Software is an ever-evolving and self-disrupting space, but it is possible to capture the core trends that are underpinning its direction. This is what we did in our Second Annual State of ERP Testing report.

It’s been a year of record-breaking revenue gains for ERP giants like Oracle and Workday, and that acceleration has spread to auxiliary industries like testing and services. However, it’s also been a year of economic uncertainty. How are these factors playing off of each other, and what do you need to know to make the best decisions heading into 2024?

We surveyed 437 IT and business leaders about their ERP systems and testing practices to find out.

But before I jump into the findings: you should download the full report here.

Overall, we found that the State of ERP testing is strong. The industry remains largely insulated from economic adversity because of its non-negotiable importance to ERP systems. And as ERP systems grow in importance and scale, it’s only natural that ERP testing does, as well.

The specific findings in our report highlight why.

Increasing Cloud migrations and “SaaS Mess” means more (and better) ERP testing is needed

It’s increasingly a Cloud-based world. The Cloud migration market grew 22% in 2023, and 76% of our respondents have already moved or started their move to Cloud-based ERP systems. Anyone who’s gone through a Cloud migration will tell you that migrations require testing. A ton of testing. More testing than you can imagine. And organizations are meeting that need by investing more in testing tools and services.

Along with more ERP cloud migrations, our survey found

organizations simply have more Cloud applications now… perhaps too many. 83% of our respondents say they’re using more SaaS tools than last year. We’ve termed the complexity caused by a large number of highly customized SaaS and ERP apps a “SaaS mess.” This “mess” is increasing ERP testing demand for two reasons: one, to ensure frequent integrations continue to function properly, and two, because SaaS tools update more frequently than on-premise systems. Customers are compelled to push these updates whether they want to or not, leaving them with no alternative but to prioritize testing.

ROI is Top of Mind

The past year has been a bumpy one economically. Leadership teams are more risk-averse than in the past, and want to see proven ROI information before committing to a software purchase or contract. 74% of our respondents said that ROI is more important to them this year.

ERP testing plays directly into ROI, as it helps organizations reap more value from their costly ERP systems through optimizing processes, gaining user buy-in, and ensuring worst case scenarios don’t happen.

And organizations are starting to realize that even more ROI is gained from test automation, with 55% of our respondents saying they’ll be investing in automation over the next year. This is yet another confirmation of an overarching trend of modern enterprises turning towards automation in order to stay competitive.

The Future of ERP Testing: Artificial Intelligence & DevOps

This final section of the report found that AI and DevOps are shaping the future of ERP testing. We’re using these findings as inspiration to shape much of Opkey’s product roadmap.

With built-in features like self-generating and self-healing test scripts, product innovations that enable true DevOps for ERP implementations, and AI-powered process mining technology, we’re confident that Opkey is primed to lead this space into a productive future.

Want to see how? Request a demo and my team is here for you.