SAP and IBM have announced cloud-to-cloud integration of their respective human resources software solutions, to help customers improve business processes and make decisions more easily about recruitment and workforce management.
The first offering from the alliance is an integration between SuccessFactors Employee Central and IBM Kenexa’s Talent Acquisition Suite, with availability planned for mid-2015.
This move aims to enable IBM customers to move their HR information systems (HRIS) to the cloud with the core SuccessFactors solution, while helping to protect their recruiting investments, and provide SuccessFactors customers with a broader set of options for recruiting, assessment and onboarding of candidates.
In addition, IBM’s Learning Content Management System will be integrated with the SuccessFactors Learning solution to help deliver learning content more efficiently.
SAP and IBM plan to offer customers greater data sets from the entire HR spectrum, drawing on SAP ERP HCM, SuccessFactors HCM Suite and IBM Kenexa Workforce Sciences for analytics, to gain better insights on how to hire, grow and retain the workforce.
The two companies are also aiming to provide a consistent user experience even to customers choosing a mixed SAP and IBM solution, supported by collaboration on implementation and ongoing support.
Mike Ettling, president, HR line of business, SuccessFactors, said the collaboration aims to help customers focus less on integrating solutions and also ensure that they can continue with investments that are working for them while looking ahead to yield greater value.
“SuccessFactors Employee Central is the fastest-growing solution in our HCM suite, and this deepening partnership with IBM means that IBM customers may be able to connect their current applications with our solution, preserving and extending their investments in IBM’s Talent Acquisition Suite,” Ettling said.
Debbie Landers, general manager, Kenexa and Smarter Workforce, IBM, said the company is excited to team up with SAP on changing the experience for clients.
“The opportunity to not only extend our existing solution reach together, but to team on bringing SAP data into IBM’s Talent Insights (powered by Watson Analytics) is expected to be a game-changer for our clients who want to move more quickly to analytics-driven business decision-making,” Landers said.
