Top SAP partner and HR specialist Presence of IT has pulled back the veil on a cloud-based implementation of the SAP Success Factors Employee Central Payroll Solution.
According to Presence of IT chief David Brookes, the company’s 200 HR and payroll customers have expressed a strong interest in migrating from an on-premise solution to a cloud-based offering.
“If you have a look at HR, there is a structural change occurring,” he said. “In the past customers bought and implemented software, [which was] a challenging process to maintain and to get the best out of.”
The shift to the cloud for Success Factors clients also marks a fundamental move in the licensing arrangements associated with the software. On-premise was a perpetual license, however the cloud offering moves to a subscription based service, with upgrades and improvements built into the subscription price.
Brookes said the cloud offering would be hosted at Success Factor's datacentre, and not with a third party such as Amazon Web Services.
“What this means is that customers are no longer buying software,” he said. “Instead, they are buying a cloud service.”
New clients, he said, could move straight into the cloud, while existing on-premise clients will go through a migration process. Brookes said the service, which is roughly six months from a kick-off, will see a gradual migration of clients, rather than a massive, all-at-once jump into the cloud. “We don’t want to flood our resources, and we want to make sure it’s the best experience for the client,” he said
He also indicated the company has a migration and training program in place called Fast Track. This is designed to make the transition for HR and payroll staff into the cloud easier.
Despite the bullishness of the company over the cloud, Brookes also conceded there are some organisations which will never abandon on-premise. They include large government agencies such as Defence, which prefer to keep data close at hand.
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