SAP CPQ is SAP’s enterprise-grade solution for product configuration, pricing, and quoting. It’s built for companies with complex product catalogs, global pricing structures, and deep ties to SAP ERP. It bridges sales, commerce, and manufacturing so your reps, partners, and customers can all quote from the same product and price logic. Its core differentiators are variant-driven configurations, real-time pricing from S/4HANA, and quote workflows that automatically protect your margins. It’s not the lightest CPQ out there, but if your business runs on SAP and you sell configurable or recurring products, it’s the one that keeps every quote perfectly aligned with the back end that actually runs your business.
Why this product is good
Positives of SAP's CPQ software
Product Details
What is SAP CPQ?
SAP CPQ is SAP’s configure, price, quote platform. It automates how complex products are sold across sales, partner, and ecommerce channels. It links directly with SAP ERP and S/4HANA, letting you use the same product logic, pricing rules, and approval workflows everywhere. Designed for manufacturers and global enterprises, it handles everything from variant configurations to subscriptions, so every quote is accurate, profitable, and production-ready.
SAP CPQ’s defining features are:
- Variant configuration and pricing integration
- Seamless SAP ecosystem connectivity
- Subscription and usage-based quoting
- Intelligent configuration and guided selling
- Dynamic pricing with margin protection
- Automated document generation
Variant configuration and pricing integration: This is SAP’s crown jewel. SAP CPQ plugs into SAP Variant Configuration and Pricing (the same engine used in S/4HANA) so sales reps and factories share identical configuration rules, dependencies, and pricing logic. You can model intricate products with characteristics, constraints, and BOM structures, then price them in real time without duplication or risk of mismatch between front-end quoting and back-end ERP.
Seamless SAP ecosystem connectivity: SAP CPQ connects natively with SAP Sales Cloud, SAP Commerce Cloud, SAP Subscription Billing, and SAP Billing and Revenue Innovation Management (BRIM). This creates a single quote-to-cash thread across rep quotes, partner portals, and web stores, which all pull from one source of truth for products, pricing, and availability. No brittle middleware or manual syncs required.
Subscription and usage-based quoting: For businesses with recurring or consumption-based revenue, SAP CPQ integrates directly with SAP Subscription Billing and BRIM to quote one-time, recurring, and usage items together. This allows seamless change orders, renewals, and contract amendments down the line, which is critical for industries like telecom, SaaS, and manufacturing-as-a-service.
Intelligent configuration and guided selling: SAP CPQ includes built-in guided selling tools powered by Intelligent Product Recommendation (IPR). Reps are guided step-by-step through configurations with real-time validations and AI-assisted suggestions that improve accuracy and deal velocity. It uses data from past deals and pricing patterns to recommend optimal bundles and upsells.
Dynamic pricing with margin protection: Through SAP VCP, every price, discount, and surcharge is calculated dynamically using master data, customer-specific agreements, and condition records stored in SAP ERP. You can automate approval routing for discount thresholds, enforce margin floors, and apply customer-specific promotions, all while keeping pricing governance airtight.
Automated document generation: SAP CPQ automates proposal and contract creation using pre-approved document templates that pull in configuration details, pricing tables, and branding automatically. Built-in approval workflows ensure compliance with corporate policies and sales playbooks. The result: quotes that look professional, match your ERP data, and pass audits without headaches.
Enterprise-grade extensibility and APIs: SAP CPQ is built on SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP), so it gives developers access to rich REST APIs, integration flows, and event-driven extensions. You can embed CPQ in portals, extend logic with custom services, or connect it to third-party CRMs and PLMs while still leveraging SAP’s security, governance, and lifecycle management.
What are the advantages of using CPQ?
SAP CPQ Benefits
There are many benefits to utilizing SAP CPQ, and here are a few:
- Faster quote delivery as complex configurations, pricing, and approvals are handled in one unified flow without manual back-and-forth.
- Fewer order errors since the same product and BOM logic powers both quoting and manufacturing, eliminating disconnects between sales and ops.
- Instant global price updates driven by live ERP conditions that sync across sales channels without waiting on IT or custom scripts.
- Stronger margin control thanks to real-time profitability checks and built-in discount enforcement that catch bad deals before they close.
- Shorter rep onboarding as guided selling flows and product recommendations reduce the need for deep catalog knowledge from day one.
- Cleaner subscription billing with accurate handoff of recurring and usage data into SAP Subscription Billing or BRIM, avoiding post-sale chaos.
- Lower IT overhead thanks to native SAP integrations and centralized logic that cut down on maintenance, middleware, and manual reconciliation.
What industries are CPQ solutions best suited for?
SAP CPQ for Industries
SAP CPQ is designed to address the challenges IT Services, Computer, and Manufacturing companies face in the quoting process. Here’s how it caters to them:
Software & IT (SaaS)
Streamlined Configuration for IT Services: IT services can involve various components like software licenses, training hours, and ongoing support. SAP CPQ uses guided workflows that walk sales reps through configuring the right service package based on customer needs. This ensures accuracy and reduces errors in complex IT service and SaaS quotes.
Automated Pricing for SaaS Products: SaaS products often have tiered pricing based on features, user count, or subscription length. SAP CPQ integrates with billing systems to automate these calculations, eliminating manual work and ensuring consistent pricing in quotes. It can also handle recurring revenue streams typical of SaaS products.
Subscription Management: SAP CPQ simplifies managing subscriptions for SaaS products. It helps generate quotes outlining subscription terms, pricing, and renewal options. It can also be integrated with customer portals for self-service subscription management.
Manufacturing
Accurate Configuration Management: Traditional methods can be error-prone when dealing with complex product variations and dependencies. SAP CPQ enforces pre-defined rules and relationships between product components, ensuring valid configurations are quoted and preventing incompatible selections.
Real-time Pricing based on Costs: Manufacturing quotes heavily depend on component costs. SAP CPQ integrates with existing ERP systems like SAP S/4HANA to pull real-time cost data. This ensures quotes reflect accurate manufacturing expenses and potential profit margins.
Integration with Production Systems: SAP CPQ can integrate with Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) to ensure quoted configurations are actually manufacturable. This avoids production delays or rework due to mismatched configurations.
Telecommunications
Streamlined Configuration for Diverse Offerings: Telecom companies can define rules within SAP CPQ to ensure valid combinations of services and network options within a quote. This helps sales reps avoid errors and configure plans that meet specific customer requirements.
Profitable Margins: Sales Operations administrators can set up guardrails within SAP CPQ, like minimum margins and pricing rules, to ensure telecom deals remain profitable during the quoting process.
Compliant and Accurate Pricing: SAP CPQ ensures telecoms comply with various service or package pricing regulations and avoids inconsistencies across customer quotes.
Prices
SAP CPQ Pricing
SAP CPQ doesn’t have publicly listed pricing and requires a custom quote. SAP doesn’t offer a free plan, though a pilot or proof of concept might be available depending on your region and offer. Request a demo from SAP directly for a personalized quote.
Is there anyone else out there?
Competitors and Alternatives to SAP CPQ
Would you like to explore alternatives to SAP CPQ? Here are some other software that SAP users consider when purchasing a CPQ. Prospective buyers evaluate solutions by comparing their competencies in evaluation and contracting, integration and deployment, service and support, and specific product features.
Top SAP CPQ Alternatives
Salesforce Revenue Cloud
Salesforce Revenue Cloud is Salesforce’s next‑generation revenue management suite built on its core platform, combining quoting (CPQ), pricing, contracts, billing, and revenue recognition into a unified solution. It gives you broad quote‑to‑cash coverage (not just CPQ but downstream order/billing) in a CRM‑native ecosystem. And it’s designed for scale and modern revenue models (subscriptions, usage, renewals) with native configuration and pricing engines. If you’re already on Salesforce CRM, Revenue Cloud may reduce integration effort compared to SAP CPQ in a non‑SAP stack.
PandaDoc
Pandadoc CPQ is a cloud-based software that helps businesses automate their sales processes. It offers many features, including document automation, e-signatures, quotes and proposals, workflow management, and more. Pandadoc CPQ is designed to help businesses streamline their sales processes and close more deals. Pandadoc CPQ is a flexible and scalable solution that can grow with your business. Pandadoc CPQ also includes analytics and insights into buyer engagement on proposals and quotes, which helps salespeople understand customer requirements and interests.
Oracle CPQ
Oracle CPQ helps businesses automate configuring and pricing of complex products and services. Oracle CPQ software can also help businesses manage pricing changes and product updates and provide insights into customer buying patterns. Oracle CPQ is typically used by companies that sell complex products or services, such as industrial equipment, custom-made products, or services that require a high degree of customization. Oracle CPQ can help simplify the sales process for both buyers and sellers, and can help ensure that quotes are accurate and compliant with company pricing policies.
Conga CPQ
Conga CPQ (formerly Apttus) is another enterprise‑grade CPQ platform that integrates well with various CRMs including Salesforce and supports complex configuration and quoting. If you use Salesforce as your CRM but have complex quoting needs (variants, channel sales, global pricing), Conga offers greater flexibility since it’s built on the Salesforce platform. It may allow faster time‑to‑value than SAP CPQ if you’re less invested in SAP ERP. The caveat is that if your ERP backbone is SAP and you want deep variant configuration reuse in manufacturing, Conga may require more custom work to match SAP CPQ’s depth.
DealHub CPQ
DealHub is a unified quote‑to‑revenue platform that includes CPQ, contract lifecycle management (CLM), subscription/billing and a digital sales room. Its intuitive guided‑selling with no‑code configuration lets sales reps build quotes quickly across complex product and pricing models. It offers integration with major CRMs (Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, HubSpot) and APIs for ERP/billing flows, so it’s flexible in mixed‑stack environments. If your business is heavily manufacturing-variant or BOM-driven, such as in complex engineering, SAP CPQ generally offers a deeper native connection to production/ERP logic. But if your business has a subscription or recurring billing element, DealHub offers the best-in-class platform for the end-to-end process of quoting, contracting, billing, renewals, and revenue recognition.
Valuable Insight From Real Customers
Gartner Peer Insights
SAP CPQ is rated 4.3 out of 5.0 stars on Gartner Peer Insights. In their reviews, users note the software’s customizability, as well as its ease of use and customer support. However, some users mention that the software can be difficult to integrate with some CRMs.
The reviewers and customer demographics are as follows:
Reviewer’s Company Size
- Less than $50M: 16%
- $50M-$1B: 40%
- $1B-$10B: 33%
- Over $10B: 10%
- Gov’t/PS/Ed: 1%
Reviewer’s Industry
- Manufacturing 19%
- IT Services 17%
- Consumer Goods 10%
- Telecommunication 10%
- Other 44%
Reviewer’s Deployment Region
- North America 53%
- Europe, Middle East, and Africa 23%
- Asia/Pacific 22%
- Latin America 2%
Gartner Peer Insights affirms that SAP CPQ is a good fit for complex product configurations, pricing, and deal structures, as cited by the featured review on their site.
FAQs
Common Questions and Answers
Yes, you can implement SAP CPQ with other CRMs like Salesforce and Microsoft Dynamics. It supports integration through SAP Integration Suite, API endpoints, and custom scripting.
But SAP CPQ is purpose-built to work seamlessly with the SAP stack: Sales Cloud, S/4HANA, Commerce Cloud, Subscription Billing, BRIM, all of it. That means if you’re not already running SAP or planning to, there are more flexible, CRM-agnostic CPQs that will get you live faster and with less technical debt.
Because quoting in a silo is a mess. When your CPQ and CRM are integrated, reps can generate accurate, personalized quotes without jumping systems, re-entering customer data, or chasing down approvals by email. It keeps the quote process fast, the customer context intact, and sales activity fully trackable—so deals move faster and nothing falls through the cracks.
SAP Integration Suite is SAP’s unified, AI-assisted integration platform. It lets you connect SAP and non-SAP systems, cloud or on-prem, with pre-built connectors, APIs, events, and automation tools. Think of it as the glue that ties your applications, data, and processes together without resorting to custom code.
Apple. One of the most valuable companies on the planet relies on SAP to manage its global supply chain, customer experience, and enterprise systems. That alone should tell you how deep SAP’s reach and reliability go.
Summary
SAP CPQ's Summary
SAP CPQ is a helpful tool created by SAP to assist and empower organizations in a wide range of industries to grow their sales teams’ productivity. SAP CPQ enables efficient quoting processes for users and helps grow revenue. With many ratings and global users, SAP CPQ is known for its customizability, ease of use, scalability, and user support.
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