Forrester Total Economic Impact™ Study Finds OpenEdge 12.8 Delivered 247% ROI and $1 Million NPV

Enterprise software organizations are under constant pressure to deliver more innovation, maintain higher levels of availability and support growing customer expectations—often without adding people or increasing operational complexity.

Yet for many organizations, the biggest obstacle to innovation isn’t the application itself. It’s the operational friction that has accumulated around it.

Slow release processes. Time-consuming database maintenance. Customer-impacting downtime. Increasing reliance on specialized expertise. These challenges consume valuable technical resources that could otherwise be focused on building new capabilities and delivering customer value.

That finding is reinforced by a new independent Forrester Consulting Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study of Progress OpenEdge 12.8, which examined the experiences of organizations modernizing from older OpenEdge environments. The commissioned study found that modernization delivers far more than new features—it creates measurable business value by helping organizations operate more efficiently, improve service reliability and accelerate software delivery.

Modernization is About Removing Friction

Technology modernization discussions often focus on future innovation. But many organizations must first realize value by eliminating the inefficiencies that slow teams down today.

The Forrester study found that organizations using OpenEdge 12.8 were able to streamline release management, reduce routine database administration effort and minimize maintenance-related customer disruptions. These improvements created operational efficiencies that allowed technical teams to spend less time maintaining infrastructure and more time focusing on strategic initiatives.

Perhaps most importantly, organizations were able to achieve these improvements while continuing to build on their existing applications and investments rather than replacing them.

The Numbers Tell a Compelling Story

Forrester aggregated feedback from seven decision-makers across six organizations and modeled the impact on a composite software company. The three-year results were significant:

• 247% return on investment (ROI)
• $1.0 million net present value (NPV)
• Less than 8 months to payback
• $1.4 million in total benefits over three years

While these headline results are impressive, the underlying operational improvements are equally compelling.

Faster Software Delivery

Development organizations are increasingly judged by how quickly they can deliver new capabilities.

The study found that the composite organization based on interviewed customers improved CI/CD productivity by up to 15%, reducing release effort by more than 5,600 hours annually. Interviewees attributed these gains to more standardized deployment processes, improved automation and reduced release complexity.

One interviewee, the senior manager for the ERP solutions ISV, reported reducing build pipeline times from 7–8 hours to under 2 hours, dramatically improving release efficiency.

More Efficient Database Operations

Database maintenance remains one of the most time-consuming operational responsibilities for many teams.

According to the study, OpenEdge 12.8 delivered:

• 55% reduction in database backup effort
• 60% reduction in database index rebuild effort
• More than 5,200 hours of annual database maintenance savings by year 3 for the composite organization.

These improvements help organizations reduce manual effort, improve predictability and free technical staff to focus on higher-value work.

Improved Service Availability

Customers increasingly expect systems to be available around the clock.

The study found that expanded online database operations reduced customer-impacting maintenance events by up to 50%, helping organizations avoid nearly $400,000 in SLA-related costs over three years.

Beyond financial savings, improved availability contributes directly to customer satisfaction and trust—two outcomes repeatedly cited by interviewees.

As one participant, the senior manager at the ERP solutions ISV, noted:

“Stability was so much better with OpenEdge 12.8, and customer happiness is much better than it used to be.”

The Strategic Benefit: Doing More Without Growing Complexity

One of the most interesting themes throughout the study was not simply cost savings, but operational scalability.

Organizations reported being able to support growth, onboard customers and manage larger workloads without proportionally increasing operational overhead. They also highlighted simplified day-to-day administration, stronger security readiness and greater flexibility in how teams manage environments and deployments.

In other words, modernization wasn’t just about improving performance. It was about creating a platform that allows organizations to scale more effectively while maintaining control over complexity.

Looking Forward

As organizations evaluate their technology strategy, the conversation is increasingly shifting from “Why modernize?” to “What is the cost of waiting?”

The Forrester TEI study demonstrates that modernization can deliver measurable business value today through improved productivity, reduced operational burden and better service reliability, while also creating a stronger foundation for future innovation.

For organizations looking to increase efficiency, improve customer experience and support long-term growth, the findings provide a compelling case that modernization is not simply a technology initiative—it is a business initiative.

Read the Full Forrester TEI Study

The results highlighted here are just a snapshot of the findings. Download the complete Forrester Total Economic Impact™ of Progress OpenEdge 12.8 study to explore the methodology, customer interviews, financial analysis and detailed business benefits behind the results.

Download the Forrester TEI Study