With cloud products continuing to soar, SAP announced that its 2017 first quarter operating profit reached €1.2 billion on revenues of €5.3 billion, up 8 per cent and 12 per cent respectively from the same time last year.
Of €4.3 billion in cloud and software revenue, €906 million was attributed to cloud products, an increase of 34 per cent. New cloud bookings continue their stellar rise, with a 49 per cent increase to €215 million in the first quarter.
In the APJ region cloud and software revenue rose 21 per cent, with cloud subscriptions and support revenue increasing by a staggering 65 per cent. The region compared favourably with both the EMEA and Americas regions which experienced 10 per cent and 12 per cent growth respectively.
SAP reported that Japan and India presented highlights in the quarter with strong results in both cloud subscriptions and software revenue. SAP also had strong double-digit software revenue growth in South Korea and Greater China, which includes revenues from Taiwan and Hong Kong.
“SAP’s outstanding first quarter results are a decisive follow-on to our record-setting 2016,” said Bill McDermott, CEO, SAP, reflecting on the company’s year-end revenues of €22.2 billion last year. “Led by S/4HANA, we are seeing mass customer adoption of our solutions globally.”
S/4HANA adoption increased to more than 5800 customers, with the addition of about 400 customers in the first quarter, almost 50 per cent of which represented net new customers to SAP. The company reported that first quarter results were assisted by the fact that Innogy selected S/4HANA and that both Citrix and iColor opted for the S/4HANA Cloud edition.
“We’re off to a good start to reach our full year targets and we are confident that we will grow our profitability in 2018 and beyond,” said Luka Mucic, CFO, SAP.
