Regarding what SAP can do better in SAP Master Data Governance, they have an entire roadmap of constant improvements since they deployed the product, always adding new business functionality and add-ons. Each company may have different feedback, wishing for certain features. The essence of SAP Master Data Governance is to provide structure, and from my standpoint, it offers a pretty good structure. There will always be areas for improvement; for example, when I deployed it a few years ago, their approach to internal orders for finance was still new, and they were figuring out how it would work based on organizational requirements. The financial data objects are straightforward, but financial statements are a bit more challenging. It is not a one-time deployment; it requires ongoing investment in user and product knowledge, and you need to weigh the pros and cons of any IT solution. I often advise clients to walk before they run because establishing hierarchies requires having a designed structure before implementation, though you can add that later. For additional functions in SAP Master Data Governance, it is interesting because on my project, we are already using AI technology for data cleansing before records are entered into SAP Master Data Governance. It would be beneficial to have the Dun & Bradstreet add-on within SAP Master Data Governance. However, one must remember that for AI to work effectively, it requires good data. Without that, AI does not make a difference. SAP Master Data Governance will always require a human perspective, especially to identify duplicate records. While SAP Master Data Governance provides technical capabilities for identifying potential duplicates based on searches, it requires human oversight due to the complexity of analyzing data fields. I believe integrating AI into the product could work, particularly after a solid data migration, which ensures that the records are reliable before utilizing AI for analytics.
Senior Master Data Consultant at a tech consulting company with 501-1,000 employees
Consultant
Top 5
Aug 8, 2025
I don't see any disadvantages or areas for improvement that I can think of, to be honest. It's sometimes challenging when you have to develop custom fields, but then usually it works, even when deploying specific changes for a specific country. It's usually doable, but it needs many custom activities to be aligned. The challenging part is that it takes much effort because it needs extra build initiatives by ABAP logic, and many technical people need to be involved. It's not straightforward sometimes. When deploying MDG to a new country with requirements to onboard suppliers with specific fields that are not in the standard template of MDG or S/4HANA, you need to build those new items. These are usually fields that need to be added into the existing interface, systems, UI, and NWBC. Unless it's part of the SAP standard, it can create extra work and needs significant technical involvement. That is one of the main disadvantages.
Regarding SAP Master Data Governance, there is significant room for improvement particularly concerning the replication types. For example, when a vendor master is created in Ariba and a request is submitted from the Ariba system, SAP Ariba directs it to MDG. MDG verifies the details entirely through PI/PO or CPI. Once MDG verifies the data, the request is submitted to the S/4HANA system, the target. After a final approval at all levels, the vendor number is generated, and the vendor code gets passed from source to target system. This number is available in both the Ariba integration in the systems and in SAP BPT code, as well as the S/4HANA system.
SAP Manager at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 5
Nov 25, 2024
SAP could do better in attracting talent and simplifying technology adoption. There's a need for SAP to develop an overall technology stack and bring resources up to speed with new technologies like cloud. Training is essential, and they should carry resources along with their roadmap.
We are trying to get the cloud solution of SAP Master Data Governance for multiple clients, which requires more improvement. Bill of materials (BOM) creation in manufacturing needs to be enhanced in SAP Master Data Governance. Clients have also suggested improvements in managing a hierarchy and ensuring that you maintain and work on the hierarchy side.
SAP is a closed tool. Integrating with it requires a lot of effort and money. It is also very expensive and not flexible. If you want to make a change, it takes 30-60 working days compared to others, where you can do things in one hour.
Master Data Delivery at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 5
Jul 1, 2024
Instead of ABAP coding for some workflows, it would be helpful to have alternative solutions. Many people are not proficient in ABAP. If there were easy, configurable options or templates, it would be beneficial. So, any user has to understand the coding process to work with the product. We need technical support to understand the coding. There is a lack of resources who have this knowledge. If one resource is handling the product and needs to hand it over, it is difficult for a new resource to understand the coding. It would be great if there were more straightforward configurations, like in other SAP modules, such as sales and distribution or materials management. These are configurable without much technical understanding. If there were a data quality tool within the product, or some kind of consolidation with MDG, it would be good. Currently, data quality management and consolidation are separate tools. There is a lack of clarity on how to create Bills of Materials (BOMs) and routings. There is some standard solution for that, but it needs improvement.
There were challenges with handling multiple values within a single input field at the screen level. Think of a typical e-commerce website where you manually provide values. SAP MDG is designed for single values, so we sometimes need to multiply values within a specific input field. We've addressed this by using a custom enhancement or an add-on application (I'd need to confirm the correct technical term for "EAP application"). Forms can also be tricky. We sometimes need to use input tokenizers, especially when there's a potential for conflicts at runtime. Dynamically managing the appearance of these elements has been a challenge that we've successfully resolved.
Functional Manager at a consultancy with 1-10 employees
Real User
Top 20
Nov 28, 2023
The profiling feature, especially for materials, needs improvement. We faced challenges maintaining specific details for a single material from multiple vendors.
Associate Director, IT Business Partner, Strategic Business Solutions at a consumer goods company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Oct 25, 2023
It is difficult to expand the product with new functionalities. It takes time and specific knowledge. We require a specialist with experience in it. Integration with other tools like Salesforce and SAP Ariba is not stable. The product is not user-friendly. It takes time to work with the tool. The tool is not flexible.
Senior SAP Basis Consultant at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Jan 25, 2021
I really look at it from the technology side, rather than use it from the function side. So, there are not really many improvements I can see from the functionality. I would like to see harmonizing with some of the external third-party products so that it will all be within SAP.
SAP Master Data Governance centralizes data governance with a user-friendly interface and robust integration capabilities, ensuring streamlined approval processes and a definitive data source.SAP Master Data Governance facilitates efficient management of enterprise data through its business workflow engine, seamless integration with ERP and other systems, and multidomain MDM features. It enhances data quality management by addressing duplicates and supports customization for data...
Regarding what SAP can do better in SAP Master Data Governance, they have an entire roadmap of constant improvements since they deployed the product, always adding new business functionality and add-ons. Each company may have different feedback, wishing for certain features. The essence of SAP Master Data Governance is to provide structure, and from my standpoint, it offers a pretty good structure. There will always be areas for improvement; for example, when I deployed it a few years ago, their approach to internal orders for finance was still new, and they were figuring out how it would work based on organizational requirements. The financial data objects are straightforward, but financial statements are a bit more challenging. It is not a one-time deployment; it requires ongoing investment in user and product knowledge, and you need to weigh the pros and cons of any IT solution. I often advise clients to walk before they run because establishing hierarchies requires having a designed structure before implementation, though you can add that later. For additional functions in SAP Master Data Governance, it is interesting because on my project, we are already using AI technology for data cleansing before records are entered into SAP Master Data Governance. It would be beneficial to have the Dun & Bradstreet add-on within SAP Master Data Governance. However, one must remember that for AI to work effectively, it requires good data. Without that, AI does not make a difference. SAP Master Data Governance will always require a human perspective, especially to identify duplicate records. While SAP Master Data Governance provides technical capabilities for identifying potential duplicates based on searches, it requires human oversight due to the complexity of analyzing data fields. I believe integrating AI into the product could work, particularly after a solid data migration, which ensures that the records are reliable before utilizing AI for analytics.
I don't see any disadvantages or areas for improvement that I can think of, to be honest. It's sometimes challenging when you have to develop custom fields, but then usually it works, even when deploying specific changes for a specific country. It's usually doable, but it needs many custom activities to be aligned. The challenging part is that it takes much effort because it needs extra build initiatives by ABAP logic, and many technical people need to be involved. It's not straightforward sometimes. When deploying MDG to a new country with requirements to onboard suppliers with specific fields that are not in the standard template of MDG or S/4HANA, you need to build those new items. These are usually fields that need to be added into the existing interface, systems, UI, and NWBC. Unless it's part of the SAP standard, it can create extra work and needs significant technical involvement. That is one of the main disadvantages.
Regarding SAP Master Data Governance, there is significant room for improvement particularly concerning the replication types. For example, when a vendor master is created in Ariba and a request is submitted from the Ariba system, SAP Ariba directs it to MDG. MDG verifies the details entirely through PI/PO or CPI. Once MDG verifies the data, the request is submitted to the S/4HANA system, the target. After a final approval at all levels, the vendor number is generated, and the vendor code gets passed from source to target system. This number is available in both the Ariba integration in the systems and in SAP BPT code, as well as the S/4HANA system.
SAP could do better in attracting talent and simplifying technology adoption. There's a need for SAP to develop an overall technology stack and bring resources up to speed with new technologies like cloud. Training is essential, and they should carry resources along with their roadmap.
We are trying to get the cloud solution of SAP Master Data Governance for multiple clients, which requires more improvement. Bill of materials (BOM) creation in manufacturing needs to be enhanced in SAP Master Data Governance. Clients have also suggested improvements in managing a hierarchy and ensuring that you maintain and work on the hierarchy side.
SAP is a closed tool. Integrating with it requires a lot of effort and money. It is also very expensive and not flexible. If you want to make a change, it takes 30-60 working days compared to others, where you can do things in one hour.
Instead of ABAP coding for some workflows, it would be helpful to have alternative solutions. Many people are not proficient in ABAP. If there were easy, configurable options or templates, it would be beneficial. So, any user has to understand the coding process to work with the product. We need technical support to understand the coding. There is a lack of resources who have this knowledge. If one resource is handling the product and needs to hand it over, it is difficult for a new resource to understand the coding. It would be great if there were more straightforward configurations, like in other SAP modules, such as sales and distribution or materials management. These are configurable without much technical understanding. If there were a data quality tool within the product, or some kind of consolidation with MDG, it would be good. Currently, data quality management and consolidation are separate tools. There is a lack of clarity on how to create Bills of Materials (BOMs) and routings. There is some standard solution for that, but it needs improvement.
The technical support should be improved.
There were challenges with handling multiple values within a single input field at the screen level. Think of a typical e-commerce website where you manually provide values. SAP MDG is designed for single values, so we sometimes need to multiply values within a specific input field. We've addressed this by using a custom enhancement or an add-on application (I'd need to confirm the correct technical term for "EAP application"). Forms can also be tricky. We sometimes need to use input tokenizers, especially when there's a potential for conflicts at runtime. Dynamically managing the appearance of these elements has been a challenge that we've successfully resolved.
The platform's pricing needs improvement.
The profiling feature, especially for materials, needs improvement. We faced challenges maintaining specific details for a single material from multiple vendors.
It is difficult to expand the product with new functionalities. It takes time and specific knowledge. We require a specialist with experience in it. Integration with other tools like Salesforce and SAP Ariba is not stable. The product is not user-friendly. It takes time to work with the tool. The tool is not flexible.
SAP should come up with specialized services as per their customer's requirements.
I really look at it from the technology side, rather than use it from the function side. So, there are not really many improvements I can see from the functionality. I would like to see harmonizing with some of the external third-party products so that it will all be within SAP.