SAP’s Position on On-Demand, Social Networking, and Cloud Computing

The last few months has seen a lot of coverage of SAP’s directions on Web 2.0 technology including on-demand applications, social networking, and cloud computing. Here are some highlights, in the words of the leaders of these initiatives at SAP.

On-Demand

Phil Wainewright reported on SAP executive VP John Wookey’s presentation at the OnDemand Europe Conference in June:

“On demand is the next stage in the evolution of application development … It is absolutely essential from SAP’s perspective that we embrace this change,” he said. “On-demand is what our customers are looking to invest in. If we do our job well and listen to our customers, these are the applications we have to be delivering. We have to drive to leadership in on-demand applications.”

Here’s a video of John Wookey and Mani Gil, Vice President of OnDemand at SAP BusinessObjects, discussing the conference:

Links

• Wall Street Journal: SAP to Make Online Software Push
• Financial Times: SAP reshapes strategy for online software
• Mary Hayes Weier of Information Week: SAP Unveils SaaS Strategy
• Dennis Howlett: SAP’s John Wookey: the task ahead

Social Networking

A podcast from SearchSAP.com on how SAP’s Web 2.0 strategy makes way for social networking in business apps

“In that light, SearchSAP.com sat down with Zia Yusuf, executive vice president of SAP’s global ecosystem and partner group, and Mark Yolton, senior vice president of SAP community networks. In addition to managing strategy for SAP’s social networking sites like the SAP Developer Network (SDN), the two men play a role in what social networking tools may be integrated into SAP’s own software.

In this podcast, Yusuf and Yolton talk about SAP’s internal Web 2.0 strategy, including why sites like SDN have been successful and how SAP’s employees are using tools like Jive and CubeTree in their daily tasks. In turn, they discuss possible business scenarios in which tools like Twitter and LinkedIn could be integrated into SAP software.”

Cloud Computing

Information Week: SAP Sheds Light On Cloud Computing Plans

“In a keynote address and interview at the Interop Conference and Expo in Las Vegas on Tuesday, [SAP CTO Vishal Sikka] broadly outlined SAP’s cloud computing strategy and discussed the technical and business challenges the company needs to solve before doing things like ramping up the number of customers served by Business ByDesign.

SAP sees its opportunities in the cloud — which it seems to define very broadly as all Internet-based services — as threefold for now: enabling “business network service clouds” like iTunes that are powered by SAP Business Suite and Business Objects, complementary and integrated cloud-based services from SAP likeCRM On-Demand, and a mission-critical business application suite in Business ByDesign.”

Also see Vishal’s Timeless Software Blog.