SAP has agreed to scrap reinstatement fees and cap back-maintenance charges for customers using its legacy enterprise resource planning (ERP) products, bringing an end to a European Union antitrust investigation. The German software giant's voluntary commitments, accepted by the European Commission, will make it cheaper and simpler for businesses to maintain older systems rather than being forced into costly upgrades.
The changes are particularly significant for UK organisations still running SAP ECC — the core ERP platform that reaches end-of-support in 2027. Many firms had faced steep reinstatement fees if they let their support contracts lapse, effectively locking them into expensive upgrade paths. Under the new terms, customers can return to legacy support plans without penalty, and back-maintenance charges will be capped.
Industry analysts estimate that thousands of UK mid-sized and large enterprises rely on SAP ECC for critical operations including finance, supply chain and HR. The UK's Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has previously warned that unsupported software can breach data protection rules under UK GDPR, making the support cliff a compliance risk as well as a technical one.
Dr. Alistair Finch, a technology policy researcher at the University of Cambridge, said the decision gives UK businesses breathing room. 'Many firms delayed upgrades due to cost and complexity. This removes a financial penalty for staying on older systems, but they still face a hard deadline in 2027. The EU's intervention shows how antitrust tools can shape software markets, but the ICO will expect proper data security regardless of which support tier a company chooses.'
The EU's investigation began after complaints that SAP's licensing practices locked customers into its ecosystem, potentially stifling competition from cloud rivals such as Workday and Oracle. SAP's commitments apply across the European Economic Area and will be monitored by the Commission. For UK businesses, the ruling offers immediate cost relief but does not remove the need to plan for eventual migration, particularly as the EU AI Act begins to impose new requirements on software used in high-risk applications.