Rimini Street at TD Cowen Conference: Strategic Moves Amid Software Changes

On Thursday, 29 May 2025, Rimini Street (NASDAQ:RMNI) presented at TD Cowen’s 53rd Annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference 2025, outlining its strategic focus amid economic uncertainties and shifts in enterprise software. The company emphasized cost-saving measures, new partnerships, and future revenue growth, while also addressing the challenges of winding down certain business segments.

Key Takeaways

• Rimini Street offers significant cost savings, cutting maintenance costs by 50% compared to vendors.
• The end-of-life for SAP ECC in 2027 presents a growth opportunity as clients seek alternatives.
• A new partnership with ServiceNow aims to modernize enterprise systems without costly upgrades.
• The PeopleSoft business wind-down is underway, impacting 7% of revenue over the next 2-3 years.
• Indirect channel development is expected to drive efficient growth without affecting gross margins.

Financial Results

• PeopleSoft Business: Rimini Street is phasing out its PeopleSoft business, which contributes 7% to the company’s revenue. The majority of clients are expected to transition within 2-3 years, with 80% moving quickly and the remaining 20% taking longer.

Operational Updates

• SAP ECC End-of-Life: With the 2027 deadline for SAP ECC’s end-of-life, Rimini Street is engaging clients to strategize for this transition, offering support and partnerships to optimize and innovate.
• ServiceNow Partnership: Rimini Street and ServiceNow are collaborating to provide modernization solutions that integrate the Now platform with existing ERP systems, allowing for AI implementation without the need for replatforming.

Future Outlook

• Revenue Projections: The partnership with ServiceNow is expected to generate significant revenue starting next year, bolstered by an expanding indirect channel and growing interest from System Integrators.
• Strategic Direction: Rimini Street is focusing on enterprise-wide AI solutions, encouraging clients to leverage existing assets and retain perpetual licenses while considering managed service providers for optimization.

Q&A Highlights

• ServiceNow Partnership Details: There is no exclusivity in the partnership with ServiceNow. Rimini Street will concentrate on supporting ERP systems, while ServiceNow manages the modernization aspect.
• Cross-Selling Opportunities: Rimini Street targets existing clients for cross-selling opportunities, offering integration services and managed services for the Now platform.
• Margin Structure: The company is confident that developing the indirect channel will facilitate economical growth without compromising gross margins.

For further details, please refer to the full transcript below.

Full transcript - TD Cowen’s 53rd Annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference 2025:

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Great. Thanks, everybody. I’m Derek Wood, senior The Rimini Street team here the of Rimini Street, what kinda, really what the kind of value proposition is that you’re serving today, and then we’ll go in from there.

Unidentified speaker: You got it. Rimini Street was founded twenty years ago now. It was founded by our founder that initiated the maintenance business for a division or a platform within Oracle and saw the value proposition that there is a third party market and created the third marquee market for vendor replacement services. That’s the core of Rimini Street. I’ve been doing it very well, have by far and away the largest market share for vendor replacement support, in the world.

Our core offerings for support are the large ERP systems, but we have since from a value proposition because we’ve been asked by our clients, to expand, and we’ve expanded into managed services, also custom offerings supporting any platform down to the code vendor replacement, as well as professional services and some other proprietary security solutions and connectivity solutions, that we wrap around that.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: What are the common reasons, a customer would choose to move off of what was traditional supported to a service like Remaining Street?

Unidentified speaker: So the obvious would be the radically improved economics. Our maintenance cost is half of what the vendor would charge. But they that’s not the real value. That’s the obvious hard immediate cost savings over time. And we’ve saved in this several billions of dollars, but that’s not the real value.

We also support, the custom code. Vendor will not support custom code. Whether we wrote it or not, we will take care of your custom code. You will not get that from the vendor. And then over time, by the elimination for and I know this because in previous lives, I’ve ran both SAP platforms and the Oracle full suite ecosystem.

And I went through forced upgrades, and I got precisely nothing for it but disruption and a large bill and higher cost on the other side is 90% cost savings. Now, of course, I would love to get to the we will get to it, with our new partnerships, is the ability to reallocate those dollars for innovation, especially in today’s world and the very, very intriguing next generation technologies that one that one has access to, but not through the vendors.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Mhmm. Okay. So let’s we’ll into that in a little bit, but I do want to talk about kind of what you’re seeing in the macro today, current spending conditions, how you feel your ability to navigate through the uncertainties, and kind of what you saw in Q1 and what you’re seeing in your pipeline.

Unidentified speaker: So we have said even in normal times, we do well. Our value proposition is we just discussed is compelling for many. We have thousands of clients. However, in periods of uncertainty, in periods of inflationary periods, when folks have pressure from a p and l standpoint, It goes without saying that there is renewed interest and instead of our outreach, we do have a tick up in the inbound inquiries as we have immediate cost savings. We have immediate ability to free up capital to invest in in other priorities.

And in summary, given the uncertainty, I think we’re all tired of saying that. Uncertainly, we’re probably most over The new norm. It’s right. The new norm. Fair.

That’s better. I do like that. That folks are looking at the priorities, and we’re certainly in a identifying a gotta have versus a nice to have. And there’s nothing higher on the list on a nice to have than a forced upgrade. That is very expensive and questionable, if ever, ROI.

So it’s an interesting time for us,

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: let’s say that. Yeah. I was going to follow-up. I’ll get there in a second too. But how do you feel, Rimini, like if you get inbound calls because people are looking at TCO more, looking at how to get more value out of systems, how do you build market awareness and brand awareness so that you do get that phone call?

Because everyone knows about Rimini. Like where have you been on your journey over the last you know, five plus years on on getting more market and brand awareness?

Unidentified speaker: So it it has been a very expensive proposition. We still, unfortunately, have to break down doors, and it’s something that we do through our traditional two decades of a direct selling model. We’ve been fundamentally a direct selling model. However, and really appreciate the question, inbounds are happening in a different way these days. We’re getting inbounds, almost to the point that we cannot develop new partnerships to develop an indirect channel.

And we have some noted partnerships that we did disclose publicly and I assure you that it is interesting for us how folks want to and need to partner with us for that value proposition of continuing those key assets that folks own through their perpetual licenses in house. So we’re shifting, the ability to reach and build that brand awareness by developing this indirect channel with some very preeminent players in the enterprise software space. Mhmm.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: So if I wanna I wanna talk about the core on SAP and Oracle. Both of these vendors have end of lives, and the one that’s, you know, more topical right now is SAP ECC that ends of life in 2027. I guess as an investor, I mean, how should investors be thinking about, like, what kind of opportune I mean, as we get closer to that date, which is now only a couple of years away, like, you know, how do you take advantage of that opportunity of these, like, road map deadlines?

Unidentified speaker: Certainly. Certainly. We, it stands with re without question based on that that set of facts there that our conversations around SAP have never been greater at this point. And so far as we are finding that we’re landing and having to remind folks that 2027 is right around the corner. And if you don’t have a strategy to deal with this, you should do so.

Here’s a path that we can lay out for you that is not only through support and we can optimize and then innovate with our partnerships that there is a different path, which is a better path, not only with economics to get take advantage of these next generation technologies. So very busy. Obviously, it’s a vendor driven event. But I do wanna note, there is the Oracle side of the house have said, no. We will have ongoing support virtually in perpetuity.

But there’s a little trick there, and we have to educate the marketplaces that, well, at least you’re two gens old. Well, you’re fundamentally needing to upgrade, nonetheless. And there is disruption there. So it’s we, believe it or not, have to have, provide this insight to clients along those lines saying that it’s just a different marketing, which is working in certain instances. But, we’re here to educate the market and let folks know that there is there are options Mhmm.

And the optionality is something that one should seriously consider because there are certainly other paths than being forced by the vendor to go along their road map.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Yeah. And I mean, it would seem like there could be a boon of opportunity for you guys on SAP, but they also have extended support to twenty thirty and like so it’s not this

Unidentified speaker: Tricks of the trade still Yeah. The tricks of the trade still exist, but forcing a conversation, we really enjoy that because surprisingly, you know, to your earlier question, right, of the brand awareness and the value proposition that we have is folks just don’t really understand the true options that they do have and what we bring from a value perspective, not only with your existing assets, but a different path one can go. Yeah. Okay.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: And on the the PeopleSoft business, you you’ve decided to wind that down. You’ve quantified the revenue, think it’s 7%.

Unidentified speaker: Correct.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: The just any kind of more color on I mean, you were maybe considering not winding that down. Why did you kind of ultimately go that way? And kind of what, you know, when will the drag tail off in the model?

Unidentified speaker: So, as you noted appropriately, right, we we the right business decision for a whole host of factors was to wind down this particular platform. Then there was a period we reassessed, and that’s after we had our conversations with our clients, and they reminded us of our value proposition. And it was was something that we stood back, made another assessment overall, and we’ve been working with all these folks because we’re we’re gonna do this in a graceful manner and and make sure we work together to provide them with another option. Again, we bring options to the marketplace. That’s what we do.

So but we made the determination that, overall, the greatest value we can bring to the entire client set, both existing existing and new clients, is to focus on these larger platforms and opportunities that are are not only greater problems, but also opportunities that we can bring to the market. So that that’s where we had the determination. Now, from a, from a timeline and a tail off, we we do believe, it’s going to it’s going to occur almost an eighty twenty rule, so to speak. Right? Almost applies to everything is that, you know, we have defined plans with a very large component of these clients as we said publicly in our last call, but it’s gonna be that last, let’s say, 20 ish percent or so that’s going to take almost the full two to three year period to really get those folks to a, alternate place.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Two to three year period from the time you started this or from today?

Unidentified speaker: Our target is from the time we started. Okay.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Well, segue to the new initiatives, and there’s a lot of them. Know, ServiceNow, Workday, VMware, T Systems. Where do you want to start? I mean, I think ServiceNow seems to be maybe having the most strategic involvement with that, you know, joint involvement with them. I think other ones as well.

But let’s kind of tackle these opportunities. Walk us through what you’re doing with ServiceNow. Absolutely.

Unidentified speaker: And I think that’s appropriate place to start. We are really excited. The initial reception has been with our conversations collectively. We had a targeted audience. We had initial conversations with ourselves in ServiceNow.

And the vast majority nodding their heads saying, this is interesting. I want to learn more. This is, very intriguing of an alternative path to access the next generation technology with the ultimate prize of your savings moving to Rimini Street will pay for the new platform. What are we talking about? ServiceNow, and it’s wonderful partnership insofar as we have no interest in selling new technology.

That’s what ServiceNow does. They do it as well, if not better than anybody else. And they have a platform on top that will allow folks to modernize your entire asset base of the hundreds of applications. You have vendors knocking down your door to buy their next generation latest and greatest. But it’s all siloed.

It’s all individual. And everybody’s trying to sell you on their next generation AI, but it’s only on that siloed data. There’s no enterprise wide look. Enter ServiceNow. Putting The US user layer on top with the now platform, then you interact, and this is where we come in.

ServiceNow knows that we know ERP systems deeper, broader than anybody else. We are helping them to take the out of the box Now platform to tie in to the ERP system and need us to tie it in. That’s what we’ve done. We have a proven case, and we saw a press release happened in The Americas. And then from there, to manage the Now platform, this is how one will access all of these assets underneath for which Rimini Street will solve the largest problem.

And the conversations when folks are looking at next generation technologies that they would like to, you know, I’ll use AI. It has to come up in this conversation. It comes up in every technology conversation these days. They’re thinking, how do I get there versus the vendor’s upgrade that says go through this and just have AI on my captive siloed platform. We solved the problem.

What do I do with the need to upgrade in fighting for these dollars? Insert Rimini Street in our core offering, not only for the core ERP systems, the Rimini custom, where we can we can, support and optimize your existing assets and then free up those dollars so you’re not going to your board for substantially more dollars to give the board what they’re asking for. How do you use AI to have a competitive advantage? And this is the quickest, most enterprise wide, path towards modernization, real modernization.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: So there’s you can provide the core service of don’t need to upgrade your ERP system. Keep it where it is. The innovation is gonna happen. The modernization up stack at the ServiceNow layer. So that’s that that draws in core services for you guys.

Is there an AMS component too or what other

Unidentified speaker: Absolutely. How are

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: you helping do the plug ins more? Is that part of core? Is that part of a different That’s

Unidentified speaker: part of our the when we are introducing our ourselves to our clients these days and prospects, it’s what we provide as support, the optimization, and then the innovation. The innovation occurs through our partners. And, yes, what we, at the user later layer the innovation with ServiceNow enterprise wide, the assets in place, we support vendor replacement, no need to upgrade, and then we will optimize through our managed services. We’ll provide the managed services even on the now platform and other SaaS plus platforms as well. So everything’s your assets are stable.

You save your economics. And what we do is we run this and we optimize this because we’re service first company. We’re not interested in selling new technology. That’s what our partners bring.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: The, can you talk about the involvement from the ServiceNow side? I mean, there any joint go to market happening? What are they bringing to the table at all? Because this is a formal partnership.

Unidentified speaker: It absolutely is. We are working together in marketing the solution to the clients. And the solution is an enterprise wide modernization that one does not have to throw out or upgrade existing assets and platforms. It is, again, the quickest, the most economic economical path to your modernization. It is collective.

And ServiceNow, the component where ServiceNow, what we bring in and we are inserted is the problem of, okay, I’m not gonna find it. I want to do this, but I am forced to upgrade on these existing platforms. No longer need to do so. Not only do you not need to upgrade, you can save had better service, and then these dollars are available for the modernization. It’s really compelling.

They’re excited on their side as well. ServiceNow is very large. They have a lot of platforms and technology to sell, but they also have a very large direct sales force. Back to your earlier conversation of awareness. Right?

And obviously, the introductions, that we can have through the ServiceNow relationship are obviously impressive.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Yeah. Yeah. Good. I mean, any thoughts on when, like, this could turn into revenue? So

Unidentified speaker: we we have said on the last call, Seth did note note that he was given the question when to expect meaningful revenue. We did say this is gonna take time to develop, to get out there, but we see it being next year Mhmm. As the earliest of being meaningful. But from a from an intermediate term perspective, you know, this whole indirect channel for us, and I’m gonna highlight what I said previously, others are noticing how we can assist. Even your large SIs.

Our phone is ringing because the market wants to go to enterprise wide AI. I heard you even talking about the agentic AI on top of the generative AI. And why not have your investment in that technology and or that layer, whether it’s at the user layer or at the data layer? Couple ways to do it. Mhmm.

But the there’s a problem. Mhmm. Above all is where do I find the dollars and what do I do with my existing platforms? How do I make those work? And that’s what Rimini Street solves.

And that’s where in the medium to inter longer term, we are really excited. And I use the words, not from a technology perspective because we’re not there, but we have partners. The market’s coming to us and our solution and our value add even more so. Yeah. Are you you’re like the AI budget freer or or creator?

Yes. The answer is yes. Please do.

Seth: Yeah. I mean, think of it, Derek. You’ve covered the company for for a long time and the argument was always, okay, business is great. There’s so much TAM, but it’s a melting ice cube. This is this is different.

We’ve been invited to have a seat at the table for to get companies on next gen technology. And it’s also, as you know, the disruption to replatform from licensed product to the SaaS cloud type product. I mean, there’s a there’s a risk. It’s very costly. It takes a lot of time.

ServiceNow wrote their press release. They’re the ones who announced the partnership and they’re saying, hey, we can get you there in a matter of six months versus years.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Wow. Wow.

Seth: So think of it. You get some of this stuff working and we’re building the connectors and calm APIs for like ECC six. You bring in other ECC six, it’s like, we got it built. This this could this could go pretty quickly if if we get it we get it right with a few key clients.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: And why are you why are SIs calling you now?

Unidentified speaker: So, very interesting. Right? Because, their highest margin offering is to help with these replatforming of these large systems. Very large revenue ticket. Yeah.

They’re calling us because the clients want to know how do I put in enterprise AI, not just the vendor’s AI. But the SI is thinking, well, hold on. What do I do with these legacy platforms because there’s not enough p and l space to do all of this. So they’re calling the group that has the solution to the problem, Rimini Street. We will stabilize all these assets.

I was at a CIO conference on a CFO CIO partnership initiative a few weeks ago and speaking with fellow CIOs. And one thing collectively is becoming real CIOs are realizing is that the crown jewel in the upgrade path from the vendor is to get their AI, but it’s only on their platform Mhmm. And the data within that platform. And I told folks in the room, and they all agreed, if you just go through I have an HCM. I have a PLM.

I have an ERP platform, and I have the AI that’s captive there. You’re gonna have different models trained in different ways on different information that’s gonna give you your hallucinations, And you’re gonna have a very large bill to do that. Think of AI, I implore the room. Think of it enterprise wide to begin with. Please do so.

Moreover, if you ever consider going to a SaaS platform, do not give up your perpetual licenses. There were a handful of CIOs I spoke with that are talking about, I didn’t give up my perpetual licenses. I’m putting them back on prem. You saw our partnership, like, with the t systems. You even have a managed service provider.

Put them in there. The hardware is great. You can put it back in. You can control your assets. You can control your data.

You can put it in one space. You can keep a captive model across your enterprise, and you can invest in the innovation. That way, if you have your data, you control your data, all of your information for your enterprise, you will maximize AI in that fashion. If you do the captive vendor, I wish you luck.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: And if you’re and ServiceNow is the layer of the enterprise AI that’s gonna be that the your innovation

Unidentified speaker: You log in to ERP, log out, log in to HCM, log out. Yeah. ServiceNow will take you on top. You’ll always have modernization. You will you will speak to the systems below to transact.

It will get housed in one area. You take their and their head on the agentic AI versus the gen AI with the now platform on top overall, and you have one interface.

Seth: Right. The pivots have come to where it it’s all about the data Yeah. And to be able to access a pack it. And so instead of going through four systems, say everyone’s been to a doctor hospital, you felt all these points, you see the people behind, they’re going to four systems, employees that used to be you’d have to do payroll, you’d have to do their their regular HCM thing, profit sharing, and and on and on. This stuff, can be automated to just, one input.

Yeah. And also, you know, Michael, you’re closer to it, but there’s there’s a hyperscaler angle to this as well. Yeah. Oh. Where they want to run workloads and they believe in this idea that it’s about the data and the advanced machine learning automation AI should be done at that top layer.

Yeah. So they’re thinking big data lakes.

Unidentified speaker: Instead of the user layer, take your information to the data layer, expand here with an open source database. They will host that, and they’ll put the AI on top and have all your information there. They’re looking at it from the data layer. Ultimately, they’re gonna continue to climb up the stack. I think you’ll see them get there as well.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: But you guys, help retain on prem systems, so you don’t

Unidentified speaker: Well, we help retain licenses.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Yeah. Right? Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Unidentified speaker: Platforms. And we are involved and we’ve helped folks take it and put it to a managed service provider. BYOL? BYOL. BYOL.

Absolutely. Which is that’s gold. Yeah. That is absolute gold. And that’s where I was saying previously, if you’re going to give SAS a try, don’t give up your perpetual licenses.

Why would you give up that asset? Don’t give up that asset. We can keep it running for decades.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Any questions out there?

Unidentified speaker: Please. So part one, there is not exclusivity in place on either side, and it’s really not needed. We don’t see a need for it. Neither side saw a real need for this. Right?

We’re we’re we’re not going to we’re not going to do what ServiceNow does. They’re not going to do what we do. Right? It works really well. It’s so complementary.

And it’s it’s just not needed. Now secondly, ServiceNow doesn’t need to go sell Rimini Street. ServiceNow needs somebody to buy and understand this vision and value, which is quite compelling. The path to get you there more economically to work better on a shorter time frame is, and here’s our partner Rimini Street, and that’s how we put this whole package together and get you there economically and quicker. And that’s where it’s in was training service now to sell what we do, is we put us in front of them, and we’ll take care of that component.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: That was a good question also on the, I mean, are you trying to sell the is this an opportunity within the existing base or is this more about, like, a new customer grab?

Unidentified speaker: Absolutely within the existing base, right, you know, from a cross sell standpoint. And that’s where we went to clients that we identified with our best relationship, the list as I referenced previously that have both ServiceNow, you know, typically the I s know, ITSM platform. Right? As well as a Rimini Street supporting one or the other platform. Right?

We support so many platforms and have a conversation. This is where we were seeing a lot of head nods saying this path makes so much sense. I wanna learn more.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: But if if you’ve already won the core, with existing customers, what do you cross sell? What are you cross selling? The connectors and

Unidentified speaker: So what we, our revenue stream will be to connect, because there’s, you know, you have, you know, the shrink-wrap, you know, the now platform on top. It’s not gonna speak to in every instance of an ERP installation is customized. Right? Nobody really keeps it off the shelf. Right?

So we have our professional services engagement based revenue stream to tie it in, which we’ve already proven out, and we had a press release release on that. Right? We have it functioning already. Then part two is the now platform for the managed services. Right?

They’re sitting on top of the ERP. We’ll manage that for the client. And then the third component, so the here’s our support optimize innovate. The innovation is the Now Platform. We put it in professional services revenue.

Managed services ARR revenue for the Now Platform on top, and then what it’s on top of to stabilize. And here’s the real what’s so interesting for us over the medium to longer term is if somebody sees this vision appropriately to put the Now platform on top and invest in innovation there, our retention rate for supporting Mhmm. The engine underneath is going to get better because this can stay in place and there’s no need to hand your checkbook, your p and l statement over to the large vendors and the SIs.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Interesting.

Unidentified speaker: Because we can keep it running for ten, twenty years. That’s what we do. And these assets, especially if somebody’s on a latest enhancement pack with the latest platform with your own licenses, sunk cost, physical life for another twenty years, fully depreciated life. Mhmm. This is pure gold.

The economics are so compelling.

Derek Wood, Senior, The Rimini Street team: Right. We I think we know where the enthusiasm is right now, and there’s a lot of pivot. I I mean, we’re we’re at time, but, like, our our our, how do we think about investing in this opportunity and, like, in the broader envelope of your margin structure and, like, how you can kind of push forward quicker?

Unidentified speaker: So from a I think I think the we have the capital allocated. I think within our existing business model, it’s there to continue our certain segment with our direct selling as we discussed earlier, but developing this indirect channel collectively, which go to market is going to be a more efficient and economical approach. I don’t see margin compromise from a gross margin perspective. We’ll manage our mix with this of our support, optimize the innovation layer through our partners. And it’s you know, we’re we’re gonna we’re developing this.

We’re working hard at this, and we see this market opportunity. And, you know, we think it it’s a really exciting next three to five years for Great.

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