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Independent RISE Advisory
SAP RISE Negotiations
VER. 2026.05
DOC.ID / SVC.07
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Home / Services / Hyperscaler Selection
SVC.07 / Hyperscaler Selection

Force the hyperscaler line inside RISE to defend itself against the open market.

Inside a RISE with SAP order form, the hyperscaler component is positioned as a single bundled pass through. AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud Platform capacity arrives priced by SAP, on SAP's choice of region, on SAP's choice of reserved term. Most buyers never benchmark the figure against what the hyperscaler would quote directly. The result is a pass through line that runs eight to twenty two percent above defensible market pricing across the seven year horizon.

This service rebuilds that pass through from the ground up. We run AWS, Azure, and GCP against the actual S/4HANA workload profile, price reserved capacity at three year and five year terms, and apply the pressure to the RISE order form before signature.

Engagement Profile
TriggerRISE quote
Duration4 to 8 weeks
WorkloadS/4HANA Private
TargetsAWS, Azure, GCP
Avg Reduction12 to 22%
OutputBenchmark, redline
IndependentAll three CSPs

RISE bundles hyperscaler capacity into a price you never benchmarked.

S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition runs on AWS, Azure, or GCP. SAP procures that capacity, marks it up, and prices it into the RISE subscription as a single line. The customer rarely sees the underlying reserved instance type, the term selected, the region, the storage class, or the discount level SAP secured. The line item lands in the order form and the buyer signs.

Across the engagements this firm has audited, the RISE hyperscaler pass through carries an average uplift of 14 percent above what the customer could secure on a direct enterprise discount programme with the same hyperscaler. On larger workloads, the spread exceeds 22 percent. Compounded across seven years, the differential routinely exceeds two million dollars on a mid sized RISE deal.

The problem is not malice. It is opacity. The hyperscaler line cannot be challenged because the buyer has no visibility into its construction. This service builds that visibility.

Three hyperscalers, the same SAP workload, an honest benchmark.

The benchmark is built against the buyer's actual S/4HANA workload profile, not against a synthetic SAP sizing. Database tier, application server count, peak concurrency, batch window, disaster recovery posture, and data residency are all modelled.

Dimension AWS Azure GCP
SAP Certified Instance FamilyX2idn, U7iM, Mv2, Mv3X4, M3, C3
Reserved Term Discount Depth3 year, up to 60%3 year, up to 55%3 year CUD, up to 57%
Data Residency Footprint32 regions globally60 plus regions40 plus regions
Typical RISE Pass Through Mark Up10 to 16%12 to 22%8 to 14%
Egress and DR Pricing PositionMature, predictableVariable by regionAggressive on egress
SAP Operational CouplingLong history, deepClosest commercial fitStrong on data services

Four artefacts that survive the deal.

Output 01
Reserved capacity benchmark.

Three year and five year reserved pricing from AWS, Azure, and GCP against the buyer's actual SAP workload. Sourced directly. Not modelled from list price.

Output 02
RISE pass through analysis.

The SAP hyperscaler line decomposed into compute, storage, network, and operational uplift. The gap to direct market pricing measured and priced.

Output 03
Hyperscaler operational fit map.

Region, latency, data residency, DR posture, and integration footprint scored against each hyperscaler. The decision is rarely about price alone.

Output 04
Order form redline.

Concrete redline against the RISE order form covering hyperscaler swap rights, capacity portability, and pass through escalation. The contract protections must outlive the price discussion.

"The hyperscaler line is the easiest line to challenge inside a RISE order form. Almost nobody does. The customer treats it as a fact. It is not. It is a negotiated mark up that pretends to be infrastructure cost."
— Lead Partner, Hyperscaler Practice

This service is rarely run on its own.

Hyperscaler selection sits inside the broader RISE with SAP negotiation service, and feeds the seven year TCO model. On larger conversions, it also informs the brownfield versus RISE comparison, because the hyperscaler price discovered here resets the brownfield baseline against which RISE is judged.

If the work is being procured against a current RISE quote, expect the hyperscaler reduction alone to recover the engagement fee several times over. If the work is being procured ahead of a future renewal, expect the data set to define the renewal negotiation position.

Pressure the hyperscaler line.

Send the current RISE quote, the workload profile, or the renewal date. The firm will scope a hyperscaler engagement against the actual deal in front of you.

Take this further with a partner level review.

Every conclusion above sits on top of work we routinely deliver inside our SAP RISE negotiation services. If the questions in this piece are live on your desk, the same bench is available to run them through with you in a closed working session.

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