How to Upgrade Sugar Successfully and Receive Maximum Benefits?

Sugar is evolving at a rapid pace, with new features added to improve employee efficiency, productivity and their work convenience. If you still use less than Sugar version 8, it is a time to plan a Sugar upgrade. SugarCRM will no longer provide customer support, maintenance patches or bug fixes for Sugar 7.9.x. after November 15, 2019.

If you have Sugar on-site with custom modules, upgrading CRM can be arduous and messy — not to mention costly — if done wrong. However, with certain Sugar CRM upgrade best practices, it can go off without a hitch, even if your numerous custom modules lack proper documentation. This article offers tips on how to make sure Sugar upgrade goes smoothly.

  • Firstly, we carry out business and technical analysis of your current Sugar CRM and environment to define the scope of work

It allows examining the best ways to ensure a smooth Sugar CRM upgrade and to recommend how to use the full power of new Sugar features.

  • Secondly, we draw up a migration plan, which includes budget and project timeframe estimation

This can help your company avoid headaches and save money when upgrading Sugar. In our practice, the biggest and most frequent blunder is underestimating the cost and amount of time it will take to get the job done right. Arriving at reliable estimates for costs associated with a CRM upgrade project is largely a matter of understanding the cost of custom modules migration.

  • Thirdly, we migrate custom modules and all data that presupposes data scrubbing and data reclassification

We recommend communicating closely with co-workers and department heads to find out what information is vital and must be transferred to continue serving customers without interruption or service degradation. Every little bit of information looks important when embarking on a CRM data migration step. However, not all custom features and data should be transferred, and it is not just a matter of capacity. It is also about cost, compatibility, convenience and serving the needs of the business.

  • We also don’t forget about Integration with existing business applications and performance optimization

A new Sugar version provides new API and new approaches to data management. This opens new capabilities for improving Sugar performance and making a work of users easier and more efficient.

  • And the last but not least, we provide user training and support

Every new Sugar version comes with many new features. That is why it is a good idea to work closely with employees and keep them abreast of any process that may be affected due to the upgrade project.

These were the key steps to take when embarking on a Sugar upgrade initiative. Although Sugar upgrade is a complex task, our experience allows us to manage it successfully over and over again, which is underpinned by the results of our customers.  

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

  • Hi Anna Petelina,

    Very nicely written article. I have one question - isn't the custom modules are taken care of during upgrade? It's just that we need to confirm that all our customization on previous version is still compatible and working well in the newer version. What is the meaning of custom modules migration in step number 3. Is there anything I overlooked?

    Please advise.

    Wish you a happy new year.

    Regards.

    Hats

  • Hi hats,

    You are right. Custom modules migration presupposes that all your customization on the previous version will be compatible and working well in the newer version.

    But the row of aspects should be taken into account:

    • SugarCRM makes a lot of improvements of GUI, safety and performance that requires making changes in a core and architecture. That is why migration of custom modules in the previous version may presuppose source code rewriting for still working in a new one. You define it after "Analysis" stage.
    • If the new version has functionality that was absent in previous one and was implemented as custom modules you need to decide what to do in this case: either to migrate custom module from an earlier version or to use a new features and transform historical data into a new format. You define it after "Analysis" stage as well.
    • Some data loss their actuality for business with the time flow. In this case, the migration on a new version is a right moment for getting rid of a ballast. Of course, just business can make such decision.