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Decision-support tool
Calculate the ROI
of your ERP project
Estimate in 2 minutes the return on investment of an integrated ERP, using the TCO methodology applied by leading industry analysts.
Step 2Investment
Total costs over 5 years
Total Cost of Ownership: every project expense
Step 3Operational gains
Productivity and quality
Time freed up through automation and reduced business errors
Live estimate
Your ROI over 5 years
Automatically updated based on your data
Analysis horizon
Assumption level
Realistic: 60% automation, 75% monetization of hours, 70% error reduction, 50% ramp-up in year 1. Aligned with Panorama Consulting and Gartner benchmarks for mid-market companies.
Traditional ERP
- %
Productivity, reliability, savings
+- pts
With Axelor ERP
- %
+ agentic AI acting directly in your modules
Where a traditional ERP automates, Axelor's AI agents execute tasks on your behalf. Estimated contribution on tasks not yet automated: an Axelor assumption, refined together with you.
ROI over 5 years with Axelor ERP
- %
★ Excellent
Break-even point (discounted)
- months
Net gain over 5 years
- €
Hours saved / year
- h
Assumptions to validate.
The result is still calculated honestly, but some values deserve a check before you present them.
Cumulative costs vs. gains
Projection over 5 years, break-even point shown
Breakdown of annual gains
By category
Cost breakdown over 5 years
Licenses / SaaS
- €
Implementation
- €
Maintenance / support
- €
Training
- €
Total TCO over 5 years
- €
Gain breakdown over 5 years
Productivity (automation)
- €
Error reduction
- €
Total gains over 5 years
- €
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Methodology & assumptions
Formula. ROI = (Discounted gains − Nominal costs) / Costs × 100. Gains are discounted at the WACC using the NPV (Net Present Value) method; costs are kept at nominal value, as a matter of prudence.
Three pillars of gains. (1) Productivity: hours saved × hourly cost × monetization rate. (2) Reduction of business errors, tied to data reliability. (3) Savings on replaced current systems: old ERP, scattered licenses, servers. This third pillar is optional and entered by the user.
Optional agentic AI pillar. When enabled, it values the additional share of manual time, not already automated, that Axelor's AI agents can absorb. It is calculated on the remaining hours, to avoid any double counting with the productivity pillar.
Modeling assumptions. Parameters are adjustable via the Conservative, Realistic or Optimistic selector: automation rate, monetization rate of hours saved, error-reduction rate, and year-1 ramp-up. The "savings on existing systems" pillar is applied from year 1, with no ramp-up, since the avoided expense is immediate. The WACC is set at 8% (an indicative median for mid-market companies, inspired by the KPMG Cost of Capital Study 2025). An automatic 15% margin is added to implementation for hidden costs (Standish Group Chaos Report).
Reference sources. The order-of-magnitude figures for automation and error reduction draw on benchmarks from the McKinsey Global Institute, Panorama Consulting ERP Reports and IBM Data Quality Studies. The precise coefficients are internal Axelor modeling assumptions, calibrated for mid-market companies, and not exact figures quoted from those sources.
Disclaimer. Results are indicative and depend entirely on the data entered. They do not constitute a contractual commitment. For a personalized, binding costed study, contact an Axelor expert.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Everything you need to know before costing your ERP project.
How is the ROI of an ERP project calculated?
The return on investment of an ERP is calculated with the standard formula: ROI = (Gains − Costs) / Costs × 100, projected over the chosen horizon (3, 5, 7 or 10 years). This is the methodology used by leading analyst firms (Gartner, Panorama Consulting, Forrester) to assess the profitability of an ERP project.
What is ERP TCO and what does it include?
TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) is the total cost of owning an ERP over the chosen horizon. It includes four items: licenses or SaaS subscriptions, implementation fees, user training, and annual maintenance (18 to 22% of the license cost for on-premise ERPs, often included in SaaS subscriptions).
How do you estimate the implementation cost of an ERP?
According to Panorama Consulting benchmarks, the average implementation cost of a mid-market ERP runs into several hundred thousand euros. As a rule of thumb, companies spend 1 to 3% of their annual revenue on implementation. This cost covers configuration, integration, data migration and change management. For a precise estimate, request a quote from an Axelor integrator.
How do you estimate the share of time spent on manual tasks?
Estimate the proportion of working time spent on repetitive manual tasks rather than core business activity: re-keying between tools, Excel consolidation, hunting for information across files, manually generated reports, invoice validation. For most mid-market companies, this figure lies between 15 and 30%. If your teams tell you they spend roughly one day in five "fighting with Excel," you're at about 20%.
What is a "fully loaded" hourly cost and how do you calculate it?
The fully loaded hourly cost represents the total cost to the company, not the gross salary. It includes salary, employer contributions, benefits, equipment and indirect costs (office space, IT). Rule of thumb: multiply gross salary by 1.3 to 1.4. Example: an employee with a gross annual salary of €40,000 costs the company €52,000 to €56,000 fully loaded, or roughly €32 to €35/h over 1,600 hours worked.
Cloud SaaS or on-premise: what's the impact on TCO?
According to Forrester Research, cloud ERPs reduce TCO by 30 to 50% over 5 years compared with an on-premise deployment, mainly by removing infrastructure and hardware maintenance costs. Conversely, on-premise can prove more economical over 10 years for large companies with many users and heavy customization needs. Axelor offers both deployment models.
What hidden costs of an ERP project should you plan for?
Four items are often underestimated: internal time (your teams tied up 0.5 to 1 day/week per key user), data migration (5 to 15% of the implementation cost), change management (communication, coaching), and future evolutions (new modules, integrations). According to Panorama Consulting, more than a quarter of projects go over budget. Plan for a 15-20% margin on the implementation cost.
What signals indicate it's time to change your ERP?
Five signals show an ERP is reaching end of life: a proliferation of spreadsheets running alongside the ERP, an inability to integrate new tools (CRM, e-commerce, AI), a lengthening month-end close, an inability to evolve without major development cost, and degraded vendor support (end-of-life versions, price increases). The average lifespan of an ERP is 7 to 10 years.
Why 18-22% annual maintenance?
This is the market standard for ERP, applied by every vendor (SAP, Sage, Microsoft Dynamics, Oracle, Axelor). This percentage covers functional updates, security patches, technical support and regulatory compliance updates (tax, accounting, GDPR).
Where do the automation rates used here come from?
The automation rate varies by scenario: 40% (Conservative), 60% (Realistic), 70% (Optimistic). These ranges are inspired by McKinsey Global Institute benchmarks on the automation of white-collar activities and Panorama Consulting reports on mid-market ERP deployments. They represent the share of repetitive manual tasks (re-keying, reporting, Excel consolidation) an integrated ERP can eliminate or sharply reduce. The Realistic scenario reflects normal adoption; the Conservative scenario builds in a margin of prudence for defending the project to a committee.
Where do the error-reduction rates used here come from?
As with automation, the rate varies by scenario: 50% (Conservative), 70% (Realistic), 80% (Optimistic). These orders of magnitude draw on annual reports from Panorama Consulting and IBM Data Quality Studies covering several hundred ERP implementations. The reduction comes from eliminating cross-tool re-keying, automated validation rules, full traceability, and real-time consistency checks.
What is the average payback period for an ERP project?
According to Panorama Consulting and Gartner, payback falls between 12 and 24 months for a well-scoped mid-market project, averaging around 18 months. Simple, well-run projects can come in at 6-12 months; poorly prepared projects run past 36 months.
Methodology note: this calculator shows a discounted break-even point (cash flows brought to present value at the WACC), which is slightly more conservative than the nominal payback figures in the benchmarks above. The gap is small for short paybacks (~12-18 months) and more visible for longer ones.
Methodology note: this calculator shows a discounted break-even point (cash flows brought to present value at the WACC), which is slightly more conservative than the nominal payback figures in the benchmarks above. The gap is small for short paybacks (~12-18 months) and more visible for longer ones.
Should you factor in the cost of your current ERP/CRM?
Yes, absolutely. This is known as the cost of inaction, and it is often a major gain pillar in a replacement ERP project. If you're currently paying for Sage, Cegid, SAP B1, Microsoft Dynamics licenses, or a patchwork of scattered SaaS tools (accounting + CRM + business tools), those costs can disappear with an integrated ERP like Axelor. Fill in the "Annual cost of your current systems" field in step 1: it's optional and can significantly change the ROI when an ERP or several existing tools are actually being replaced. This calculator applies these savings with no ramp-up curve, since the avoided expense is immediate (you cancel the subscriptions at go-live).
At what size does an ERP become worthwhile?
From around 10 users, an ERP can become worthwhile if the volume of manual tasks, error costs, or replaced systems is significant enough. Profitability depends less on the number of users than on the scope, project cost, and the operational gains that can genuinely be captured. On well-scoped mid-market projects, the typical 5-year ROI in a realistic scenario falls between 150 and 450% — but an overly ambitious project for too small a team can just as easily show a negative ROI. That's exactly what this calculator lets you check before committing budget.
Why choose an open-source ERP like Axelor?
Four advantages: code transparency (no black box), control of TCO (no hidden costs), data sovereignty (private cloud, on-premise, or a sovereign European host), and unlimited customization thanks to the Axelor No-Code platform.
How long does an ERP implementation take?
Duration depends on the functional scope: 2 to 4 months for a limited scope (CRM or accounting only), 4 to 8 months for 3 to 5 integrated modules, 8 to 18 months for a full integrated ERP. Axelor's No-Code approach significantly shortens these timelines: what would take 6 months of traditional development is often configured in 6 weeks with Axelor Studio.
What is an agentic ERP, and what does it change for my ROI?
An agentic ERP embeds AI that acts directly on your business data, rather than simply answering questions. In practice, it can enter invoices, trigger business rules, plan, and anticipate a stockout or a delay. These are exactly the tasks that, until now, took up human time — which is precisely the "productivity gains" line this calculator estimates. The more of these tasks are automated, the faster the return on investment.
In concrete terms, what can Axelor's agentic AI do?
Axelor's AI covers several use cases: automating data entry and business rules, optimizing planning (production, routes, resources), anticipating stockouts, delays and cash-flow needs, searching your data in natural language, and even creating screens, fields or dashboards without writing any code, simply by describing the need. This No-Code capability is the real differentiator: you adapt the ERP to your processes, not the other way around.
Does the AI have access to all my data? Is it secure?
Yes, and it's built in by design. At Axelor, every request made to the AI passes through a layer that applies your permissions before reaching the database: the AI only sees and modifies what the user is authorized to see and modify. Your data is never used to train an external model, and you retain control of hosting (cloud, private, or on your own servers). GDPR compliance and access control are therefore native, not bolted on afterward.
What are the key success factors of an ERP project?
Five factors set successful ERP projects apart: executive sponsorship (a project without direct backing from leadership fails 70% of the time), precise functional scoping, choosing an integrator experienced in your industry, user training and adoption, and rigorous project governance with regular steering committees.