Leveraging AI for Predictive Technical Debt Management in SAP Development Ecosystems: Case Studies and Future Prospects

Authors

  • Vamsi Krishna Talasila

Keywords:

Technical debt, SAP, Technical Debt Management, AI

Abstract

Technical debt (TD) acts as the silent killer in massive, integrated SAP ecosystems and is often the main reason projects crash and burn. We simply can’t afford to be reactive anymore; we need to get ahead of the problem with Predictive Technical Debt Management (PTDM). This paper proposes a PTDM framework that uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to handle three critical jobs: predicting what will break, prioritizing what to fix, and keeping the deployment line moving. We use a binary classification model (Algorithm 1) to guess the odds of an ABAP object failing, and we apply Natural Language Processing (NLP) to support tickets to figure out which bugs are actually hurting the business (Algorithm 2). By wrapping this in a Continuous PTDM Loop (Algorithm 3), we automate the creation of remediation tasks. Our operational case studies like an S/4HANA migration triage and continuous performance forecasting (Algorithm 4) show that this AI-driven approach speeds up custom code cleanup and stabilizes the system by calculating the "interest rate" of debt before it becomes too expensive to pay off. We wrap up by discussing future research into Deep Learning for semantic debt detection and managing debt in cloud-native SAP landscapes.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

M. Muthusamy, Cloud-Native AI metrics model for real-time banking project monitoring with integrated safety and SAP quality assurance, International Journal of Research and Applied Innovations, 7(1), 2024, 10135-10144.

B.K. Pandey, A. Tanikonda, S.R. Peddinti, and S.R. Katragadda, Ai-driven methodologies for mitigating technical debt in legacy systems, Journal of Science & Technology (JST), 2(2), 2021.

J.S. Prabakaran, Cognitive Cloud Framework for AI-Assisted SAP Financial Modernization and Database Reliability Testing, International Journal of Engineering & Extended Technologies Research (IJEETR), 7(5), 2025, 10559-10564.

L.A. Baumann, Responsible AI and Intelligent Automation for Enterprise Cloud Platforms A Software Defined and Sensor Aware Framework for SAP HANA Maintenance and Governance, International Journal of Research Publications in Engineering, Technology and Management (IJRPETM), 6(4), 2023, 9001-9005.

D. Albuquerque, E. Guimarães, G. Tonin, P. Rodríguezs, M. Perkusich, H. Almeida, A. Perkusich, and F. Chagas, Managing technical debt using intelligent techniques-a systematic mapping study, IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, 49(4), 2022, 2202-2220.

A.K. Aleti, Reinforcement Learning Driven Adaptive Software Testing with Continuous Fault Anticipation and Self-Healing Feedback Loops in SAP, International Journal of Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, and Machine Learning, 6(4), 2025, 21-28.

C. Atakari, AI-Driven Predictive Maintenance Models in ERP Systems for Critical Infrastructure and National Defense Logistics, International Journal of Emerging Research in Engineering and Technology, 6(1), 2025, 82-90.

M.D. Chawla, AI-Driven Cloud Framework for Software Maintenance in Life Insurance Systems: Gray Relational Analysis of Risk, Security, and Scalability in SAP and Oracle EBS Deployments, International Journal of Advanced Research in Computer Science & Technology (IJARCST), 6(6), 2023, 9483-9487.

L. Aversano, M.L. Bernardi, M. Cimitile, M. Iammarino, and D. Montano, Forecasting technical debt evolution in software systems: an empirical study, Frontiers of Computer Science, 17(3), 2023, 173210.

S. Sarferaz, Implementing AI into ERP Software, Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 57(1), 2025, 74.

P.R. Jonathan, Intelligent Cloud-SAP Software Framework for AI-Driven Healthcare Analytics and Process Optimization, International Journal of Research and Applied Innovations, 8(Special Issue 1), 2025, 22-27.

V.K. Kola, AI-Powered Test Case Generation for Regulatory Compliance: Leveraging Generative AI in SAP and Salesforce Environments, Journal of Computer Science and Technology Studies, 7(3), 2025, 554-560.

V. Petchiappan, AI-Powered Data Load Automation from SAP HANA to Cloud Platforms with Instant Error-Handling Techniques, Journal of Computer Science and Technology Studies, 7(5), 2025, 272-282.

J.A. Barnes, Modernizing Loan Software with AI-Cloud Ecosystems: SAP Integration, Citrix Access, Wireless APIs, and Banking Services, International Journal of Research Publications in Engineering, Technology and Management (IJRPETM), 8(5), 2025, 12741-12745.

R.K. Puvvada, SAP S/4HANA Finance on Cloud: AI-Powered Deployment and Extensibility, IJSAT-International Journal on Science and Technology, 16(1), 2025.

H. Müller, A. Kharitonov, A. Nahhas, S. Bosse, and K. Turowski, Addressing it capacity management concerns using machine learning techniques, SN Computer Science, 3(1), 2022, 26.

P. Avgeriou, I. Ozkaya, H. Koziolek, Z. Codabux, and N. Ernst, Reframing Technical Debt (Dagstuhl Perspectives Workshop 24452), Dagstuhl Reports, 14(11), 2025, 16-39.

S. Sarferaz, Implementing Agentic AI into ERP Software, IEEE Access, 2025.

P.S.R.P. Muntala, The Future of Self-Healing ERP Systems: AI-Driven Root Cause Analysis and Remediation, International Journal of AI, BigData, Computational and Management Studies, 5(2), 2024, 102-116.

K.A. Solberg, Optimizing SAP-Integrated Cloud and Machine Learning for Rural Healthcare with AI Governance, Cybersecurity, and Risk Control, International Journal of Research Publications in Engineering, Technology and Management (IJRPETM), 7(6), 2024, 11548-11552.

M. Muthusamy, A Scalable Cloud-Enabled SAP-Centric AI/ML Framework for Healthcare Powered by NLP Processing and BERT-Driven Insights, International Journal of Computer Technology and Electronics Communication, 8(5), 2025, 11457-11462.

V. Banerjee, Data Migration Strategies for SAP S/4HANA: Leveraging SAP Joule for Business Transformation, Journal of Computer Science and Technology Studies, 7(9), 2025, 271-279.

M. Hariharan, Reinforcement Learning Integrated Agentic RAG for Software Test Cases Authoring, arXiv preprint arXiv:2512.06060, 2025.

R.R. Althar, D. Samanta, S. Purushotham, S.S. Sengar, and C. Hewage, Design and development of artificial intelligence knowledge processing system for optimizing security of software system, SN Computer Science, 4(4), 2023, 331.

A.C. Márquez, Digital maintenance management (Berlin/Heidelberg: Springer, 2022).

S. Höhn and N. Faradouris, What does it cost to deploy an XAI system: A case study in legacy systems, in International Workshop on Explainable, Transparent Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, (Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2021) 173-186.

R. Khalil, Design and Evaluation of an AI-Driven Workflow for Technical Debt Remediation in Software Systems, master's thesis, University of Turku, Turku, Finland, 2025.

T. Fehrer, R.C. Lozoya, A. Sabetta, D. Di Nucci, and D.A. Tamburri, Detecting security fixes in open-source repositories using static code analyzers, Proc. 28th International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering, Salerno, Italy, 2024, 429-432.

M. Begoug, M. Chouchen, A. Ouni, E.A. Alomar, and M.W. Mkaouer, Fine-grained just-in-time defect prediction at the block level in Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC), Proc. 21st International Conference on Mining Software Repositories, Lisbon, Portugal, 2024, 100-112.

G. An, J. Yoon, T. Bach, J. Hong, and S. Yoo, Just-in-time flaky test detection via abstracted failure symptom matching, Proc. 2024 IEEE International Conference on Software Maintenance and Evolution (ICSME), Flagstaff, AZ, 2024, 741-752.

Downloads

Published

28.02.2026

How to Cite

Vamsi Krishna Talasila. (2026). Leveraging AI for Predictive Technical Debt Management in SAP Development Ecosystems: Case Studies and Future Prospects. International Journal of Intelligent Systems and Applications in Engineering, 14(1s), 89–95. Retrieved from https://www.ijisae.org/index.php/IJISAE/article/view/8124

Issue

Section

Research Article