Norwegian public finance and administration programme environment.

Stack: Cloud integration delivery · SAP programme context
04 — The diagnostic

Seven questions that reveal the right platform — before we name it.

Not platform-neutral — platform-revealing. We refuse to name a platform before we have honest answers to all seven.

01
What belongs inside the SAP domain?
SAP-native flows, Clean Core extensions, SAP-delivered content vs. everything else.
02
What belongs in the Azure platform?
Cross-domain APIs, data, AI, identity — without forcing every flow into custom Azure engineering.
03
Where would Frends make integration more manageable?
B2B, EDI, hybrid execution, long-running processes, operational visibility.
04
What does your integration profile look like in 3–5 years?
Event fan-out, AI-agent traffic, B2B volume — not last year's interface count plus 10%.
05
What is your real tolerance for variable cost models?
A finance question dressed up as a technology question. Often the deciding lever.
06
Where is your engineering talent?
SAP-centric, Microsoft-centric, .NET, polyglot. Forcing the wrong team onto the wrong platform is a daily tax.
07
What operating model can you actually run?
Integration strategy succeeds or fails in the operating model — not the tool selection.

The platform shortlist falls out of the answers.

Most programmes choose a platform first and retrofit the diagnostic. We refuse that order — it is the single most expensive mistake we see in SAP integration.

By forcing the questions ahead of the platform, we narrow the credible options before any vendor enters the room — which is when the customer has the most leverage.

Questions #5 and #7 are where the analysis usually breaks. Both are operating-model questions disguised as something else. Both are where consultancies without delivery experience produce thin advice.

05 — Architectural outcomes

What does a real SAP integration strategy look like in practice?

Almost no enterprise SAP customer should expect one platform to do everything well. The diagnostic points to one of three concrete hybrid patterns — naming the pattern matters.

Pattern A
SAP IS + Azure
SAP ISSAP-native flows, Clean Core extensions
AzureCross-domain APIs, data, AI, customer-facing
Architecture role: Keeps SAP-native integration close to SAP while Azure carries the broader enterprise platform layer.
Best fit when
SAP-native flows stay close to SAP, while Azure handles cross-domain APIs, data, AI and customer-facing integration.
Pattern B · Most Common
Frends + Azure + selective SAP IS
FrendsOrchestration, B2B, hybrid, operations
AzureData, AI, identity, events, cloud-native
SAP ISSAP-native, Clean Core (selective only)
Architecture role: Lets Azure remain the enterprise platform while Frends keeps the integration layer manageable.
Best fit when
Azure is already the enterprise platform, but integration needs a more manageable orchestration layer for B2B, EDI, hybrid and operational flows.
Pattern C
Frends + SAP IS (light)
FrendsWorkhorse — most of the integration estate
SAP ISOnly where SAP genuinely demands it
Architecture role: Keeps SAP Integration Suite focused on SAP-native flows while Frends carries the wider estate.
Best fit when
SAP IS is used only where SAP genuinely requires it, while the broader integration estate needs predictable operations and simpler governance.
06 — The platforms

Which SAP integration strategy actually works: BTP, Azure, or Frends?

All three are credible. None is right for everyone. Here is where each one wins — and where it will cost you if you pick it for the wrong reasons.

SAP
BTP Integration Suite
CPI · API Management · Event Mesh · Open Connectors
Wins on
  • SAP-to-SAP and SAP-to-cloud flows
  • Pre-built S/4HANA, SuccessFactors, Ariba, Concur content
  • Natural home for Clean Core extensions
  • Effectively required for Grow with SAP
Hurts on
  • ~€8k/month minimum before building anything
  • Pricing compounds fast under event-driven volume
  • CI/CD and observability trail hyperscaler iPaaS
  • For ECC stayers, not the obvious choice it is for RISE
Microsoft
Azure Integration Services
Logic Apps · Service Bus · Event Grid · APIM · Fabric
Wins on
  • Breadth, scalability, convergence with data and AI
  • Mature DevOps and observability tooling
  • Talent availability across the market
  • Right cross-domain platform with a Microsoft strategy
Hurts on
  • 6–10 services, each with own SKU and governance model
  • Power is not the same as manageability — landscapes drift
  • Rarely the best tool for pure SAP-side flows
  • Requires strong engineering governance
Frends
Frends iPaaS
Hybrid agents · Visual orchestration · .NET escape hatch
Wins on
  • Predictable economics under real event-driven volumes
  • Native hybrid — closer to what on-prem and ECC need
  • 5× faster integration delivery (Raisio: 1,000+ integrations)
  • Works standalone or alongside Azure
Hurts on
  • Smaller vendor than SAP or Microsoft
  • Connector library narrower for SAP than BTP IS
  • Not a platform-AI ecosystem in its own right