By Freya Purnell
SAP APJ had its biggest year yet in sales to the financial services sectors, outperforming 2012, which was the previous top year.
More than 20 banks and 10 insurance companies chose SAP solutions last year, including five major banking deals. This resulted in significant marketing gains in banking in Australia and New Zealand, and in insurance in Korea.
According to SAP, the increased business was in part driven by a series of industry developments, such as a rise in the use of mobile devices by customers and employees, growing customer expectations for service and personalisation and an increasingly competitive and globalised industry landscape.
Andrew Pitcher, SAP APJ senior vice president and general manager, financial services and strategic industries, said, “The financial services sector has long been a cornerstone of our business at SAP in the Asia Pacific Japan region, and this sector is a key focus of our drive to deliver innovative products which help customers solve real problems.
“In these dynamic times we believe our record revenue in 2013 speaks to the value our customers see in our offerings. Looking ahead, our customers are looking for ways to simplify their operations, and so we expect the SAP Financial Services Network and our cloud offerings to continue to garner greater interest from customers,” Pitcher said.
Among the major deals in the region were the Agricultural Bank of China choosing SAP Adaptive Server Enterprise and SAP IQ software; Adarsh Credit Cooperative Society in India adopting SAP mobile technology; Kiwibank in New Zealand selecting SAP for Banking solutions for its core banking implementation; and in Vietnam, VietinBank and VPBank choosing SAP for its enterprise data warehouse needs.
Following on from these results, Pitcher has been given an expanded role across public services, telecommunications and retail, as senior vice president and general manager of financial services and strategic industries in SAP APJ.
“Under Andrew’s leadership, SAP has reached a record number of financial services customers in the region and expanded our market reach. The public services, telecommunications and retail industries are a natural fit for his customer-first approach,” said Adaire Fox-Martin, president, SAP APJ.
