SAP PO To CI Migration: Plan your journey

Why Migrate?

The motivation to migrate from SAP Process Orchestration (PO) to the SAP Integration Suite is driven by various factors, with the foremost being the end-of-life status of PO in 2028 and the strategic pivot towards cloud computing. With SAP announcing the sunset of PO, organizations are faced with the imperative to modernize their integration infrastructure to align with evolving technological trends and business needs.  

Additionally, the migration to the cloud presents a compelling opportunity for organizations to leverage the scalability, agility, and cost-efficiency offered by cloud platforms. Moving to the cloud not only future-proofs integration capabilities but also enables organizations to take advantage of advanced features and services provided by cloud providers.

This move is pivotal for organizations looking to integrate their IT landscape and configure/extend SAP and third-party applications efficiently. Integration suite facilitates the achievement of seamless business processes by enabling the integration of diverse application landscapes and business networks through comprehensive capabilities. Moreover, it accelerates business outcomes by swiftly connecting applications and business partners with a vast array of pre-built integrations, leveraging SAP's proven methodology derived from 50 years of best practices.  

The modernization of integration is a key aspect, allowing for self-service integration at scale through user-friendly tools, built-in AI, and contemporary integration capabilities. The deployment to any cloud is fortified with trust and security, fully managed by SAP. Embracing the SAP Integration Suite unlocks the transformative power of Cloud Integration (CI), propelling organizations into a future-ready era. As we delve into the migration journey, we explore how to navigate from PO to CI in the subsequent paragraphs.  

Migration with standard SAP tools - What do we already have from SAP for Migration?

The migration journey from SAP Process Orchestration (PO) to Cloud Integration (CI) is guided by the offerings of standard SAP tools and migration functionalities. SAP provides a robust suite of tools designed to facilitate seamless transitions between integration platforms.  

In addition to the standard SAP tools, Rojo has developed a valuable tool, the significance of which will be elaborated upon in subsequent sections of this blog. The Rojo automation on top of what SAP provides can accelerate the whole process of journey of migration by almost 50%*.

Assessment & the important of Assessment During Migration

Before starting the migration journey, conducting a thorough assessment is essential. SAP offers standard assessment and migration tools within the Integration Suite to support this process, which includes categorizing integration scenarios, considering adapter types, and evaluating the readiness of scenarios for migration. However, this is not the only assessment required; it is also important to reevaluate existing patterns, discard outdated interfaces, and redesign where necessary to ensure optimal migration outcomes.

Importance

A migration without a proper assessment is akin to moving houses without knowing what needs to be moved. The importance of assessment during migration cannot be overstated. SAP's standard assessment tool provides an overview of readiness, but understanding which interfaces to migrate requires a detailed evaluation. Synchronization of systems across different environments must be ensured, and redundant interfaces that haven't been in use for years may not need migration.

Plan & Prepare

Functionality gaps may exist, requiring a redesign and re-strategization of what to migrate. An estimation of effort involved, landscape analysis, and high-level architecture planning are essential. Cloud Foundry setup, tenant provision, and SAP Integration Suite configuration follow, including security artifact considerations.

Migration Strategy

Define your integration approach and decide on the mapping of environments. Implement a decision tree per integration category or pattern to guide the automation process. Consider integration content redesign or protocol changes based on best practices and experience.

Migrate

Migration involves automatically migrating, semi-automatically migrating, or redesigning scenarios. Prioritize scenarios based on business requirements and features available on Cloud Integration. Execute the migration, including mapping from ESR, ensuring security artifacts are migrated seamlessly.

Test & Go-Live

Validation, regression testing, and assessing redesigned interfaces are crucial. Rojo, an automation tool, can play a significant role in this phase by categorizing interfaces based on adapters, protocols, and communication channels.

*Rojo has worked on automations on top of what SAP provides and can accelerate the whole process or journey of migration by almost 50%

How Automation Can Play a Key Role in Migration

Automation is pivotal throughout the migration journey. Rojo introduces full automation to accelerate migration, reducing manual efforts and enhancing efficiency.

In the journey of migrating from SAP Process Orchestration (PO) to Cloud Integration (CI), it's essential to recognize that detailed assessment of the existing interfaces in SAP PO will be a vital step in the migration journey. The assessment should be covered from various angles and as an outcome we should have complete overview of the all the manual and automated steps to be carried out during the migration process. As part of planning and preparation stage if we are able to automate the majority of manual steps it will not only reduce the chances of manual error but can also reduce the migration time to 60 %.

During the assessment phase, one pivotal task is the identification of deprecated interfaces. Establishing an efficient method to assess and manage these interfaces is essential for a seamless transition. Even before initiating the actual migration, attention to handling security artifacts is paramount. The prospect of partially automating this process holds the promise of significant time savings and enhanced efficiency.

As part of the SAP Assessment, gaining insight into Interface Communication Objects (ICO) categorized as "Ready to Migrate" or requiring further adjustment is also vital. For ICOs labeled as "Ready to Migrate," integrating a standardized exception handling mechanism becomes imperative. By centralizing this process, Rojo can streamline the management of exceptions, incorporating functionalities such as email notifications or logging in Splunk for comprehensive monitoring.

For ICOs flagged as needing adjustments, our approach leans towards automation to bridge existing gaps efficiently. For instance, the absence of standardized adapter modules in sender and receiver channels necessitates an automated solution to handle these discrepancies seamlessly. This approach aims to minimize manual interventions, enhancing the overall efficiency of the migration process.

In Rojo's quest to streamline the migration journey, the team has diligently implemented a series of comprehensive automations. Crafted strategically, these solutions target key aspects of the migration process, aiding users across diverse assessment categories. By reducing manual interventions, Rojo aims to facilitate a smoother and more efficient transition from SAP Process Orchestration (PO) to Cloud Integration (CI).

How Rojo is using automation to accelerate your Migration Journey?

Rojo has helped various customers in there migration journey and with each iteration Rojo has tried to cover the gaps in the standard tools and the migration process by introducing automation as much as possible for the manual steps involved.  

Additionally, Rojo has enriched the assessment report by furnishing it with more intricate details pertaining to necessary adjustments and evaluations. This comprehensive approach ensures a more informed decision-making process during migration. Going beyond surface-level insights, Rojo's contribution includes providing a deeper analysis aimed at proactively mitigating risks before the actual migration phase. By delving into the intricacies of the assessment results, Rojo adds substantial value, offering organizations a heightened level of preparedness and risk management for a successful migration journey:

Assessment Phase

Using the assessment tool provided by SAP customer can determine what can be migrated to SAP Integration suite and the high level effort estimation but it is also important to determine what should be migrated to SAP Integration and this can be only answered by doing assessment on top of SAP assessment tool for example if we need to compare the objects across the environments.  Rojo helps determine the feasibility of migration and assesses whether migration is needed for all interfaces. It aids in deciding whether specific interfaces need deprecation, redesign, or can leverage standard content from SAP.

Plan & Prepare Phase

Detailed assessment by Rojo enhances migration planning and more precise effort estimation. As highlighted earlier on the basis of assessment the all the manual task should be and can be automated as part of prepare phase before starting the migration for example in standard migration the user details are not migrated and has to be manually extracted and created in SAP Cloud Integration per ICO for each environment which can be a cumbersome task and will have chances of manual errors instead this whole process can be automated in a secured and controlled manner.

Migrate Phase

Once the detailed assessment  automates the creation of packages in SAP Cloud Integration, grouping iFlows based on their grouping in SAP PO. This automation reduces manual efforts and accelerates the migration process using SAP tools.

Enhance Phase

Rojo helps in enhancing the migrated interfaces by automating error handling, configuring security artifacts, adjusting naming conventions, and handling value mapping.

Deploy & Test Phase

Automation continues in the deployment and testing phases, avoiding manual interventions and accelerating the entire process.

Through automation and standardization, the transition becomes smoother, allowing organizations to embrace the future with SAP Integration Suite.

In conclusion, the migration from SAP PO to CI is a complex but necessary journey. Rojo, with its automation capabilities, significantly mitigates risks, saves time, and ensures a secure transition. Through automation and standardization, the transition becomes smoother, allowing organizations to embrace the future with SAP Integration Suite.

Rojo's enriched output from SAP Migration Assessment Service, introducing automation, providing detailed information on adjustments and evaluations, and offering deeper risk analysis, positions it as a valuable ally in the migration process.