SAP turns to small businesses in China

BEIJING: SAP AG Europe's top software maker has said it would go beyond its traditionally large customers in China and sell programmes made for small and medium-size businesses. The company said last week it faced weaker demand in all regions except its home country, Germany, and offered no hope of a quick rebound, joining a growing list of technology companies hit by a drastic slowdown in investment spending.

SAP, the dominant supplier of integrated business software to big companies, is hoping new software aimed at small and medium businesses -- combined with a recent shakeup of its U.S. operations -- can help it crack a wider market for business software.

In China, where it boasts large clients such as top PC maker Legend Group Ltd. and home appliance giant Haier Group, SAP will help distributors to sell small-business products, the executives said. SAP hopes to have 100 distributors of its new small-business products in China by the end of the year, Hans-Peter Klaey, SAP Asia president, said .

According to some estimates, about 70 percent of software sales by foreign giants in China, which also include Microsoft Corp, Oracle Corp and Siebel Systems Inc., go through distributors.

In China's growing market of small and medium-sized firms, domestic software suppliers such as Shenyang Neusoft Co Ltd. and UF Soft are winning market share with business software that is often cheaper and easier to install. SAP's revenues in China for the first half of this year -- which make up a tiny portion of total revenues -- had grown by 120 percent over the same period last year, SAP President for the Greater China region Klaus Zimmer told the news conference.

©Reuters