Simplify Your Business with Smart Subscription Management

subscription billing

The Rise of Smart Subscription Management

Imagine this: A fast-growing SaaS startup rolls out a new AI-powered tool. Within weeks, it gains global traction. But soon, the team is drowning in billing issues manual invoicing errors, delayed payments, and a lack of clarity on who is on which plan. Revenue leaks become inevitable, and customer satisfaction starts to dip.

The ongoing situations continue to recur without end. As companies adopt subscription-based sales methods for their products, including software, media, and IoT devices, they face significant challenges in accurately and rapidly generating revenue. Organizations now expect flexibility to be their standard operating procedure.

Standard billing systems often fail to keep pace with the demands of modern operations.  They cannot scale to meet the volume of customers, transactions, and/or complexities in recurring revenue & consumption-based models, and lack the fundamental perspective of ongoing or recurring customer relationships.

Many legacy systems view monetization as a single transaction, much like checkout at the grocery store – pay for your items, and our relationship is done; we hope you return for more business in the future.   These systems cannot comprehend the intricacies and complexities of an ongoing relationship with that customer, which may involve variable recurring and ongoing charges, usage and consumption charges, incentives, allowances, entitlements, and minimum commitments.

SAP Quote to Cash solutions provide purpose-built support for contemporary pricing methods, which support not only these complexities but also many more that arise when embarking on recurring revenue and monetization transformation.   These solutions enable you to manage customer contracts and track usage data while generating real-time billing information.

But here’s the key: SAP’s Quote-to-Cash portfolio includes different solutions with different, sometimes overlapping, sometimes confusing, capabilities.

This blog aims to help clarify confusion and demonstrate how Mobolutions provides a strategic advantage not only in your SAP solution selection but also in implementation and change management success.

Why the World is Subscribing, Not Buying

The current economic landscape is showing a transition toward access models, which replace conventional product sales with service-based approaches. Modern consumers have shown a preference for subscription services in various industries, including software, entertainment, automotive, and others, over traditional one-time transactions. The growing preference for subscription services has led to recurring revenue models that enable organizations to generate stable income while enhancing client relations and accelerating development activities.

The transformation process generates fresh operational difficulties. Conventional billing systems encounter challenges when handling dynamic pricing and usage monitoring, as well as mid-cycle adjustments and personalized billings. Automated billing processes raise the level of operational risk through mistake occurrence, time delays, and uncollected revenue. Businesses which operate with outdated systems encounter problems related to regulatory compliance and customer discontent as well as extended market entry periods.

Modern organizations need robust and forward-looking solutions to handle their Quote-to-Cash processes and Recurring Revenue Monetization needs. Organizations can choose SAP Subscription Billing as their cloud-native agile solution which enables rapid deployment and flexible pricing models and seamless integration with SAP BTP and Public Cloud or SAP S/4HANA Billing and Revenue Innovation Management (BRIM) as a modular enterprise-grade suite which manages complex subscription orchestration and real-time usage charging and large-scale billing for digital-first business models and scalable recurring revenue.

Analyzing the SAP Quote-to-Cash Options:

Preface: The Wrong Questions Lead to Misleading Answers

Many SAP customers start by asking: “Should I use SAP Subscription Billing or SAP BRIM?”

But the better question is:

“What subscription management tools are available & recommended to me, given my ERP deployment model—and how do I make the most of them?”

This blog clarifies how SAP’s subscription billing tools align with ERP choices and explains how Mobolutions helps customers navigate and optimize these options for recurring revenue success.

Consider: What Determines Your Subscription Management Options?

SAP offers two powerful ways to support subscription and usage-based business models:

But what you can, or are recommended to use is dictated by how your ERP is deployed:

ERP Deployment Model Recommended / Available 
Subscription Monetization Engine*
SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition (GROW) SAP Subscription Billing only**
SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition (RISE) SAP S/4HANA BRIM
SAP S/4HANA On Premise SAP S/4HANA BRIM
Non-SAP ERP (3rd-party) SAP S/4HANA BRIM

*Specifically focusing on Subscription Monetization capabilities, as SAP Contract Accounting and Convergent Invoicing (FI-CA, CI) Invoice-to-Cash capabilities are available in both S/4HANA BRIM (any premise) and S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, and thus available in all options.

** SB’s primary intended ERP integration, and SAP’s future strategy for this solution, is S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition.   Other deployments are technically possible with project-based integration, but not recommended by SAP and may not be commercially viable.

Part 1: SAP subscription management in SAP Public Cloud (GROW)

If you’re deploying SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition (the GROW model), your recommended subscription management path is clear:

SAP Subscription Billing (SB) is the supported solution

What Is SAP Subscription Billing?

The Agile Engine for Digital-First Businesses in the Public Cloud

Native to SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP), SB is designed for:

  • Simple or mid-complexity subscription models
  • Digital-native businesses, SaaS, IoT, and pay-per-use models
  • Fast time-to-value, high extensibility, and low TCO

 Key Features

  • Define and manage subscription products, pricing models, and usage rules
  • Automate subscription lifecycle: trial, contract, renewals, cancellations
  • Real-time usage tracking, rating, and billing
  • Seamless integration with SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, SAP Entitlements Management
  • Embedded with analytics, workflow automation, and extensibility via SAP BTP
  • Automates the generation of billing data, renewals, usage aggregation, and notifications
  • Reduces manual errors and improves billing cycle efficiency
  • Regular feature updates through SAP BTP, with no heavy infrastructure required

Mobolutions Tip: Maximize your public cloud deployment with our BTP accelerators and packaged integrations.

Part 2: SAP subscription management in SAP Private Cloud (RISE) or Other

If you’re on SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition, On-Prem, or integrating to a 3rd-party ERP, the solution set expands:

SAP S/4HANA for Billing and Revenue Innovation Management (BRIM) becomes your default solution suite

What Is SAP BRIM? 

The Enterprise-Grade Suite for Complex Monetization Models

SAP BRIM is a modular suite that supports high-volume, complex billing environments.
It includes:

  • S/4HANA Subscription Order Management (SOM)
  • SAP Convergent Charging (CC)
  • S/4HANA Convergent Invoicing (CI)
  • S/4HANA Contract Accounting Receivables & Payables (FI-CA)

Ideal for:

  • Complex subscription bundles and usage scenarios
  • High-volume event processing
  • Telecom, utilities, media, transportation, mobility, media & entertainment, high-tech, and more

Key Strengths

  • Orchestrates multi-service subscriptions with bundling and dependencies
  • Handles real-time rating of usage events
    (e.g., per-second charging, data thresholds)
  • Invoice consolidation and convergence of different billing streams
    (SAP & non-SAP)
  • Advanced dunning, collections, and settlement via FI-CA
  • Natively integrates with S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition or On Prem, SAP Entitlements Management, SAP CPQ, SAP Revenue Accounting and Reporting, and more
  • Supports integration with 3rd party ERPs

What’s Unique in Private Cloud or On-Prem?

  • SOM + CC: Not available in Public Cloud. These handle advanced orchestration, bundling, and rating of subscription and usage-based services.
  • Unmatched Scalability & Flexibility: With the full S/4HANA BRIM solution suite and S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition infrastructure, BRIM is unmatched in terms of being able to scale with complexities, volumes, and whatever future business models may bring.

What’s Shared Across Both?

  • CI & FI-CA: Available in both GROW and RISE. These modules handle invoicing, receivables, revenue sharing, dunning & collections, integration to Finance, and more.

Part 3: Side-by-Side Comparison (Based on Deployment Model)

Feature Public Cloud (GROW) Private Cloud  (or OP / Other)
Primary Subscription Engine & Deployment SAP Subscription Billing
(Public Cloud BTP Based)
SAP BRIM’s
Subscription Order Management module
(S/4HANA native)
Orchestration & Bundling Basic:   some bundling within S/4HANA Solution Order, other dependencies in some cases of bundling in Commerce / CPQ layer. Advanced:   full bundling support within S/4HANA, as well as native integration to SAP CPQ.
Real-time Rating included via SAP Price Calculation Service (PCS) SAP Convergent Charging (CC)
Invoicing & Accounting Standard Integration from SB (BTP) to Invoice to Cash (S/4HANA GROW)

S/4 Options include:
— SAP Sales Billing (SD) + FI-AR + Receivables Management
— SAP Contract Accounting & Invoicing (CI + FI-CA)

End-to-End S/4HANA solution inclusive of Invoice-to-Cash.

S/4 BRIM solution suite includes
SAP Contract Accounting & Invoicing (CI + FI-CA)
and also supports native S/4 integration with
SAP SD + FI-AR + Receivables Management

Customization & Extensibility SAP BTP (low-code) Full SAP enhancement framework
Primary Use Cases & Industries  Fast-growing SaaS, DaaS, & digital service businesses High-volume industries like telecom, utilities, transportation, Media, XaaS, etc.
Customer Base Best Suited B2B Simple Subscription,
Low-volume B2C
All: B2C, B2B, B2B2x – simple & complex subscription & event-based, convergent scenarios, high-volume, indirect, partner ecosystem, 3rd party billing, etc.
Scalability Mid-volume, fast-growing firms High-volume, Enterprise-grade scalability; able to support millions of billing events/day
Deployment Effort Fast deployment, low-code config Longer implementation cycles, focusing on phased quick-wins
Cost & TCO Lower total cost of ownership  Scope & scale dependent, higher costs comparative to SB, but higher ROI as well

 NOTE:  While not typically recommended by SAP, hybrid models across different Cloud ERP deployments and Subscription Monetization solutions are technically feasible with the right integration and SAP approvals. Mobolutions offers proven accelerators and expertise to manage these complex scenarios.

Part 4: When & How to Decide – Subscription Billing vs BRIM

First and foremost, choosing between Subscription Billing or BRIM depends largely on wider ERP deployment model decisions and the associated capabilities of the ERP regarding Invoice-to-Cash, Revenue Recognition, and other related areas.

With regards to Subscription Management itself, choosing between SAP Subscription Billing and SAP BRIM depends on your business size, complexity, and billing volume if you’re a mid-sized company, digital-native startup, or launching subscription services with straightforward pricing models and leveraging SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition ERP, SAP Subscription Billing offers speed, lower cost, and ease of use.

On the other hand, if your business processes millions of billing events, relies on event mediation, or operates in telecom, utilities, or transport, or leverages SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition ERP or non-SAP ERP, then SAP BRIM is the enterprise-grade suite built for you.

There are also hybrid scenarios where companies use both solutions: Subscription Billing to manage productized digital services, and BRIM for their high-volume operations. The key is to assess where flexibility, scale, and complexity intersect in your business and choose the tool that aligns with your billing goals.

The Bottom Line:  SB or BRIM?: 

It’s not always “SB or BRIM?”

It’s a question of:

“What are your ERP deployment constraints, and how do we architect the best-fit Q2C solution?”

“How much is my subscription & recurring revenue monetization strategy driving my overall transformation decisions?”

The implementation of subscription models by businesses requires an effective billing solution to drive revenue growth while improving customer satisfaction.  These subscription models must co-exist with the wider Quote-to-Cash, revenue, and finance ERP solutions.  This is why the comparison involves more than feature comparison of SAP Subscription Billing vs. SAP BRIM’s Subscription Order Management.

SAP Subscription Billing (BTP) provides a superior choice for those seeking rapid solutions and flexible options to expedite market entry. Businesses that operate using digital-first models and mid-sized companies receive the necessary agility, automation, and integration capabilities through SAP Subscription Billing on BTP.

SAP’s strategy for Subscription Billing going forward is focused on SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition (GROW) above all others.

SAP S/4HANA for Billing and Revenue Innovation Management (BRIM) remains the preferred solution for businesses managing complex high-volume billing demands.

SAP’s strategy for BRIM going forward is focused on SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition (RISE), while maintaining support for architectures involving on-premises or third-party ERPs.

Part 5: Why Mobolutions is Your Advantage

“Mobolutions helped us rethink our revenue model—and showed us how to scale it across SAP’s Quote-to-Cash portfolio.”

At Mobolutions, we’re not just implementers.

We’re Q2C strategists and SAP subscription monetization experts.

Our team at Mobolutions supports organizations by delivering customized SAP solutions tailored to their specific requirements. Our experts guide businesses through an implementation process that delivers scalable billing systems, ready to handle future growth and expansion.

Whether you’re on GROW, RISE, or a hybrid model, we help you:

Make sense of SAP’s Quote-to-Cash and Subscription Management Portfolio

Accelerate implementation with prebuilt IP & accelerators, best practices, & industry expertise for Quote-to-Cash

  • Unlock the full value of your subscription revenue streams,
  • Get the most value out of SAP AI, BTP, and Public Cloud tools
  • Integrate CPQ, billing, entitlements, revenue recognition, finance + more!
  • Align stakeholders & change management across finance, sales, and IT
  • Navigate hybrid scenarios across different solutions (SAP & non-SAP)
  • Design a scalable architecture fit for today & future-proof for ongoing evolution

Let us help you align your subscription goals with your SAP landscape—and accelerate time-to-value with proven accelerators.

Final Thoughts

SAP has intentionally aligned Subscription Billing to GROW and BRIM to RISE/On-Prem to ensure solution fit and supportability. Choosing the right subscription engine isn’t a toss-up—it’s a deployment-driven decision.

Mobolutions is your partner in navigating this journey: From fast, flexible SB deployments to complex BRIM landscapes, we bring unmatched expertise in Quote-to-Cash transformation.

Next Steps: Not Sure Which Path Is Right?

Let’s talk. Our Subscription Monetization Assessment will map your business model to the optimal SAP Q2C architecture based on:

  • Deployment model (GROW vs. RISE)
  • Monetization strategy (SaaS, usage, bundles, tiers)
  • Technical landscape (S/4HANA, BTP, CPQ, Commerce, EMS, Rev Rec, etc.)

Regulatory and financial requirements.

Related Posts