Amazon Web Services (AWS) and SoftwareOne Holding AG, a global provider of end-to-end software and cloud technology solutions, have partnered to help customers transition to RISE with SAP on an AWS cloud environment. Called the Ready for RISE on AWS bundle, it combines SoftwareOne’s deep SAP advisory and implementation knowledge with AWS technologies to expedite… Read more »
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Guest blog article from Michael Hülskötter. All we can say is: SAP developers, come to Apple! Some recent news is causing a stir in the business world. The established software provider SAP and Apple, renowned for trendsetting and design, are working together to provide future software developers with the right tools to build SAP-compatible mobile […]
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SAP has announced a number of new updates for its analytics solutions portfolio at the 28th annual SAPPHIRE NOW conference.
The company’s business intelligence portfolio, BusinessObjects, will continue to offer solutions on premise and in the cloud, as well as incorporating a number of new features for visualizations and storytelling, data wrangling and blending, geospatial, trend analysis, custom filters, linked stories, notifications and chat.
“SAP is enabling companies to lead in the digital economy by significantly simplifying the platform, providing best-in-class analytics and a superior user experience,” said Stefan Sigg, SVP for SAP Analytics. “SAP BusinessObjects remains the most relevant analytics in the industry — and we offer the best end-to-end capabilities both on premise and in the cloud in the market today.”
One enhancement has focused more on the integration and collaboration efforts of the business, as the offering can now connect and blend existing data sources such as the SAP ERP, SAP SuccessFactors solutions, Salesforce, and Google Drive (amongst others), on a single platform without having to move data into the cloud environment. The offering now also includes predictive analytics capabilities leveraging powerful built-in algorithmic models, to enhance data-driven decision making capabilities.
SAP also updated its BusinessObjects Enterprise offering, which has been mainly designed for on premise analytics. Enterprise organizations have a choice of premium, professional and standard editions, which offer a variety of services including enhancements which make the platform Internet of Things–ready.
The company also launched one of its newest cloud offerings, the Digital Boardroom (see below), which has been built on the BusinessObjects platform. The Digital Boardroom is real-time business intelligence and ad hoc analysis portal, which provides executives with information sourced from all SAP S/4HANA Lines of Business data to provide a “single source of truth for the company”.
Huawei and SAP have announced the general availability of the SAP HANA platform on Huawei’s OpenStack cloud platform FusionSphere 5.1.
The announcement follows a long-standing partnership, dating back to 2012 when Huawei became a SAP global technology partner, which saw the team open a co-innovation centre at Huawei’s Shenzhen campus last year, which was tasked with advanced the teams capabilities in the cloud computing and big data market segments.
“SAP is the world’s largest provider of enterprise application software, and SAP HANA is leading enterprise software innovation right now,” said Zhipeng Ren, President of the Huawei IT Cloud Computing Product Line. “Huawei’s FusionCloud solution support for SAP HANA is widely accepted in the market. With the open cloud computing strategy, Huawei builds a win-win cloud ecosystem through an open, enterprise-class cloud platform.
“Based on OpenStack open source architecture, Huawei FusionSphere has made thousands of enterprise-class enhancements, and is an ideal cloud infrastructure platform for SAP HANA and critical enterprise applications. In the meantime, our joint initiatives with SAP are intended to create more value for customers to achieve their goals.”
Over the course of the relationship, SAP’s HANA offering has been made available on a number of Huawei platforms including FusionCube, FusionServer RH2288H V2/V3, FusionServer RH5885H V3 and FusionServer RH8100 V3. Huawei claims that since FusionSphere can run business applications that have traditionally been run on premise, the platform will create a number of new opportunities for mass processing of big data on the cloud.
SAP CEO Bill McDermott (Left) and Satya Nadella, CEO at Microsoft (Right) speaking at SAPPhire Now in Orlando
Microsoft and SAP have extended a long-standing partnership to deliver broad support for the SAP HANA platform on Microsoft Azure.
The extended partnership will focus on greater integration between the two portfolios to simplify work-through integrations between Microsoft Office 365 and cloud solutions from SAP. The new team also claim the combined proposition will provide enhanced management and security for custom SAP Fiori apps.
The announcement builds on a previous relationship which was debuted in 2014, allowing SAP customers to build HANA applications in the Microsoft cloud platform, taking advantage of public cloud scalable resources, though the new partnership now incorporates more of the Azure security and management capabilities.
“This partnership is perhaps one of the broadest things we’ve done together,” said Satya Nadella, CEO at Microsoft. “Take the cloud. We’ve taken the best of SAP and the best of our hyper-scale cloud. It means SAP certifications are now certified on Azure, HANA is certified on Azure and S/4 HANA is certified on Azure.
We’ve taken our hyper-scale cloud and made it real for customers. Every application which SAP run is now compatible with Office 635 meaning we now have seamless integration. This recipe is going to accelerate the growth which our customers seek, by combining two product portfolios which are customers probably already use.”
As part of the new agreement, there will be a new deployment option for SAP HANA on the Azure cloud. The updates will certify SAP HANA to run development, test and production workloads on Microsoft Azure, including SAP S/4HANA, and will enable customers to run larger and more demanding workloads than previously possible. New integrations will also enable customers to combine Office 365 features (including communications, collaboration, calendar etc.) with SAP cloud-based applications including Concur, SAP Fieldglass and SAP SuccessFactors.
New developments which can be expected towards the latter end of the year also include the ability to deploy custom mobile hybrid SAP Fiori apps on SAP HANA Cloud Platform with an open standards plug-in framework, which will enable Microsoft Intune capabilities to be embedded within the app itself. The team believe these integrations will be available in Q3.
“We believe the IT industry will be shaped by breakthrough partnerships that unlock new productivity for customers beyond the boundaries of traditional platforms and applications,” said SAP CEO Bill McDermott. “SAP and Microsoft are working together to create an end-user experience built on unprecedented insight, convenience and agility. The certification of Microsoft Azure infrastructure services for SAP HANA along with the new integration between Microsoft Office 365 and cloud solutions from SAP are emblematic of this major paradigm shift for the enterprise.
The news follows another partnership announcement from SAP with Apple made in recent weeks. Apple has made multiple moves over the last 24 months to improve its position in the enterprise IT space, partnering with Cisco last year, to optimise iOS device performance across Cisco’s suite of enterprise communications services, and IBM in 2014, bringing IBM’s strengths in big data and analytics to Apple devices.
The UK & Ireland SAP User Group has released findings from a survey which state only 58% of current SAP users are considering or using its cloud offerings, and 60% said the company were not good enough at communicating the benefits of their products.
The findings showed only 39% were using or planning to use SAP Cloud for Customer and only 23% planned to use S/4 HANA enterprise cloud edition. Just over a third confirmed they were currently or planning to use SAP’s HANA Cloud Platform (HCP), though 32% said they didn’t know what was, and 10% said they believed the company did an effective job of outlining the benefits and use case of the product itself. Overall, 60% of the user group said the company was not good enough at communicating benefits of the cloud suite to the users themselves.
“Over the last 18 months, we have seen more of our members looking to move elements of their SAP estate to the cloud. However, as the survey results show, users still face challenges when it comes adopting SAP’s cloud offerings,” said Paul Cooper, vice-chairman of the UK & Ireland SAP User Group. “For organisations that have heavily invested in on-premise applications in the past, there still needs to be an attractive business case for them to move to the cloud.
“If users are to fully realise the benefits of SAP cloud offerings, they need to understand the company’s roadmap and strategy. For instance, the survey highlighted that just over half (52%) of respondents were unsure that S/4HANA would make them more readily consider using cloud services from SAP in the future.”
While cloud computing as a concept could be perceived as penetrating the mainstream market, it is worth remembering there is a substantial proportion of organizations that are not in a position to make the transition currently. 58% of respondents said they were concerned the strong focus on cloud computing from SAP could result in installed on premise products being left being left behind, and the users of such products missing out on product updates.
Another area which may worry SAP is that of acquisitions, as 44% of respondents highlighted they were not sure as to where SuccessFactors, Ariba, Fieldglass and Concur would fit into future strategies of the business. Concur Technologies was acquired for $8.3 billion, Ariba for $4.3 billion, SuccessFactors for $3.4 billion and Fieldglass for $1.1 billion (estimated).
“SAP is committed to helping deliver business value to all its customers and we welcome the feedback from the UKI User Group,” said Kevin Kimber, Head of Cloud at SAP UK&I. “At SAP, all our solutions can be tailored to our customers’ individual needs – whether that involves on premise, cloud or hybrid models. By offering this flexibility we can support our customers on their individual cloud journey which varies across industry and user.
“We’re encouraged by the results of the survey that show that the majority of SAP users are either already using or planning to adopt our cloud offerings. We believe SAP provides the most complete end to end holistic cloud portfolio and we continue to strive to enhance our offerings through strategic acquisitions and sustained investment with the goal of providing best of breed cloud solutions. We’re committed to engaging in an active dialogue with our customers and the wider ecosystem to share our vision and roadmap for cloud solutions and will continue to promote this message publicly.”
SAP reported its quarterly earnings last month, in which it was highlighted cloud subscriptions and support revenues grew 33% year-on-year to €678 million, and new cloud bookings grew at 23% over the quarter to €145 million. The cloud business, as well as software support revenues, accounted for 69% of the quarter’s total revenues.
The cloud business unit within SAP has been prioritized as the growth engine, though it might be considering a worrying sign for SAP executives that the cloud offerings themselves are not being communicated to their current customer bases who are reportedly confused about the company’s future direction.
Apple CEO Tim Cook (Left) and SAP CEO Bill McDermott (Right)
Mobile device giant Apple has announced a new partnership with enterprise software vendor SAP to develop iOS apps based on the SAP HANA cloud platform, reports Telecoms.com.
This marks the latest move by Apple to strengthen its position in the enterprise sector, following a similar partnership with IBM in 2014, and other with Cisco last year. The most recent iPad launch was focused squarely at enterprise and with shipments of both iPhones and iPads having apparently peaked, Apple will be hoping an enterprise push will yield dividends.
The SAP partnership is focused on the development of native enterprise apps for iOS that support SAP’s cloud platform HANA. There will also be a dedicated SDK and training academy to assist in the development effort and a version of the SAP Fiori UX platform for iOS.
“This partnership will transform how iPhone and iPad are used in enterprise by bringing together the innovation and security of iOS with SAP’s deep expertise in business software,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO.
“As the leader in enterprise software and with 76% of business transactions touching an SAP system, SAP is the ideal partner to help us truly transform how businesses around the world are run on iPhone and iPad. Through the new SDK, we’re empowering SAP’s more than 2.5 million developers to build powerful native apps that fully leverage SAP HANA Cloud Platform and tap into the incredible capabilities that only iOS devices can deliver.”
“We’re proud to take this special partnership between Apple and SAP to a ground-breaking new place,” said Bill McDermott, CEO of SAP. “In giving people an agile and intuitive business experience, we empower them to know more, care more and do more.
“By combining the powerful capabilities of SAP HANA Cloud Platform and SAP S/4HANA, together with iOS, the leading and most secure mobile platform for enterprise, we will help deliver live data to people wherever and whenever they choose to work. Apple and SAP share a commitment to shaping the future, helping the world run better and improving people’s lives.”
Tablet shipment numbers are not much lower than PCs these days but the default enterprise device remains the laptop. For mainly desk-based workers this will probably remain the case indefinitely but Apple will be keen to entrench and expand its foothold in enterprise. The BYOD (bring your own device) era that accompanied the smartphone boom is also a great opportunity for Apple in enterprise, as is the work-provided opportunity created by the decline of Blackberry.
EMC, SAP and Intel have all reported quarterly figures, with cloud taking centre stage during all announcements.
EMC demonstrated positive growth within the cloud business units, though its staple business unit, EMC Information Infrastructure saw double-digit year-on-year declines. The $67 billion merger with Dell was prominent throughout the earnings call, as the team would appear to be in the final stages of confirming the transaction.
SAP’s HANA once again dominated the company’s earnings call, demonstrating healthy growth in revenues and customer numbers over the period. The company saw positive growth worldwide, despite challenging conditions in Latin America.
Finally, Intel is seemingly succeeded in its transition programme as it reported positive growth during Q1. The company is moving away from its historical playground, setting its sights on the increasingly affluent IoT and cloud market segment.
EMC core business unit drags while cloud soars
EMC Corporation has reported its Q1 2016 results at revenues $5.5 billion a year-on-year decrease of 2%, though its VMWare and Pivotal businesses experience positive growth over the same period.
While the EMC Information Infrastructure business saw Q1 revenues decrease of 6% to $3.8 billion, the company was bolstered by 5% revenue growth from VMWare, and a 56% increase from the Pivotal business. The company highlighted healthy growth within the Pivotal cloud and big data subscription software in particular, with annual recurring revenue up over 200% year-on-year, to $116 million.
“Work forces are becoming increasingly mobile,” said Joseph Tucci, President and CEO at EMC Corporation. “There is an explosion of data from connected smart device as sensors and telemetry are being built into every imaginable product. Companies are embarking on digital transformations to exploit this ever increasing amount of data, get more connected with their customers, employees, and suppliers. In short, we feel very good about the depth and breadth of our product portfolio.”
The results continue a trend of under-performance according to analysts, as this is now the sixth straight quarter EMC has missed analyst expectations. The company’s core business also saw declines as sales for its high-end storage services dropped 14%, though the flash storage business countered these declines somewhat, growing 122% year-on-year.
“The spending environment continues to be challenging as customers focus more on transformative IT projects while also minimizing transactional spend,” said Denis Cashman, CFO at EMC Corporation. “This customer behaviour is impacting our traditional business in the near-term. However, the major trends in IT remain intact, and we are having positive discussions with customers regarding how EMC and eventually, the combination of Dell and EMC, can help them with their IT and digital transformation.”
While the management would appear to be upbeat about the progress of EMC as an individual entity, attention could not be drawn away from the $67 billion Dell merger. The company claims the integration programme has been accelerated over recent months, and a number of EMC executives have included in the new leadership team announced by Michael Dell recently. Tucci also claims the team are now only awaiting regulatory approval from China, before the transaction can be completed.
S/4HANA dominates headlines at SAP quarterlies once again.
SAP has reported positive growth in the first quarter of 2016 as the company continues its transition from an enterprise to cloud-focused organization, with S/4HANA demonstrating healthy progress.
Cloud subscriptions and support revenues grew 33% year-on-year to €678 million, and new cloud bookings grew at 23% over the quarter to €145 million. The cloud business, as well as software support revenues, accounted for 69% of the quarter’s total revenues. EMEA demonstrated solid growth over the period, accounting for an 8% increase, whereas the Americas reported a 29% increase, despite political and economic instability in Brazil creating a challenging environment.
“Our cloud results this quarter leave no doubt that this business continues on its fast-growth path,” Luka Mucic, Chief Operating & Financial Officer at SAP. “Cloud revenue came in at 33% growth this quarter, which marks the 12th quarter in a row with 30%-plus growth rate excluding acquisitions. This is at the high end of our implied guidance range and ticking well ahead of our CAGR through 2020.
“New cloud bookings saw robust growth, up 23% or up 26% at constant currencies. With our strong cloud backlog and our strong bookings performance in 2015, we are well on track to deliver on our midterm growth ambitions in the cloud.”
SAP added more than 500 S/4HANA customers, of which approximately 30% were new. The company now boasts 3,200 customers for across the world for the product. HANA Enterprise Cloud was credited with particularly strong performance from the management team, as it highlighted customers are now utilizing the cloud platform for sensitive and mission critical processes.
“Companies are running their supply chain, manufacturing, asset management, sales and distribution that all operate on a 24/7 basis on the SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud,” William McDermott, CEO at SAP. “The triple-digit growth in this business is a validation of SAP Cloud innovation and we are only getting started.”
Intel cuts 12000 jobs to focus on IoT and cloud markets
Intel has reported year-on-year growth of 7% for Q1, taking the company’s revenues to $13.7 billion. Despite the positive growth, the management team also confirmed it would be cutting 12000 jobs, equivalent to 11% of the global workforce.
The Internet of Things group reported revenue of $651 million, an increase of 22% year-on-year, Security group revenue was up 12% to $537 million and the Data Centre group reported a 9% year-on-year growth to $4 billion. The company’s historical playground, its Client Computing group which includes PCs and mobile devices, was down 14% to $7.5 billion. The Client Computing group is where the management have revealed the majority of the job cuts will come from.
“Our results over the last year demonstrate a strategy that is working and a solid foundation for growth,” said Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, who is leading the company’s shift away from client computing and towards IoT and the cloud.
“The opportunity now is to accelerate this momentum and build on our strengths,” said Krzanich. “These actions drive long-term change to further establish Intel as the leader for the smart, connected world. I am confident that we’ll emerge as a more productive company with broader reach and sharper execution.”
During the call Krzanich detailed the company’s restructuring programme, in which the team aim to move away from the perception Intel is a PC company, focusing on the cloud and connected devices markets. The company claims the staff reductions will enable Intel to focus its resources on new priorities
“You take a look at it, 40% of our revenue, 60% of our margin comes from areas other than the PC right now,” said Krzanich. “It’s time to make this transition and push the company over all the way to that strategy and that strategic direction. So that’s why we wanted to do it now.”
NTT Comms has achieved SAP Global Certification for hosting services, cloud services and SAP HANA operations services.
The certification will enable NTT to build and manage SAP applications by utilizing the company’s enterprise cloud and its Global Management One platform. The offering will be made available on all NTT infrastructures across private, public and hybrid clouds, through a consumption-based delivery model.
“We’re set to see more organizations place key infrastructure and applications in the cloud. However, for global enterprises it is often a difficult and complex journey,” said Damian Skendrovic, CEO at NTT Comms Managed Services. “Our new cloud solutions for SAP put our customers in pole position to migrate to the cloud and manage their applications more effectively. This ensures that business operations are enhanced as quickly as possible and without disruption.”
To achieve the certification, a provider’s cloud platform must undertake comprehensive testing by SAP to authorize the integration with its complete application set. Aside from the company’s infrastructure being tested against the standards, NTT’s technical staff in the EMEA, Americas and Asia Pacific regions were also placed under the same scrutiny.
Outside of the managed services business unit, the NTT team have continued efforts to diversify its revenue channels and grow its business in new markets. NTT Data recently announced plans to acquire Dell Services for $3.06 billion, as it prioritized growth in international markets.
“NTT Data is pleased with the unique opportunity to acquire such high-calibre talent, and a corporate culture that shares common values with NTT Data, with emphasis on client first, foresight, teamwork and a commitment to innovation,” said Toshio Iwamoto, President and CEO of NTT Data Corporation. “Welcoming Dell Services to NTT DATA is expected to strengthen our leadership position in the IT Services market and initiates an important business relationship with Dell.”
The acquisition is the fourth made by NTT over the course of 2016, though it would appear that EMC are not in such a favourable position. Dell Services as a business unit was reportedly to be valued in the region of $5 billion, which could highlight Dell’s urgency in completing the sale. If reports are correct, it would appear NTT Data has negotiated a good deal.
As SAP’s year-end figures were published the cloud giant has unveiled plans to clarify the positioning of all its cloud offerings in an open letter to customers.
SAP said the preliminary figures for its financial year ending on December 31st outpaced the growth of the rest of the cloud industry and exceeded its own expectations.
SAP’s non-IFRS cloud and software revenue grew by 20%, double the original outlook of 8 to 10% growth. The ‘exceptional momentum’ claimed by SAP will be even great next year, it claimed, as cloud sales bookings increased by 103% in the full year to $0.97bn (€0.89 billion) and 75% in the fourth quarter to $0.35bn (€0.35 billion). Cloud subscriptions and support revenue was $2.49 bn (€2.30 billion) for the full year and Operating profit was $6.89 bn (€6.35 billion).
Use of the in memory platform SAP S/4HANA doubled each quarter, claims SAP, which has 2,700 customers by the end of 2015. “We decisively beat our full year guidance for cloud and software revenue,” said Bill McDermott, CEO of SAP.
Based on these figures, the outlook for next year should see faster growth, predicted SAP. Cloud subscriptions and support revenue are projected to be up to $3.31bn (€3.05 billion), which would represents a growth rate of 33%. Meanwhile, non-IFRS cloud and software revenue will increase by up to 8% on the 2015 total of $18.69 (€17.23 billion). Operating profit, it said, will be around the same as 2015’s total, with maximum expectations being $7.27Bn (€6.7 billion).
A key to managing operating profit will be a simplification of SAP’s software portfolio, explained Chief Marketing Officer Maggie Chan Jones on the SAP web site.
“Our portfolio for digital business has also expanded through acquisition and we are stronger for customers, partners and ourselves,” said Jones. That growth needs to be managed, Jones warned.
In 2016 SAP will bring its acquired companies closer together under a unified SAP brand that includes Ariba, Fieldglass, Hybris and SuccessFactors. The acquisitions will now be known as SAP Ariba, SAP Fieldglass, SAP Hybris, and SAP SuccessFactors respectively.
Jones claimed this will bring clarity to customers and ecosystem partners across all ‘touch points’. “Our goal is to deliver a simpler, superior customer experience, with all the SAP brands going to market with a consistent, unified look and feel,” said Jones.