How the city of Johannesburg modernized its core systems and paved the way for innovation

Faced with aging infrastructure and growing operational risks, the City of Johannesburg partnered with SAP to stabilize its IT environment, upgrade legacy systems, and drive meaningful transformation.

The City of Johannesburg was at a critical juncture. Its core IT systems were outdated, heavily customized, and no longer fit to support the demands of a modern, digitally driven municipality. As Aubrey Mochela, Group Chief Technology Officer, recalls, “We were working with a virtual dinosaur sitting on top of a physical dinosaur, the infrastructure was at serious risk.”

For over 15 years, the city had relied on SAP version 4.7, a platform that had been customized to the point of losing alignment with best practices. The decision to upgrade required a complete shutdown of SAP operations for 21 days, a bold but necessary move to prevent system failure.

The turning point came when city leaders, in collaboration with SAP, established a public-private partnership focused on three priorities: stabilizing operations, migrating to modern technology, and redefining business processes to support innovation.

“We couldn’t build a smart city on top of old processes,” says Mochela. “Treasury guidelines and industry best practices must align, and we knew technology alone wasn’t enough. It was time to rethink how the organization worked.”

Transitioning to SAP S/4HANA was not just a technical upgrade; it was a complete re-implementation of how the city managed key functions. The migration also required cultural change, especially when it came to cloud adoption. One of the early hurdles was internal resistance to moving Human Capital Management (HCM) to the cloud.

Sergio Maccotta, Senior Vice President at SAP Middle East and Africa South, emphasizes that cloud is no longer a question of if, but how. “We’re long past the debate about whether cloud should be adopted,” he notes. “What matters now is how quickly organizations can leverage it to drive innovation and free up IT teams to focus on business strategy, not system maintenance.”

Today, the City of Johannesburg has not only stabilized its environment but is also building a more responsive and innovative digital foundation. By embracing modern infrastructure and aligning processes with global best practices, the city is better equipped to serve its residents and adapt to future challenges.

This article first appeared on ITOnline.