By Freya Purnell
Demand for the SAP Cloud portfolio has been the saviour for SAP in the Asia-Pacific Japan region, its Q3 2014 results show.
The vendor achieved 10 per cent growth in non-IFRS software and software-related service revenue, which was underpinned by strong growth in non-IFRS cloud subscriptions and support revenue, which was up by 57 per cent on a year-on-year basis.
SAP reported solid growth of the SuccessFactors Human Capital Management (HCM) suite, particularly in the public sector, resources and telecommunications industries, while an increased focus on e-commerce across the region has boosted demand for omni-channel commerce solutions from hybris, and cloud-based procurement and trading from Ariba.
While the analytics business registered double-digit growth, with organisations looking to capitalise on big data, demand also seems to have picked up for the SAP Business Suite on HANA solution, which posted triple-digit growth.
While Robert Enslin, president of global customer operations and member of the executive board of SAP SE, attributed the results to customer buy-in to the company’s new ‘Run Simple’ message, Adaire Fox-Martin (pictured), president of SAP Asia-Pacific Japan, recognised the momentum being provided by cloud.
“SAP brings to the market a strong portfolio of industry solutions to help enterprises digitise, operate in real time and simplify consumption of the solutions in a cloud model,” she said.
Among the third quarter customer highlights in the region was the selection of the SAP Simple Finance solution powered by SAP HANA and the SAP Student Lifecycle Management application by La Trobe University. According to SAP, Simple Finance in the cloud will provide instant insight across financial and operational processes to help the university drive value through planning, analysis, prediction and simulation, while Student Lifecycle Management will allow the university to capture an end-to-end view of the student experience.
Accolade Wines, which is based in South Australia and sells some of the world’s best-known wine brands into more than 80 countries, opted for SuccessFactors HCM Suite to support the consolidation, simplification and transformation of its global processes, while Fire and Rescue NSW, Australia’s largest urban fire and rescue service, has taken the lead with SAP Business Suite powered by SAP HANA, which it sees as the future driver of its provision of emergency services.
