In a world that is still very much coping with a pandemic, industries of all walks of life are dealing with the significant cost-related pressures of rapidly changing market and business needs. Now more than ever, decision makers need to focus on optimizing costs and directing their technology spend to key digital transformation initiatives.
The decision to upgrade a heavy-hitter application like Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) certainly falls into the category of strategic initiatives to consider and approach carefully. The reality of many EBS clients nowadays is that their EBS instance continues to support their mission-critical operations, even when below Release 12.2.
For most, that has been one of the biggest drivers in deciding to postpone the decision to upgrade or migrate their EBS instance to Release 12.2. So, what’s the big deal with Release 12.2 and why are Oracle and Oracle partners doing one last push in encouraging clients to upgrade?
In a nutshell, business modernization and the ongoing delivery of new updates, fixes, and security patches.
Oracle EBS R12.2 will continue to be covered by Premier Support throughout 2032, as recently announced by Oracle. This commitment will ensure that clients on R12.2 will continue to benefit from the innovations and security measures that Oracle invests in and deploys to ensure the instance continues to run optimally and deliver the value that EBS clients have come to love and expect.
EBS clients who fail to upgrade to R12.2 before the deadline arrives will immediately lose Premier Support and will expose their instance to the unwanted costs and increasing security risks or operating under an unsupported EBS version. The due date to upgrade to R12.2 and remain under Premier Support is end of this year, December 2021, which is why it’s important, and we can’t stress this enough, that you take action as soon as possible to upgrade your Oracle EBS instance to R12.2.
EBS 12.2 Upgrade Cost Efficiency
When talking about an upgrade as important as the one to R12.2, cost, of course, is an important subject to touch upon. Achieving cost-efficiency can be done if you define your upgrade strategy and determine the most critical needs you have that you’d like to cover. According to Gartner’s 2020 I&O Leaders Survey, 86% of infrastructure and operations (I&O) heads reported having invested or planning to invest in modernization initiatives to upgrade their legacy systems.
Stemming from modernization efforts, is the need to systematically create strategies that will improve the overall technology health while also meeting internal needs in terms of time and cost. In that same survey, Gartner also found that I&O leaders have plans to invest in modernization to remediate technical debt. This interesting tidbit of information further expands on how important it is to work in an optimized version of EBS that is fully protected by Oracle as it will eliminate the risks and costs associated with cyberattacks or a low-performing system.
Leaders responsible for modernization should focus on:
- Incentivizing the remediation of underlying technical debt;
- Determining how valuable the system upgrade is and the value it will bring once adopted;
- Guide stakeholders in modernization processes to ensure it’s a natural part of their workflow.
One straightforward way to achieve cost efficiency is engaging in a resource-sharing model where you split portions of the upgrade tasks between your internal teams and an external team of EBS upgrade consultants who can skillfully take care of some of the most challenging upgrade tasks.
If you find that your budget is cause for concern and you’re set on finding practical solutions to reduce costs, you can leverage a task-sharing model where consultants are engaged in the Functional, Technical, and DBA workstreams, which can be thought of as the bulk of the effort during the upgrade process, all while teaching your internal team what needs to be done so they can perform a portion of the tasks. To learn more about each of these workstreams, we highly encourage you to download our latest infographic where we break down what each of these workstreams entail.
Cost reduction strategies are at the heart of most software or system upgrade efforts. It’s a big factor to consider and one that should be carefully thought out as application leaders and decision makers are often pressured to maximize a complex application portfolio. Application support can end up being one of the most costly aspects of an application, especially if your system version is outdated or exposed to greater risks by not adhering to the latest standards.
By upgrading your Oracle EBS to R12.2, you not only ensure that your application is continuously updated and optimized, but you’ll also rest assured that your instance is not exposed to unwanted costs due to outages or cyberattacks, or additional support fees that you may end up paying to remain compliant, like Oracle’s Market Driven Support that only covers your application for the years 2022 and 2023 in a limited fashion.
