SAP AG
Active Global Support (AGS)
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SAP AG
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Industry
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Founded
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Weinheim, Germany, EU (1972)
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Headquarters
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Area served
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Worldwide
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Key people
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Products
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Revenue
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Employees
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Website
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SAP AG is a European multinational software
corporation that makes enterprise software to manage business operations and customer
relations.
Headquartered in Walldorf, Baden-Württemberg, Germany, with
regional offices around the world, SAP is the leader in the market of
enterprise applications in terms of software and software-related service.
The company's best-known software products are
3.
SAP BusinessObjects software, and most recently,
History
Foundation
Their
first client was the German branch of Imperial Chemical Industries in Östringen, where
they developed mainframe programs for payroll and accounting.
Therefore, they called their software a real-time system, since there was no
need to process the punch cards overnight (for this reason their flagship
product carried an R in its name until the late 1990s).
This first version was
also a standalone software, that could be offered to other interested parties.
In
1973, their first commercial product was launched. The SAP R/1, as it was
called,[7]
offered a common system for multiple tasks. This permitted the use of a
centralized data storage, improving the maintenance of the data. From a
technical point of view, therefore, a database was necessary.[8]
In
1976, "SAP GmbH"
was founded, and moved its headquarters the following year to Walldorf. SAP
AG became the company's official name after the 2005 annual general meeting. AG is short for Aktiengesellschaft (public limited company).
Three
years later, in 1979, SAP launched SAP R/2, expanding the capabilities of the
system to other areas, such as material management and production planning.[7]
In
1981, SAP brought a re-designed product to market. However, SAP R/2 did not
improve until the period between 1985 and 1990. SAP developed and released
several versions of R/3 in 1992 through 1995. By the mid-1990s, SAP followed
the trend from mainframe computing to client/server architectures. The
development of SAP’s internet strategy with mySAP.com redesigned the concept of
business processes (integration via Internet).[5] SAP was awarded
Industry Week’s Best Managed Companies in 1999.[9]
Corporate
Restructuring
In
August 1988, SAP GmbH transferred into SAP AG (a corporation by German law), and public trading started 4
November. Shares were listed on the Frankfurt and Stuttgart stock exchanges.[5]
In
1995, SAP was included in the German stock index DAX. On 22 September 2003, SAP was
included in the Dow Jones STOXX 50.[10]
In
November 2010, SAP lost a $1.3 billion intellectual property lawsuit
(related to the actions of the SAP subsidiary TomorrowNow) to Oracle Corporation – cited as the largest software piracy
judgment in history.[11] SAP
filed post-trial motions to lower the damage awarded to Oracle and stated it
may also file an appeal.[12] On 9
September 2011, the verdict was overturned by Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton, who
called the penalty "grossly excessive."[13]
Acquisitions
In
2001 SAP acquired Israeli
company TopTier Software (founded in 1997) for $400 million.[14] The founder of TopTier
Software Shai
Agassi joined SAP and eventually was given the responsibility for
the company's overall technology strategy and execution.[15]
In
2008, SAP acquired Business Objects, a
business intelligence company, and added its products to its portfolio. In
2010, SAP acquired Sybase in a
major acquisition move. Sybase being the largest business software and service
provider specializing in information management and mobile data use.
In
December 2011, SAP AG agreed to buy SuccessFactors Inc.
for $3.4 billion in cash or 52 percent more than the share closing price on 2
December 2011.[16]
In
May 2012, SAP AG announced acquisition of the Sunnyvale, California-based
supply chain network operator Ariba Inc.
for an estimated $4.3 billion. SAP said it will offer $45 a share.[17]
Business and markets
SAP
is the world's largest business software company and the third biggest independent
software provider by revenue (as of 2007).[19] It operates in four geographic
regions: EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa),
America (United States and Canada), LAC
(Latin America and Caribbean), and
APJ (Asia
Pacific and Japan),
which represents Japan, Korea, Australia and New Zealand, India, Greater China, and Southeast Asian
countries. In addition, SAP operates a network of 115 subsidiaries, and has
R&D (Research & Development) facilities around the globe in Germany, India,
US, Canada, France, Brazil, Turkey,
China, Hungary, Israel, Ireland and Bulgaria.
SAP
focuses on six industry sectors: process industries, discrete industries,
consumer industries, service industries, financial services, and public
services.[20] It
offers integrated product sets for large enterprises[21] and midsize companies and
small businesses.[22]
Enterprise
Service-Oriented Architecture
E-SOA Authentication
SAP
E-SOA, client certificate-based authentication is the only authentication
method (besides username/password) and the only Single Sign-On method
to be supported across all SAP technologies. Kerberos and logon tickets, for example, are not compatible
with SAP service-oriented architecture.[23]
Products
SAP's
products focus on Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP).
The company's main product is SAP ERP. The
current version is SAP ERP 6.0 and is part of the SAP Business Suite. Its
previous name was R/3. The "R" of SAP R/3 stood
for realtime. The number 3 related to the 3-tier architecture: database, application server and client (SAPgui). R/2, which
ran on a Mainframe architecture, was the predecessor of R/3.
Before R/2 came System RF, later dubbed R/1.
The other four applications are:
1.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
– helps companies acquire and retain customers, gain marketing and customer
insight
3.
Supply Chain Management (SCM) – helps companies with
the process of resourcing its manufacturing and service processes
5.
Other major product offerings include:
c.
Duet (joint offering with Microsoft),
e.
SAP offers service-oriented architecture
capabilities (calling it Enterprise SOA) in the form of web services that are
wrapped around its applications.
While its original products were
typically used by Fortune
500
companies, SAP now actively targets small and medium sized enterprises (SME)
with its SAP Business One and SAP Business All-in-One.
SAP Business ByDesign is a software as a
service (SaaS) offering, and provides a fully integrated enterprise resource
planning (ERP) software, On Demand.
This acquisition expanded SAP's Product
Suite of Business Intelligence (BI) software and increased the customer
installed base to 89,000.
SAP
will only be using the company’s technology as an internal resource and has no
plans to offer Coghead’s products to its customers.
In May 2010 SAP AG announced that it is
buying the database software maker Sybase for
US$ 5.8 billion in cash.
The deal closed at the end of July 2010.
Sybase will continue to run as a separate, independent unit but will be
leveraged across the other SAP areas.
As
of July 2010 TechniData is a 100% subsidiary of SAP AG.
In October 2010, SAP AG announced the
release of SAP
HANA
1.0 (High-performance Analytics
Appliance), an in-memory appliance for Business Intelligence allowing
real-time analytics.
SAP Enterprise Learning (environment) is
an enhancement of the previous version of the learning management system, SAP
Learning Solution 600. Apart from the features in SAP Learning Solution 600,
SAP Enterprise Learning (environment) contains a virtual learning room feature
powered by Adobe Connect.[29] SAP
officials say there are over 100,600 SAP installations serving more than 41,200
companies in more than 25 industries in more than 120 countries.[30]
SAP
Human Resources Management System is one of the largest modules in the SAP R/3 system
which consists of many sub modules that assist with tasks of human resource management.
Partnerships
1.
SAP partners include Global Services Partners
with cross-industry multinational consulting capabilities,
2. Global
Software Partners providing integrated products that complement SAP Business
Suite solutions, and
3. Global
Technology Partners providing user companies with a wide range of products to
support SAP technology, including
a.
vendors of hardware,
b.
database,
c.
storage systems,
d.
networks, and
e.
mobile computing technology.
SAP PartnerEdge
SAP products for small businesses and
midsize companies are delivered through its global partner network.
Communities
SAP Community Network (SCN) is a community of
1.
SAP customers,
2.
partners,
3.
employees, and
4.
influencers –
typically
in roles such as:
1.
developers,
2.
consultants,
3.
integrators, and
4.
business analysts –
who
gain and share knowledge about
2.
Java,
3.
.NET,
4.
SOA, and
5.
other technologies,
6.
plus analytics and dashboards,
business
process best practices,
1.
cloud,
2.
mobile,
3.
big data, and
4.
a range of other topics via expert blogs,
5.
discussion forums,
6.
exclusive downloads and code samples,
7.
training materials, and
Organization
Functional units of SAP are split across
different organizational units for R&D needs, field activities and customer
support.
SAP Labs are mainly responsible for product development
whereas
the field organizations spread across each country are responsible for field
activities such Sales, Marketing, Consulting etc.
Head office located in SAP AG is
responsible for overall management as well as core Engineering activities
related to Product Development.
SAP customer support, also called Active Global Support (AGS)
is a global organization to provide support to SAP customers worldwide.
SAP Labs locations
SAP
Labs Latin America
Werner
Brandt, Stefan Wagner, Luis César Verdi and Gerhard Oswald celebrating the
expansion of SAP Labs Latin America
SAP
has its development organization spread across the globe. As of Jan 2011, but
not all, labs locations host SAP Research groups.
The
labs are located in
Germany,
France, Ireland, Bulgaria and Hungary in Europe;
Palo Alto, USA;
São
Leopoldo, Brazil;
SAP
Labs India is the largest development unit in terms of number of employees outside
the SAP headquarters located in Walldorf,
Germany.
Each
SAP Lab has prominent area of expertise and focus.
SAP
Labs in Sophia Antipolis, France for example specializes in
development of Java based SAP software products.
SAP
opened in June 2009 its new SAP Labs campus in Brazil, representing the first
SAP Labs Center in Latin America and the eighth worldwide.
The
facility is located in São Leopoldo, in
the state of Rio Grande do Sul and employs 520 people. Of particular note
are the building’s structure and interior, which are composed entirely of
environmentally friendly materials.
SAP
Labs Latin America has just received Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design (LEED) Gold certification for the building.
User groups
User
Groups are independent, not-for-profit organizations of SAP customer companies
and partners within the SAP Ecosystem that provide education to their members,
influence SAP product releases and direction, exchange best practices, and provide
insight into the market needs.
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