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Follow UsBANGALORE: SAP, the leading provider of business software solutions, today
reiterated its commitment and focus on India with the first India visit of Shai
Agassi, President of the Product and Technology Group and member of Executive
Board, SAP AG. Shai Agassi, a technology evangelist and the key driver for
shaping Enterprise Services Architecture (ESA) - SAP's blueprint for a
business-driven approach to services-oriented architecture (SOA) - emphasized
the increasing adoption of SAP NetWeaver and ESA among the Indian developer
community and SAP partner network in India. Shai Agassi visited India as part of
the 2005 SAP NetWeaver Technology Tour, across 15 cities globally.
"We are excited about the contribution of India in the global success of
SAP NetWeaver, the first true applistructure platform, said Shai Agassi,
President of the Product and Technology Group and member of the Executive Board,
SAP. "The SAP Labs India team is one of our most important development
teams for SAP NetWeaver worldwide and is driving innovation and development in
diverse areas such as ESA, Application Platform, xApps, Business Intelligence,
Exchange Infrastructure and Knowledge Management & Collaboration. As SAP
continues to deliver on the vision of a business-driven services-oriented
architecture and continues to lead the market towards solutions that will offer
new levels of flexibility and innovation, we see SAP Labs India playing an
increasingly important role", he added.
SAP NetWeaver and ESA — a major opportunity for Indian IT services
companies
First introduced in 2003 with the unveiling of ESA, more than 1,500 reference
customers have begun the process of service-enabling their business processes
across their entire IT landscapes by implementing and using SAP NetWeaver, the
industry's first platform to successfully demonstrate the convergence of
applications and infrastructure that enable the ESA blueprint.
Indian IT services companies have identified ESA and SAP NetWeaver as the
next big growth opportunity and are building significant technical strength and
capabilities in ESA and SAP NetWeaver platform.
According to Morgan Stanley, 33% of SAP customers globally plan to do a SAP
NetWeaver project in the next 12 months and going forward, the demand for
services around SAP NetWeaver will significantly increase from SAP's existing
customer base of over 27,000 customers. Indian SAP Partners, together employing
well over 10,000 SAP professionals, have a significant opportunity to leverage
on SAP Netweaver in their own business growth.
Elaborating on SAP's initiatives to enable its Indian partners to leverage
the opportunity, Shai Agassi said, "Our Indian partners are building on
their SAP NetWeaver capabilities and is working with and helping Indian and
Global corporations in designing a service oriented architecture for their
enterprises. To reinforce SAP's commitment to its partners in India and to
enable them to build on their SAP NetWeaver skills, SAP has opened the first SAP
NetWeaver Center of Excellence (COE) in the region at SAP Labs India".
At the SAP Netweaver COE, a global team of experts on SAP NetWeaver
technology will assist partners in developing prototype and pilot solutions for
unique customer requirements and migrating legacy systems onto the SAP NetWeaver
platform. The SAP NetWeaver COE will offer advanced workshops on various SAP
NetWeaver topics in order to give partners the opportunity to gain hands-on
exposure to this platform and will include case studies to ensure that partners
are exposed to newly developed solutions that are relevant to real-life
implementation situation.
SAP Developer Network (SDN) achieves significant momentum in India
Shai Agassi also announced the significant momentum for the SAP Developer
Network (SDN) in India. SDN, the online community for SAP developers,
consultants and integrators, is the premier meeting place for SAP experts to
share technical content on SAP NetWeaver and SAP xApps composite applications.
With over 16,000 registered members, India is among the significant contributors
to SDN globally.
"India is at the forefront of setting benchmarks for the industry with
world-class IT development and its impressive talent pool is marching ahead in
identifying newer opportunities offered by emerging technologies. I would like
to specifically mention the quality contribution from Indian companies and the
Indian developer community in fostering and building the SDN Community,"
said Shai Agassi.
SAP rates India among the top eight strategic markets globally
SAP rates India among the top eight strategic markets for SAP, globally. With
over 700 customers and 1500 installations, India is one of the fastest growing
markets for SAP products and solutions in the region. With 1750 employees, SAP
Labs India — one among the four global development hubs for SAP - is SAP's
largest development facility outside Germany. To further expand its operations
in India, SAP plans to increase the total number of employees in India to 4000
by 2006.