SAP takes aim at small businesses
Published: 04 Sep 2002 14:44 BST
Hewlett-Packard will distribute SAP's business software to small and medium-sized companies under a new agreement the two companies announced on Wednesday.
The programme, which will launch first in Germany, calls for HP to help SAP identify, qualify, pre-select and manage local resellers. The programme involves Germany-based SAP's Business One package of tools for accounting, logistics and sales force automation.
SAP announced the Business One products in March and said earlier this year that it planned to start offering them in the United States in the fourth quarter.
SAP and HP announced the deal at SAP's international users conference in Lisbon, Portugal. Other announcements included:
- A new customer services unit, dubbed Global Custom Development Services, will help businesses get in touch with SAP developers and partners for specific projects. The new group will be jointly managed by Andrea Roesinger, senior vice president and general manager of the SAP Global Solution Center EMEA, and Harald Stuckert, senior vice president and general manager of the SAP Global Solution Center Americas, both of whom will report to Henning Kagermann, the company's chief executive.
- SAP has signed a deal to supply its enterprise portal software to German manufacturer Siemens. The companies did not release financial details, but SAP said the deal, which covers Siemens' 440,000 employees, represents the largest number of users licensed in a single deal in its history.
- Seventy customers have begun to upgrade to R/3Enterprise, the latest version of SAP's enterprise resource planning software. SAP said that around 200 customers are expected to begin upgrading to the new software by the end of the year.
BNP Paribas analyst Alex Ryshawy said the Siemens-HP deal and the upgrades should help bolster the company's fortunes. SAP failed to announce any major customer wins at its users conference held in Orlando, Florida, in June.
SAP could use the boost. Last week, the company reported weaker demand in all regions except Germany. SAP trimmed its 2002 sales forecast after posting preliminary second-quarter results well short of analyst forecasts.
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