25 years of BDF EXPERTS: 2001 vs. 2026 (21/25)

An SAP consultant travelling to a customer in 2001 carried a three-kilo laptop, dialled into the system via ISDN and stayed until Thursday. The concept was written in Word, printed, filed and signed on paper. Evaluations ran overnight; the result was ready the next morning. Extensions were coded straight into the core of SAP R/3, the project followed the ASAP waterfall and went live as a big bang.

In 2026, the same workshop runs in a browser. SAP Fiori and, increasingly, AI-generated user interfaces have replaced the SAP GUI, the system sits in the cloud, and the SAP Business Technology Platform complements S/4HANA under the clean-core principle. Evaluations are available in real time, a cash position appears at the push of a button. Documents are versioned and shared, approvals take a click. New methodologies such as SAP Activate have been added without displacing the old ones, and go-lives are product- and process-based rather than big bang. And anyone with a question asks the AI assistant in the system. Or, as ever, the colleague at the next desk.

We have worked in both worlds, and we are attached to neither. Tools change; that is what they are for. An SAP project succeeds with clean data. But one thing has stayed in 25 years and will not change: people on both sides of the table who understand each other and communicate with one another. That has been our work since 2001.

Which change has shaped your working day the most? Tell us on LinkedIn. The finale of the series follows on 11 December.