As we have moved to virtual vendor briefings, I have increasingly been excerpting short video segments (with permission from vendors), as part of my Analyst Cam series.
SAP hosted for analysts a Industry Cloud briefing last week. I have excerpted below about 15 minutes from an hour long session.
Peter Maier, President Industries and Customer Advisory kicks it off and I liked that he gave several examples of new industry functionality. SAP (and in fairness other large vendors) often talk about industry qualifications in generalities and about past efforts ignoring that every industry turned upside down last year.
I had interviewed him last May and you can definitely see progress.
At 6.50, Peter and Kai Finck, who heads Industry Cloud Program respond to a question about industries where SAP has seen most momentum in the last year.
At 9.15, Svend Wittern, who heads Industry Strategy and Peter explain that business networks where SAP plays a big role with horizontal functionality from Ariba, Concur and others are increasingly moving to industry versions.
At 12.18 Ralph Stemler, who heads Industry Ecosystems mentions that strategy firms like McKinsey may be partnering with SAP and getting into the IP business with their industry knowledge
At 13.30 Steffen Schad, Product Manger, SAP Business Technology Platform talks about how partners and customers are starting to use the platform (including recent acquisitions of Signavio and AppGyer) to build industry functionality
Overall, I liked the momentum Peter showcased, but I still don't think SAP is thinking small enough. It has missed the boat on so much demand we saw for vertical edge apps like telemedicine, distance learning in higher ed, warehouse automation, last mile delivery in retail and food service, virtual open houses in real estate in the last year. It is still focused on big "intelligent enterprise" type positioning which will take years to flesh out.
Also, in the next briefing, it would be nice to hear much more specifically about how strategy firms (and the traditional SI partners) and low code tools are helping develop specific industry functionality. Similar about how RISE with SAP is being verticalized.
Look forward to more of these periodic briefings.
