SAP has been named the ‘Leader in SaaS and Cloud-enabled Finance Applications’ in the latest IDC MarketScape report that assessed six global vendors in the enterprise finance and accounting applications space.
The IDC MarketScape report titled “Worldwide SaaS and Cloud-Enabled Enterprise Finance and Accounting Applications 2020 Vendor Assessment” aims to give enterprise businesses and CFO’s an expert view of enterprise-level finance and accounting software solutions that can help them cope with new and complicated challenges—such as the rising pace of business, the expanding volume of business data, and the growing scope of global commerce—in today’s volatile environment.
The multinational software solutions vendors assessed for the report included:
- Oracle
- Oracle Netsuite
- Workday
- Microsoft
- Infor
- SAP
The IDC Methodology
According to the report, IDC analysts divided potential key measures for success into two primary categories:
- Capabilities – How the vendor’s current capabilities and offerings are well aligned to customer needs and how the vendor is developing and delivering these to enable its adopted business strategies in the market.
- Strategies – How well the vendor’s high-level decisions and underlying assumptions about offerings, customer segments, and business and go-to-market plans align with customer needs for the next three to five years.
The results of the analysis that measured each vendor’s characteristics, behaviour and capabilities through structured discussions, surveys, publicly available information, and interviews with market leaders, participants and end-users show that SAP is in the Leaders category in the finance and accounting software applications space.
The report notes SAP’s S/4HANA Cloud Finance solution—a part of SAP’s S/4HANA Cloud offering—helps customers create a common view of all financial data, provide flexible reporting, and automate processes, and real-time analytics through advanced technologies such as
- machine learning for reconciliation in several areas
- predictive analytics/accounting for continuous close features
- robotics processing automation (RPA)
- Big Data
The report also cites the following strengths of SAP’s S/4HANA Cloud Finance solution that makes it highly attractive for large multinational, multi-entity organisations:
- Global capabilities – S/4HANA Cloud Finance is able to support even the most complex globalization demands, including support for all local legal guidelines and reporting standards.
- Rapid implementation methodology – S/4HANA Cloud Finance can be implemented within a month following the SAP Activate methodology which is localized for 43 countries including legal compliance supporting IFRS, US GAAP, and local GAAPs in the Asia Pacific and European regions.
Kevin Permenter, Research Manager at IDC’s Enterprise Applications said,
“The ground underneath the feet of today’s financial professional is rapidly shifting to digital. It will be the companies with the right mix of talent and software tools that will be best able to thrive within these changing conditions. Software vendors that prioritise features that provide enhanced visibility, flexibility and agility will find themselves well-positioned for future growth.”
As the finance industry faces a record pace of digitalisation, SAP’s S/4HANA Cloud Finance’s leading-edge technology and global approach can help business enterprises worldwide accelerate their transformation and help them gain a better view of their financial data, find strategic trends and gather insights that will impact key performance indicators for the business.
