INDIA: So would a CIO jump on to the very concept of a third party ironing out all the maintenance kinks?

Yes and No.

As Asmita J, CIO, Voltas shares, “At first, it sounds good. But when it comes to high-vale mission-critical applications, you don’t want to take chances.”

As a customer, she has looked at such options, and it looks exciting, but when one looks into the risks, hesitance is natural.

“I would not go forth. I guess the whole support army or software is what unlocks the real value of SAP.”

If the contractual document is correct for the environment, it can be a very powerful tool. advises Hackett Global Business Services Practice Leader Honorio Padron.

“Since sometimes the AMC work is heavily dependent of variables not under the IT control, we suggest, that enough variability and agility be factored into the agreement. Again, an experience contract negotiating team can be an invaluable thing.” He argues.

The new support scenario may come with its own set of patches, upgrades, and other plumbing issues. You may have to undertake regression testing, interface adjustments, user reorientation plug-ins, overlap pat-downs as well as leave routes of going back to existing vendor’s environment etc.

Experts advise to have a good upgrade plan in place before making a support-switch decision. If your needs are not being met by a relatively unresponsive vendor, a third-party could be good anti-incumbency choice here, thanks to their size, scale and dedicated teams. If you want a bug fix or a regulatory patch-up, then third-party is a ready option.

It goes without saying that a sunset ERP product breathing its last, with not much interest from its parent company, will be an ideal candidate for a switch. It also depends on how much of recurring support do your employees need on a day to day basis. And of course on your downtime thresholds and transition scenarios; as well as your long term business plans, IT strategy and associated integration issues.

Not to forget the litigation backlash that most of these third-party boys have been getting from big boys like Oracle. What pops up immediately is the question of – how much attention and resource bandwidth can this third party maintain amidst all the legal wrestling going on?

Customers select such options based on the provider’s familiarity with the product, points out Sunil Padmanabh, Research Director, Gartner. Confidence won’t come unless OEM part is certified, by SAP. By and large a customer may like it as an alternative proposition but certification or ability to map it on a particular vertical will be very important.

Noted analyst Ray Wang however leaves a spine to depend on, in one of his interviews.

You can always go back to the original guy. What more, you can use this option on the negotiating table.

Looks like having an option makes life easier either ways.