SAP: Experimenting And That’s a Good Thing

SAP talked a bit more about Sybase at Sapphire Now today and its focus for on-premise, on-device and on demand systems.

But is the approach that much different? And is SAP taking a bold step into a future where its more about the best approach versus a white knuckled, clenched fist hold on its on-premise systems?

James Governor, co-founder of Redmonk says like a lot of companies, SAP is throwing out the seeds to see what flowers.

“There has been a huge change in the development culture…..they are doing a lot of experimentation. They are throwing seeds out. Some will grow, some won’t,” Governor said.

The discussion about SAP’s future came again through the combined conferences in Frankfurt and Orlando presented by Co-CEOS Bill McDermott and Jim Hagemann Snabe.

Hagemann Snabe provided the details, focusing on the inflection point we see today. Interestingly, he made a big point about people and the content that we are producing as evidence of the need to shift toward a more ubiquitous world where collaboration is the rule, not the exception. In turn, real-time services are becoming the most important element in the way people interact and make decisions.

This transcends on-premise v. cloud infrastructure debates. Real-time decisions are needed no matter what the delivery. And the data needs to be available anytime, anywhere. That’s where real-time analytics and the Sybase acquisition come into play.

Sybase is supposed to be the database for the mobile device. With in-memory, the belief is that customers can get that real-time analysis, accessing SAP apps.

Hagemann Snabe used a sales person as a example to show a service that it will release later this year. It’s a sales force automation style service that uses a real-time activity stream.

It serves as a decent segue to the efforts SAP is making in the cloud. Business By Design will be rolled toy worldwide in July. SAP StreamWork, the decision making collaboration service, is integrating with Google Wave.

SAP is very careful not to make too deep of a commitment to cloud computing. It does seem like it has that vice like grip, making it clear the company will always be true to its roots in the on premise world.

But the experimentation is underway. The seeds are in the ground.

Now we’ll just to see what flowers bloom.