3727053 - Replicating Cost Centers from SAP S/4HANA 2025 to SuccessFactors Employee Central: Choosing between MDI and Cloud Integration (CPI)

When planning a new integration or migrating to SAP S/4HANA 2025 (Private Cloud or On-Premise), customers often need to decide whether to use the legacy SAP Cloud Integration (CPI) iFlows or the SAP Master Data Integration (MDI) service to replicate Cost Centers to SuccessFactors Employee Central.

Users may notice documentation indicating that the traditional integration components are being deprecated and require clarification on the supported path forward for the 2025 release and beyond.

• SAP SuccessFactors HCM Suite
  • Employee Central
• SAP S4/HANA
• SAP BTP

With the release of SAP S/4HANA 2025, SAP has officially deprecated the ODTFINCC software component. This component is the technical foundation for the standard "point-to-point" iFlows in SAP Cloud Integration used for Cost Center replication.

As part of the "Clean Core" and "Suite Quality" initiatives, SAP's strategic direction for master data orchestration has shifted to a hub-and-spoke model using the One Domain Model (ODM) via SAP Master Data Integration (MDI).

For all new implementations and upgrades involving SAP S/4HANA 2025, SAP strongly recommends using SAP Master Data Integration (MDI) as the primary solution for replicating Cost Centers to SuccessFactors Employee Central.

1. Why use MDI for S/4HANA 2025?

• Supportability: Since ODTFINCC is deprecated in the 2025 release, it will no longer receive functional enhancements and will eventually be removed in future releases.
• Architecture: MDI acts as a central hub. S/4HANA publishes the Cost Center once, and SuccessFactors (along with other potential consumers) fetches the data using a standardized format (ODM).
• Reduced Complexity: Using MDI removes the need to maintain custom mapping or complex iFlow logic within Cloud Integration, as SuccessFactors has a native MDI consumer.

2. Can Cloud Integration (CPI) still be used?

Technically, the iFlows remain available in the SAP Business Accelerator Hub for backward compatibility. However, using them for a 2025 release is considered a legacy approach. It should only be used as a temporary fallback if MDI is not viable due to specific landscape constraints (e.g., lack of BTP access or highly non-standard legacy requirements).

• Introduction to Cost Center Replication - CPI: "If you set up a new integration and are planning to move from SAP ERP to SAP S/4HANA, we recommend that you use the SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central integration with SAP Master Data Integration to replicate cost centers from SAP S/4HANA (on-premise edition) or SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition to Employee Central. For more information, refer to Scenario: Integrating Cost Center from SAP Master Data Integration to Employee Central in Integrating SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central with SAP Master Data Integration. If SAP Master Data Integration is not a viable solution for you, you can still use this guide to set up the replication of cost centers using SAP Cloud Integration. However, please keep in mind that with the SAP S/4HANA 2025 release, the ODTFINCC software component will be deprecated and you will need to use SAP Master Data Integration to replicate cost centers from then on."
• Integrating SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central with SAP Master Data Integration

Cost Center, S/4HANA 2025, SuccessFactors, Employee Central, MDI, Master Data Integration, CPI, Cloud Integration, ODTFINCC, Deprecation, ODM, One Domain Model, Replication, Integration. , KBA , LOD-SF-INT-MDI , OneMDI Business Scenarios , Problem