An ERP Maintenance Model

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) maintenance and upgrade activities are receiving much attention in ERP-using organizations. Annual maintenance costs approximate 25% of initial ERP implementation costs, and upgrade costs as much as 25-33% of the initial ERP implementation. Still, the area of ERP maintenance and upgrade is relatively new and understudied as compared to ERP implementation issues. Many organizations lack experience and expertise in managing ERP maintenance and upgrade effectively. This situation is not helped by the lack of a standard ERP maintenance model that could provide practitioners with guidelines on planning, implementing and upgrading an ERP. Although software maintenance model standards exist, they have been found in a recent study to be insufficient for ERP maintenance and upgrade processes. In order to bridge this gap in literature and practice, this study proposes a preliminary ERP maintenance model, reflecting fundamental ERP maintenance and upgrade activities. A detailed case study was conducted to gather empirical data for developing such an ERP maintenance model. Data analysis identified (potential) benefits of the maintenance model to ERP-using organizations generally, and to the case firm in particular.