SAP Shines the Spotlight on Small and Medium Businesses

Posted on January 15, 2013 by lauriemccabe

SAP SME SummitSAP’s stellar success in building its blue-chip large enterprise business has often overshadowed its considerable but quieter achievements in small and medium business (SMBs) markets. But SAP is not a household name in the SMB community. Even technology insiders are often surprised to learn that SMBs (or as SAP refers them, small and medium enterprises, or SMEs) account for the majority of SAP’s 197,000 customer base.

But at SAP’s first small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) summit, hosted at the company’s New York offices in late November, co-CEO Bill McDermott and other key SAP execs made it clear that SAP is intensifying its aspirations and endeavors with new programs and initiatives that reach well beyond its conventional solutions.

From SME Solutions to an SME Ecosystem

Over the last few years, SAP has steadily grown its SME business with its traditional solution offerings. For instance, year-over-year revenues have grown 20% for SAP Business One, SAP’s flagship ERP offering for small businesses. As discussed in The Progressive SMB: Customer Stories are Worth 1,000 Analyst Words, SAP has been particularly attractive to Progressive SMBs, who realize the increasingly direct connection between strategic IT investments and successful business outcomes.

The steady growth of SAP solutions has been admirable, but, as we learned at the SME Summit, SAP is casting a much wider net through a series of different initiatives that bring SAP’s big data, mobile and cloud capabilities to smaller organizations in a more accessible manner. Together, these are starting to take the shape of a growing SAP SME ecosystem. For instance, SAP is:

  • Growing and enabling the traditional partner channel. SAP channel partners currently account for one-third of SAP SME sales. SAP intends to raise this to 40% by 2015. To help accomplish this, SAP is enabling more of its traditional partners (VARs, SIs, MSPs, etc.) with Rapid Deployment Solutions (RDS).  Currently, SAP offers 150 RDS solutions, which provide businesses with fixed cost, fixed scope preconfigured software, best practices and implementation services that give customers everything they need to get up and running in just a few weeks. RDS has proven to be very instrumental in driving SAP’s growth in the SME sector. In the past year, RDS deployments in SME have outpaced the 500%+ overall RDS growth rate over the prior year. The importance of building and enabling the channel cannot be underestimated: according to SMB Group’s 2012 SMB Routes to Market Study, over half of SMBs purchase business applications through indirect channels.
  • Recruiting partners to build micro-vertical solutions on Business One. The small business market is actually very fragmented. While all small businesses share some common needs, each micro-vertical has unique requirements and needs specific capabilities when it comes to business software. SAP is building a development-focused partner channel to zero in on the needs of each micro-vertical. For instance, SAP partner Orchestra is building specialized solutions on Business One for small businesses in the fuel, beer and food industries. OrchestraBeer was showcased at the Summit. In this video interview, Ryan Hilliard, CEO of Hilliard’s Beer, a small startup with less than 10 employees, explains to me why he selected OrchestraBeer. Ryan plans to grow his business, and wanted a solution that would grow with him, and one over the lifetime of his business. But he also needed a turnkey solution geared to his business, and able to track specific metrics–such as batches and barrels of beer for visibility into his supply chain and production.
  • Empowering startups with SAP HANA. At the Summit, SAP announced that it has powered over 150 startups in Silicon Valley with SAP HANA. These startups are using HANA as a development platform to provide SMBs with a new, user-friendly generation of real-time analytics and advanced predictive solutions. For instance, Vish Canaran, CEO of Liquid Analytics, talked about his company’s cloud-based, mobile analytics applications for iPhone, iPad, Blackberry and Android users.  As Vish explained to me in this video discussion, Liquid Analytics starts with the user experience to help optimize productivity. Liquid Analytics apps use gamification and predictive analytics to help make it easier, quicker and more fun for wholesale industry sales reps to place orders and set and meet sales goals. As noted in SMB Group’s 2012 SMB Routes to Market Study, the data fire hose is running at full blast and shows little signs of abating. But, the big gap in big data is painfully evident for small businesses: Just 18% have purchased/upgraded a business intelligence solution in the past 24 months, and only 17% plan to do so in the next 12 months. Solutions such as Liquid Analytics show promise to offer small businesses an accessible, user-friendly ways to harness big data for business good.
  • Extending the Ariba network effect. As part of SAP’s recent Ariba acquisition, every SAP customer gets a free connection into the Ariba network (and any company, whether an SAP customer or not, can enroll as a Supplier on the Ariba Network). As revealed in our 2012 SMB Routes to Market Study, about one-quarter of SMBs sell goods and services to large enterprises. Since attracting new customers, growing revenues, and increasing profitability are perennial SMB challenges, we expect that SMB interest and involvement in big company supplier networks to heat up in 2013. As discussed in SMB Group’s Top 10 SMB Technology Predictions for 2013, access to the Ariba network is one opportunity that SMBs can leverage to compete for their share of the $300 billion dollars that large businesses spend annually on goods and services.

Looking Beyond Technology

SAP is also expanding its engagements with influencers, venture capitalists, governmental agencies and other vital SME catalysts. The Summit’s “Power of Small” panel featured speakers with wide-ranging perspectives and influence in the SME market, and underscored that SAP’s focus will go well beyond technology to include initiatives focused on policy, people, capital to help create an environment in which SMEs can thrive.

For example, Linda Rottenberg of Endeavor, who pioneered the examination of how high-growth business can transform economies, discussed the necessity of “mentor capital” for SME success. At the event, Bill McDermott announced that SAP has committed to help Endeavor select, mentor, and accelerate high-impact entrepreneurs on a global scale. Sunil Hirani of trueEX examined the effect of immigration policies on entrepreneurship in the U.S., and the importance of aligning governmental policies to help SMEs prosper.

Perspective

With these initiatives, SAP is tapping into a very important trend. As discussed in SMB Group’s Top 10 SMB Technology Predictions for 2013, Progressive SMBs, who invest more in technology and use technology for competitive advantage are also much more likely to anticipate revenue gains than peers whose tech investments are flat or declining. We also see this gap widening year over year, and expect that it will continue to do so.

Although not everyone at SAP may yet “get” small business, it was clear from the event that Co-CEO Bill McDermott does understand them, and also values the increasingly make or break role that technology plays for SMEs. SAP’s commitment to enabling partners to expose it technology in a relevant way, and its investment in the broader SME community were on display at this high-profile event, making it clear that McDermott wants to make SAP a household name among SMEs.  A lofty goal, to be sure, but one that SAP is very committed to aspiring to.

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BI and Analytics for Mid-Market Businesses: My Podcast with SAP

Posted on December 11, 2012 by lauriemccabe

I recently joined Paul Clark from SAP in a thought leadership podcast to discuss the topics of Business Intelligence (BI), Enterprise Performance Management (EPM), and Social Analytics for Mid-market companies.

In the podcast, we discuss the various aspects and uses of Enterprise Performance Management (EPM), Business Intelligence (BI), and Social Analytical tools within the dynamics of a mid-market business. We talk about how the proper use of EPM and BI tools and software by companies in the mid-market can achieve a higher level of corporate consistency and efficiency in performance management.
Our conversation also turned to a newer area of business intelligence–Social Analytics. Social Analytics tools monitor and analyze market and brand sentiment and the return on social engagement with consumers. They can help mid-market companies monitor and engage with customers in the areas of support, sales and ongoing relationship development.

We offer some final advice on the “first steps” towards achieving an improved level of performance management within the mid-market corporation.

I hope you enjoy the podcast!

Podcast Segments and Timeline:

00:00 – 01:10: Introductions and backgrounds

01:10 – 16:50: Enterprise Performance Management and Business Intelligence. Here’s what we covered:

  • Defining Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) and Business Intelligence (BI) and the role it can play in helping mid-market(*) companies and where
  • The rate of adoption of performance management practices and business intelligence in mid-market organizations
  • Key issues facing mid-market leadership teams when it comes to enterprise wide performance management practices
  • Some guidance for mid-market company leaders with respect to improving corporate performance and long-term success
  • What results are mid-market companies seeing from EPM and Business Intelligence solutions?

16:50 – 30:00: Social Analytics. What we covered:

  • Defining Social Analytics and the role it can play in helping mid-market companies and where
  • Whether mid-market companies are becoming interested in monitoring social networks and social media. If so, what they plan to do with this information and insight
  • Whether the data from social networks is an opportunity for mid-market companies
  • Final advice for CFO’s first steps to improve corporate performance management.

Thanks to Paul Clark and Chris Herbert (discussion moderator) for participating in this conversation. Below are their bios.

Paul Clark

Paul Clark is responsible for the messaging and deliverables that describe the business analytics solutions from SAP, from business intelligence and enterprise information management to enterprise performance management and governance, risk, and compliance. Paul has over 20 years’ experience in marketing, specializing in product and solution marketing. He holds a BSc from the University of Bristol, UK and a Management DESS from the Université de Savoie, France.

Chris Herbert

Chris Herbert is the manager of the CFO Intellectual Exchange Network which brings thought leaders together to share experiences and engage in conversations around the office of finance and the role technology is playing to improve business performance, compliance and overall success.

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The Progressive SMB: Customer Stories are Worth 1,000 Analyst Words

Posted on July 18, 2012 by lauriemccabe

I attended SAP’s SAPPHIRE NOW 2012 several weeks ago and am finally getting a chance to share my thoughts on the customer meetings I had with Big Byte Corporation and KEEN Footwear at the event. These two customers are very “real” SMBs. BigByte has 52 employees; KEEN has 130. Neither is a Silicon Valley venture capital startup, which let’s face it, is a very different breed. Why did they choose SAP, which, after all, is best known for its footprint in large companies? Their perspectives about this are quite interesting because they personify what we at the SMB Group call “Progressive SMBs.”

The Progressive SMB Class–What is it, and Why is it Important?

Our 2011 SMB Routes to Market Study indicated that many SMBs are tightening their tech wallets for 2012 as compared to 2011 (Figure 1). But the study also showed a distinct segment of SMBs that we call “Progressive SMBs.” Despite economic uncertainties, Progressive SMBs plan to increase IT investments. They see IT as a tool for business transformation, and a way to create market advantage and level the playing field against bigger companies. Although while price is a factor, they rate other criteria–such as the ability to customize solutions, strong vendor reputation, and local support and service–higher than other SMBs when making technology purchase decisions. Figure 1: SMB IT Spending Plans and Revenue Expectations More important, Progressive SMBs have higher revenues expectations than their peers. For instance, 75% of the Progressive medium businesses (who are increasing technology spending) anticipate revenue gains in 2012, compared to just 17% of medium businesses that plan to decrease IT spending. BigByte and KEEN Footwear have both adopted a Progressive strategy. They illuminate how Progressive SMBs think about IT, and how their businesses have benefitted by making a bigger investment in IT than most of their SMB peers.

BigByte’s SAP Story

Founded twenty years ago, BigByte provides annual global warranty services, after-sales tech support, product repair and refurbishment and reverse logistics services to large companies such as Apple, Cisco and Panasonic. BigByte had used a combination of entry-level financials, homegrown apps, spreadsheets and manual processes for a long time. But keeping track of the significant inventory on consignment from its customers became more challenging over time. And, since every manufacturer has its own, unique set of processes to handle warranty service, BigByte was struggling to accommodate each company’s individual workflow. By 2009, BigByte’s resources were stretched thin. It didn’t have the inventory controls it needed, and was spending too much time pulling data together for reports. At the same time, the company’s owner wanted to prepare the business for growth and/or acquisition. He realized that to accomplish this, the business had to become more efficient. Michael Franklin, who I spoke with at SAPPHIRE NOW, was hired as COO to fix the problem. Initially, Mike hadn’t considered SAP; he had a couple of other ERP solutions he was vetting for the job. But the company’s owner spotted an SAP ad in Golf Magazine, and thought, why not get information? Mike went to SAP’s web site and was connected to Softengine, an SAP Business One partner. Why did BigByte decide to buy SAP Business One? The other solutions Mike was looking at promised many of the same things, such as a unified management for core business functions and embedded analytics. What sold the company on SAP Business One echoes what we heard in our survey about what Progressive SMBs are looking for:

  • Good value and no pricing surprises. Soft Engine offered a fixed price for implementation, and fixed monthly price per user, per month pricing for everything else (hosting management, 24×7 support, upgrades, etc.).
  • Fast time to value. As part of the fixed scope implementation BigByte got the software and 21 users up and running in less than 6 months via Softengine’s hosting program for Business One.
  • The ability to customize. BigByte needed to tailor return authorization functionality tailored for each of its customers–and be able to customize for future ones too.
  • Trust in and credibility. Softengine had a strong mix of SAP credentials and competencies, along with managed services and cloud infrastructure design and deployment.

Interestingly, although debating what isn’t and isn’t really a “true” cloud solution has become the most popular past time for many of us in the industry, this was not an issue for BigByte. Mike wanted the best ERP solution for BigByte, but didn’t want to manage the IT infrastructure needed to support it. Two years later, Mike says that Business One has given the company what it needs: automated processes and efficiencies; reliable, unified and real-time data; dashboards, tools and reporting for better decision-making. BigByte also uses Business One mobile apps for things such as approving purchase orders. Net-net, Mike estimates the company cut labor costs by about 15%, and cut IT costs by about 80%, because it now outsources hardware maintenance. IT now helps power the business, instead of just supporting it. BigByte can adjust to different customers’ processes and requirements, giving the company the agility to replace shrinking customer demand in the optical disk drive sector with the new customers in the growing LCD market. And, with its business processes in order, BigByte is also much more credible to potential buyers.

KEEN Footwear

If you’re an outdoor enthusiast, you know (and probably love) KEEN Footwear, a Portland, Oregon-based footwear designer and distributor. KEEN’s founders went into business to invent sandals that protect the toes with a signature protective “toe bumper.” Today the company offers shoes, bags and socks for many outdoor activities and for casual wear. I had the opportunity to talk to David Boeschenstein, KEEN’s COO about their SAP story. When Dave came to KEEN from Adidas in 2008, the company had outgrown its ERP system. Dave’s charge was to select a scalable solution that could adapt as the company continues to grow. He looked at a few options–including SAP Business All-in-One (BAiO) for apparel and footwear, which is used by several others in the outdoor and specialty footwear sectors. After extensive evaluation involving multiple users from each department, KEEN decided SAP BAiO–along with SAP Business Objects and Business Warehouse–would be the best fit for the company. Now remember, KEEN has only just over 130 employees! But they are another prime example of a Progressive SMB. KEEN views IT as an essential enabler to drive business growth, and wanted solutions that will scale to support the initiatives they have planned for the next 5 years and beyond. According to Dave, Keen’s motivation for installing SAP solutions was “to ensure we provide our customers with excellent service. Our business operations mandate is to make it easy for customers to do business with KEEN wherever in the world they interact with our products and our fans.”. SAP partner Gravity Pro helped KEEN deploy BAiO (using Rapid Deployment Solutions, or RDS), Business Objects and Business Warehouse in July 2011. KEEN is now live in the U.S., Canada, and The Netherlands.

Customer Stories are Worth 1,000 Analyst Words (or more!)

Much has already been written about the details of the new products, strategies and solutions that SAP announced at Sapphire, and this is, of course, very valuable to understand. But sometimes not enough is discussed from the customer’s point of view–and some of the most important things–namely the business outcomes from technology–can get lost in translation. The BigByte and KEEN experiences help put the SAP into perspective for SMBs, and illustrate how Progressive SMBs are making their decisions about business solutions. They also highlight why it is so important to be–or become–a Progressive SMB.

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SAP Business One, Chapter Two: Raising the Small Business Bar

Posted on June 29, 2012 by lauriemccabe

In the world of SAP enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions for small and medium businesses (SMBs), SAP Business One is sometimes overshadowed by SAP Business All-in-One (BAiO), which has SAP’s large enterprise ERP at its core, and by and SAP Business ByDesign, which is SAP’s first software-as-a-service (SaaS) ERP entry.

But Business One, which is designed from the ground up to meet the needs of small businesses with fewer than 100 employees, has quietly kept growing both its capabilities and in new customer acquisition. During the past year or so, SAP has also made some significant new investments in three key areas: mobile, on demand and big data.

Taken together, these developments could open a new chapter for Business One–and for small businesses that want to use IT to transform their businesses.

Chapter One–A Brief History

Business One has its roots in SAP’s acquisition of TopManage Financial Systems in 2002. SAP made the acquisition to provide small businesses (and subsidiaries in larger companies) with an affordable way to move up from entry-level accounting solutions to a single, integrated business management offering.

The solution is designed for small businesses that have little or no IT resources. It provides a unified suite of financials, sales, customer relationship management, inventory and operations capabilities, along with embedded analytics and reporting capabilities.

Over the years, SAP has continued to invest in Business One to keep pace with changing market requirements and global demands. Business One is now available in 27 languages and 40 localizations. To help partners more easily extend solution functionality, SAP built an integration platform for Business One that has since attracted over 550 add-on solutions. Today, Business One has over 35,000 customers in over 80 countries. At its current pace, SAP estimates that it is on track to add about 5,000 new customers per year.

Chapter Two–Mobile, On Demand and Big Data

Fast forward to today. SAP is infusing Business One with the new mobile, on demand and big data capabilities it needs to take the solution to the next level.

On the mobile front, SAP launched Version 1.5 of its Business One mobile app in February 2012. The mobile app gives customers access to key Business One functionality, such as alerts and approvals, real-time Crystal Reports, customer and supplier data and inventory information via mobile devices. The app is available for the iPhone and iPad via SAP, and for Android devices through its partners. Looking ahead, SAP plans to add new mobile functionality for as sales document creation so that sales reps can do more on the go. SAP is also updating the user interface (UI) so that mobile users can have multiple windows open the same time so they can more easily view the information they need.

In March, SAP introduced Business One OnDemand to offer Business One in a cloud-based, subscription model. The OnDemand version has and will maintain the same functionality and interface as the on premise version. SAP is certifying partners to host the solution to ensure that they meet security, performance and quality standards. In most cases, these hosting partners provide the back-end infrastructure, and team with SAP VARs who sell and implement the solution. SAP has also created a Cloud Control Center that supplies partners with automated tools to manage Business One OnDemand throughout the solution lifecycle.

Some pundits have claimed that Business One OnDemand is not a true, multi-tenant, software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution. So I asked SAP for clarification on some of the technicalities and learned that users do need a remote desktop solution (such as those from Citrix or Microsoft) to access Business One OnDemand. And, while the solution is multi-tenant in that users share the same instance of the application and SQL server, each user has its own database schema.

Since Business One OnDemand requires a remote desktop solution and customers don’t share a database schema, cloud purists are likely to discount it. However, these details are much less likely to create issues issue for actual small business customers–and may work in SAP’s favor.

The fact that SAP’s on premise and on demand versions share the same interface and database structure means that existing customers can move to the cloud without complex data conversions or additional user training. Meanwhile, SAP Business One can now get into consideration among prospects that are only considering a cloud solution. And, some of these prospects may prefer to have their own dedicated database schema, along with access to the 550+ partner apps that are in Business One arsenal. Finally, NetSuite, arguably the leading SaaS ERP vendor, has been moving away from its original small business focus to concentrate more on the mid-market and departments of large enterprises, ironically paving the way for SAP to make inroads here.

SAP also announced Analytics powered by SAP HANA for SAP Business One, which will be generally available in late 2012. HANA is SAP’s “big data” solution. It’s a column-based, in-memory database that allows applications to zip through calculations for millions of records in just fractions of a second. SAP HANA for SAP Business One is scaled for the needs of small companies. It combines the SAP HANA-based application with SAP Crystal Reports software so small businesses can get the benefits of speedy data crunching and use the tools that they are already comfortable with to analyze this data. The solution includes a set of predefined, ready-to-run dashboards and reports.

While some small businesses may not require this added horsepower, the offering is relevant for those that need to more effectively analyze more and more complex content–including audio, video, and text–to compete effectively in their markets. These customers will be able to create interactive reports and run ad-hoc analysis much faster than they could before; navigate through various business objects from one screen; and use free-style search to access information more quickly.

The Rest of the Story

SAP Business One isn’t for all small businesses. After all, although the price tag is low compared to other SAP offerings, Business One still represents a significant expenditure compared to the typical small business accounting solutions.

But, even amidst–or maybe because of–economic uncertainties, our SMB Group 2011 Small and Medium Businesses Routes to Market Study indicates that there is sizeable segment of the small business market that plans to increase IT investments. These “progressive” small businesses see IT as a means to create market advantage and achieve their business goals. While price is a factor, they rate other criteria–such as the ability to customize solutions, strong vendor reputation and local support and service–higher than other SMBs when making technology purchase decisions. Business One hits the mark on these criteria, and consequently, is likely to enjoy continued good growth in this segment.

However, this progressive segment is demanding and will expect SAP to stay ahead of the curve. To do so, SAP will need to address a couple of additional areas in this new chapter, including:

  • Collaboration and social. One of the biggest trends in social-collaboration space is to connect collaborative activities with business processes. SAP has already merged its Streamwork team with its newly acquired SuccessFactors’ Jam team, and the combined entity is hammering out SAP’s future direction in this area. SAP needs to add social and collaboration capabilities to Business One sooner, rather than later, to ensure that Business One customers can take advantage of integrating collaborative and business processes.
  • Mobile applications for external users. Business One has a solid solution and game plan for internal (employee) mobile apps, but what’s the plan to extend access to selected functions to external customers, partners and suppliers? The SMB Group’s 2012 SMB Mobile Solutions Study indicates strong plans among small businesses to provide mobile apps for external users for activities such as appointment scheduling, payments, marketing offers and service. Over the long-term, partners should probably be responsible for developing most of these apps, but SAP needs to seed the area to jump-start partner app development.

Overall however, SAP Business One, Chapter Two is off to a good start. The mobile app has already been downloaded more than 34,700 times; about 60 partners are preparing to come on board to offer Business One OnDemand; and over 30 customers are in ramp up with Analytics powered by SAP HANA for SAP Business One.

In addition, while large enterprise solutions will continue to dominate SAP news, SAP’s commitment to and investment in small business solutions is growing. For instance, the vendor recently announced that it is sponsoring a global competition with Ashoka Changemakers, The Power of Small: Entrepreneurs Strengthening Local Economies.  The contest is designed to identify innovative strategies that can help small businesses grow and thrive in underserved communities.

The bottom line? SAP clearly takes small business seriously–and small businesses that are ready to move up from stand-alone accounting solutions should take SAP Business One seriously too.

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Key Themes from SAP TechEd 2011–How Do They Relate to SMBs?

Posted on September 21, 2011 by lauriemccabe

As the name implies, SAP TechEd offers technical education, such as hands-on workshops, deep-dive lectures and sessions with SAP technical experts about all things SAP. That said, TechEd isn’t for everyone, and it’s no wonder that most of the 6,500+ attendees at SAP TechEd 2011, held the week of September 12 in Las Vegas, were SAP partners and technology specialists from the vendor’s large enterprise accounts.

However, despite the technical focus of the event, there were several key themes that have important implications for non-techies and small and medium businesses (or as SAP calls them–small and medium enterprises or SMEs). This makes sense, as SAP’s SME ambitions are core to the company’s growth strategy. Many of the partners I spoke to at the event provide sales, service and third-party development for SAP’s portfolio of SMB-centered applications, including Business One, Business by Design, Business All-in-One and Business Objects Edge. Undoubtedley not by accident, as SMB customers rely on these partners to translate the technology and solution innovations below into practical business results.

  • HANA everywhere. As noted in fellow analyst Cindy Jutras’ post, HANA was by far the lead theme at TechEd–just take a look at the tweet stream at #sapteched. HANA is SAP’s innovative column-based, in-memory database, which enables applications to zip through calculations for millions of records in just fractions of a second. While this is relevant for large companies, why should SMBs care? According to SAP, HANA will be part of every solution that SAP offers. SAP applications, from Business One through the Business Suite, will be “powered by HANA,” providing these applications with a big performance boost. The good news here for SMBs is that while SAP Business Suite customers will pay extra for high-test HANA performance, customers using SAP’s SMB-centric solutions will get at least some of this added horsepower as part of the normal upgrade cycle, at no additional charge. However, at this stage, it’s still fuzzy as to exactly how SAP will embed and deliver HANA in its SMB portfolio, what will be included, and what will be priced separately.
  • SAP Business by Design (ByD) as a platform. ByD will continue to fill the role of a cloud-based ERP suite, but ByD is evolving to become a cloud platform as well. SAP is providing partners and customers with an integrated SDK to build applications on top of the ByD platform, and plans to debut a ByD app store ala Salesforce.com AppExchange, where customers can buy, download and deploy both SAP and partner ByD apps. The ByD cloud platform should make it easier for partners to build their own applications and IP on top of ByD and expand their market opportunity. Partner-developed ByD services will be layered on the ByD foundation to deliver the common elements of ByD.  Providing and enhancing the partner opportunity is essential for SAP to groe its SMB footprint in the cloud space, especially as it plays catch up against early birds such as NetSuite and Salesforce.com. Partner applications and services will be essential to provide the diverse SMB market with the choice and richness in solutions they require.
  • Mobile as the design center for solution development and delivery. Aided and abetted by its Sybase acquisition, SAP is putting the mobile experience front and center for application design and development. This means that SAP’s design point for new applications starts with the mobile device experience. Existing apps will get a mobile makeover–providing users with the mobile interfaces they are increasingly clamoring for and turning to over traditional desktop devices. For instance, SAP Business One presented Version 1.3.1 of it mobile app, which enables users to use Business One on an iPhone or iPad. The app provides things such as alerts and approvals, reports and interactive dashboards, and inventory management, and looks very easy to use and streamlined for the mobile experience that more and more SMBs are using in addition to or as a replacement for traditional desktop interfaces.
  • Making business applications more engaging. Mary Poppins told us long ago that “For every job that must be done there is an element of fun, find the fun and snap, the job’s a game.” Jane McGonigal, SAP TechEd’s guest keynote speaker, presented the modern-day version of this with her talk on “gamification.” In a nutshell, gamification is making a non-game application more engaging by making it game-like. While I talked to several skeptics (or Puritans?) who don’t get the connection between work and games, I’ve always bought into the Mary Poppins philosophy. To me, it’s intuitive that people doing more fun and interesting work are naturally more engaged and productive. SAP put this theory into action at TechEd with Knowledge Quest, which attendees could play and earn points by answering questions, completing interactive challenges, acquiring codes, and taking on head-to-head challenges with other players. Players with the most points were awarded prizes such as iPads, Nintendo 3DS, and headphones. I don’t know how many people played, but the Knowledge Quest booth was pretty packed whenever I went by. Now this is a very big if, but if SAP successfully tackles the gamification challenge (maybe with a game?!) it can gain a big advantage. SMBs using SAP solutions will also come out ahead–via a more productive and engaged workforce–especially as more businesses are started and run by younger entrepreneurs and employees that have been raised in a video-gaming culture.

The bottom line is that while TechEd isn’t for everyone, SAP’s key themes are as relevant to business decision-makers as they are to technology decision-makers and solution builders.

However, SAP is competing against some great marketers–most notably Marc Benioff of Salesforce.com–who bring their own appetite for and vision of business software innovation to the market. In contrast, SAP, for all of its technical strengths, has not been a marketing powerhouse. While SAP has committed to making its technology innovations digestible for SMB customers, can it do the same with it’s marketing and messaging? Creating clear, crisp and compelling marketing for its diverse portfolio of solutions and its new technology directions may prove to be SAP’s toughest innovation challenge.

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SAP Business One: Big Business Capabilities on a Small Business Budget

Posted on May 26, 2011 by lauriemccabe

SAP has forged its corporate identity in the large enterprise space, serving the likes of Coca Cola and Dow Chemical. But, while attending SAP’s Sapphire user event last week, I had the opportunity to meet with Andreas Wolfinger, Global Head of Solution Management and Product Management for SAP Business One, and Jennifer Schulze, Director SME Solutions Marketing (who I interviewed in this SMB Spotlight video) and get an update on SAP Business One –which may be SAP’s best kept secret.

In a nutshell, SAP Business One is designed from the ground up to meet the needs of small businesses and departments and divisions of large businesses. Geared to organizations with limited or no IT resources, SAP Business One offers a unified business management solution that integrates core business functions, including financials, sales, customer relationship management, inventory, and operations. Also included are embedded analytics, ad hoc queries, and standard reports, and integration with SAP Crystal Reports software. Because SAP Business One is built as a unified solution, it can help small businesses get the synergy they need across different business functions, streamline processes, and cut down on redundant data entry and errors.

SAP offers the solution in 40 countries and 25 languages—providing coverage that few other small business ERP vendors can rival. SAP Business One also boasts about 550 add-on solutions, many of which provide industry-specific functionality.

Business One is a packaged solution that customers can run on-premise, but is also available in hosted and hosted subscription offerings. It has a very small footprint, which enables smaller companies to run the solution on a laptop instead of a server. Business One customers are typically up and running in 2 to 8 weeks. Available via SAP Business One partners, pricing (including software license and implementation) typically starts at about $20,000 for five users.

To expand awareness and extend its market reach, SAP introduced the SAP Business One Starter Package in May. The starter package offers a fast, affordable, low-risk on ramp even for very small businesses. It includes pre-configured administration, financials, sales, purchasing, and inventory processes and implementation services for up to 5 users. Pricing starts at under $2,000 U.S., and companies go live in 3 to 10 days. When and if you need to add more users or functionality, you can upgrade to the standard edition of SAP Business One, without having to migrate data, learn a new application or re-train users.

Despite its small size, SAP Business One can also take advantage of sophisticated technology that can provide businesses with a competitive edge. For instance, I was surprised to learn that SAP has Business One running directly on HANA, SAP’s column-based, in-memory database, in its labs. HANA enables applications to zip through calculations for millions of records in just fractions of a second. According to SAP, this is valuable even for companies that don’t have to crunch through huge volumes of data. For example, in-memory technology will also improve the performance of the application. Though not yet ready for prime time, SAP plans to introduce Business One In-Memory Database with the release of the 9.x family, slated for early 2012.

Small businesses have very diverse needs and constraints, and Business One won’t fit the bill for every small business. However, small businesses that want a flexible, capable integrated, on-premise business suite may be pleasantly surprised to learn about–and investigate–what SAP Business One has to offer.

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SAP Aims for SME

Posted on March 15, 2010 by lauriemccabe

I dialed into SAP’s SME (small and medium enterprises) Global Business Update Call a couple of weeks ago. Jeff Stiles, SVP, SME, Volume & Ecosystem Marketing, provided analysts a recap of recent SAP SME highlights, and shared strategic directions for 2010. I’ve been following SAP in the SME market since it acquired TopManage (which later become SAP Business One) in 2002, so I’m always interested in checking their progress. Here’s what I heard and what I took away from the discussion—with the most interesting stuff saved for the end.

  • SME is critical to SAP’s future growth: As part of recent restructuring changes, the company named Peter Lorenz, Executive vice president of Small and Midsize Enterprises (SME), as a Corporate Officer, elevating SME attention at the corporate level. Though SAP has been investing in SME solutions, marketing and sales for several years, this appointment indicates that SAP is redoubling its efforts to crack the SME code. SAP also recently hired Kevin Gilroy—who spent 24 years at HP, most recently as senior VP of HP’s worldwide small and medium business segment—as vice president for channel and business development for SAP’s small and midsize business organization in North America. SAP is also making substantial product, channel and marketing investments in SAP Business One and SAP Business by Design—both of which are geared to smaller companies—as well as to SAP Business All-In-One, which is designed for the mid-market. As noted in the next bullet, however, SAP’s SME definition, solutions and pricing still skew towards larger SMEs, so the question remains, how low will SAP be able to go in the broader small business market?
  • SAP is growing its SME market footprint: Jeff shared a number of impressive stats, such as the fact that more than 77% of SAP’s 95,000 customers are SMEs, and that this percentage is growing. However, SAP defines the SME market as companies with $500 million in annual revenues or less, which gets into some pretty big businesses. For instance, the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), has established two widely used size standards—500 employees for most manufacturing and mining industries, and $7 million in average annual receipts for most non-manufacturing industries. Nevertheless, SAP has tripled its SME base (using its SME definition) in last 3 years (with about 30% coming from the Business Objects acquisition). The vendor indicates that it is garnering 35 new SME customers per working day, and that it is enjoying good growth among small businesses and in the lower end of the medium business market.
  • SAP is investing in channels to enable SME growth: The direct, feet-on-the street sales model that has served SAP so well in the large enterprise space doesn’t scale to the economies needed in SME. In addition to hiring Kevin Gilroy, SAP is recruiting and enabling more SME channel partners and developing and expanding direct inside sales to do the job. Channel partners now account for more than 50% of SAP’s SME revenues, inside sales accounts for 20% of the business, and 30% derive from SAP’s direct outside sales team. SAP has struggled with building effective SME channels for a long time. But, it looks like it is making some good gains here. It is investing in “virtual agency” marketing services to help its 6,000 partners create their own targeted campaigns, and in SAP Marketing University to teach partners about marketing. Inside sales will be increasingly critical for SAP in SME—especially as it prepares for the launch of Business by Design’s next version in mid-2010.
  • Business One gets a facelift and Business All-in-One gets a refresh: Release of Business One 8.8, slated for Q2 2010, features a new UI with Web 2.0 capabilities for a better user experience, and cloud integration for partner applications. Behind the scenes, SAP has consolidated three individual lines of Business One code into one—making the economics much more attractive. SAP has also created packaged integration scenarios for subsidiaries of big companies, making it easier for them to integrate with their corporate HQ SAP systems; remote monitoring; and embedded, packaged analytics. Meanwhile, Business All-in-One gets a refresh, with SAP extending the Fast Start (fixed scope, fixed fee) program with partner hosting offerings in 20 countries—another indicator that more companies just don’t want to or can’t run all of this themselves. SAP also said that its online solution configurator is helping to reduce the cost of sales, and that it will introduce a new supply chain relationship management module into the Business All-in-One offering.
  • Business Objects has been a boon: With 57% year-over-year growth, Business Objects has seen good traction with both SAP ERP customers (it tripled BI revenues with SAP ERP clients in Q1 through Q4 of this year) and non-SAP customers. SAP also intends to use Business Objects as a wedge opportunity, to get in the door and eventually replace older legacy systems with SAP ERP. The company recently announced a free personal use version of BI On Demand, which should boost interest among the vast majority of SMBs that don’t yet use any BI solution.

And now to what I found most interesting—Business by Design, Chapter 2. What a long strange trip this has been. After launching ByDesign to much fanfare in 2007, things quickly fizzled. Going against conventional wisdom (and economics) SAP built its debut SaaS offering on a single tenant model instead of a multi-tenant architecture. We all know what that means—lots of red ink because single tenancy doesn’t afford the economies of scale and skill that multi-tenancy provides. Anyway, since then SAP has limited ByDesign to about 100 charter clients, who are getting a lot of tender loving care. Feature Pack (FP) 2.5, slated for H2 2010 will sport multi-tenancy, making it economically feasible for SAP to sell, provision, maintain and support it in a broader market. SAP will continue to offer a single tenancy option alongside the multi-tenant offering (both on the same code base).

Since this is ByDesign’s first multi-tenant varietal, SAP isn’t quite sure what the sweet spot will be but will stick with a 25-user minimum. From my perspective, this still seems a bit high for getting at much of the SMB market. By SAP’s own calculations, about 10% of client companies’ workers currently use ERP. Although this percentage may grow, right now this puts ByDesign at 250 employees and up (whereas the vast majority of SMBs have fewer than 100 employees). Another challenge SAP faces is around routes to market. Few SaaS vendors have established successful channel programs with traditional IT VARs, many of whom have been skittish about the model. As I mentioned above, SAP will need to fire up the inside sales model for ByDesign, and create a lot of pull with marketing campaigns (enter the 100 ByDesign reference customers).

Another interesting note: SAP is incorporating Microsoft Silverlight to make it easier to make changes to the ByDesign UI, create mashups and integrate with Microsoft Office applications and features. SAP will also release an SDK for developers based on Microsoft Visual Studio.NET, hoping that all those developers will be enticed to build add-ons and industry-specific extensions for ByDesign. And yes, there will be a store for that—SAP intends to build an app store down the road.

I don’t know if I’m reading too much into the tea leaves, but I’m a bit intrigued by SAP’s growing relationship with Microsoft for ByDesign. Since Microsoft Dynamics has yet to offer a true SaaS ERP solution, it just makes me wonder if there’s something up with that. Related to this, Microsoft recently forfeited it’s small business accounting play to Intuit, and soon after, inked a deal with Intuit to integrate its cloud-based Partner Platform with Microsoft Windows Azure—which looks to be a mutually beneficial relationship. Could SAP and Microsoft be hatching some similar type of joint effort in this space, aimed at the mid-market?

As ByDesign FP 2.5 comes fully online, SAP will probably spend more time than it would like in positioning ByDesign against both Business One and Business All-in-One.  Though the on-site vs. cloud angle is clear, there is lots of market overlap. SAP will need to proactively guide both customers and partners to the right solution in terms of total cost, ease of use, functionality, ROI timeframes, etc. so it doesn’t waste time and energy competing against itself—or having its partners compete against themselves or its inside sales team. It will also be interesting to see if ByDesign can replicate the experience of its 100 charter customers to a broader base, as it will be difficult to broadly supply the same level of attention that these early customers enjoyed.

But clearly, the vendor must make ByDesign work to capture the SME market’s increasing appetite for SaaS and cloud alternatives—yes, even in the ERP space, as evidenced by NetSuite and Intacct. SAP’s recent investments, Peter Lorenz’ new chair at SAP’s corporate table, and Kevin Gilroy’s appointment to steer North American channel and business development indicate that this time, the vendor intends to go much further to make sure that it’s cloud and SME formulas work.

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NetSuite’s SP 100 Program: An Offer VARs Can’t Refuse?

Posted on March 2, 2010 by lauriemccabe

In a bold move to get traditional value-added resellers(VARs) off the SaaS fence, NetSuite announced its new Solution Provider (SP) 100 Program, which gives business application VARs 100% margin on the first year of license subscriptions they sell. The program requires a 2-year minimum license commitment from the customer, and after the first year, NetSuite pays VARs 10% margin on recurring annual license fees. Prior to this program, NetSuite had offered VARs 30% of annual license sales.

NetSuite’s SP 100 Program targets established mid-market and enterprise ERP and CRM VAR’s and consultants, including VARs selling Microsoft Dynamics, SAP, Sage, Epicor, Deltek, and others. The program is not exclusive—VARs can continue to sell their packaged business software offerings as well. NetSuite is also extending the program to it’s current solution provider partners, and it includes all other SP program perks, including sales and technical training, sales cycle assistance, and marketing support.

Background:

Since the model got off the ground over 10 years ago, SaaS vendors have argued that SaaS can open the door for VARs to create a recurring revenue stream, and free them up from low margin IT service chores to focus on generating higher value business.

But the case has evidently not been strong enough to entice the masses, for a few key reasons. First, the recurring revenue model is radically different to the conventional business applications model, where VARs earn a large upfront commission for selling a business solution, hardware and infrastructure software. Second, VARs have balked at not being able to generate income from services necessary to deploy and maintain business applications on customer premises. Third, whether real or perceived, many VARs don’t trust SaaS vendors. Deep down, they think that after they make the sale, SaaS vendors will take control of the account and soon disintermediate them entirely.

Quick Take:

NetSuite’s SP 100 Program supplies VARs with the big upfront payment that they are accustomed to. NetSuite’s own side-by-side VAR revenue comparison to Microsoft Dynamics favors NetSuite of course, but VARs can try it and do their own math to see how it proves out without having to give up selling competitive packaged software. It’s an opportunity to get up to speed on SaaS, the cloud and recurring revenue models and develop their business consulting skills.

As important, it comes at a time when the SaaS model has proved its maturity and staying power, many VARs have lost deals to a SaaS vendor, and many customers are trying to avoid big upfront capital outlays. While some VARs will remain skittish, distrustful, or even just lethargic about adding a SaaS solution to their business management portfolio, I think NetSuite’s SP 100 will be big wake-up call for many VARs.

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