DSAG & IA4SP

Missing answers are being replaced by digitization. Hardly any community has demonstrated this more clearly than the SAP scene: speed and transformation are everything!

The direction, the added value, the costs, the legacy data - all immaterial and negligible. What counts is innovation and speed: SAP Hana!

For three years, SAP lurched from one in-memory computing database speed record to the next, even more spectacular record.

Meaning and value fell by the wayside. If not Hana, then cloud computing. SAP is pushing into the cloud because cloud subscriptions promise fatter profits for the global ERP monopolist. Questions about security, compliance, licenses, ROI and a cloud exit strategy are answered only hesitantly or not at all.

SAP is charging ahead and almost rolling over in its digital transformation. Existing customers are standing on the sidelines in amazement, rubbing their eyes in wonder at the disruptive innovations.

Recent example:

Apple and SAP agree on a cooperation. In addition to in-memory and cloud computing, mobile computing is naturally the order of the day!

In an interview with Computerwoche, DSAG CEO Marco Lenck says that, as an existing SAP customer, he feels that the Walldorf-based company's mobile computing strategy lacks clarification.

Where should this cooperation lead? What is the added value? SAP is charging ahead, leaving more questions than a three-day DSAG annual congress in Nuremberg in September will be able to answer.

In the face of chaotic innovation and disruptive transformation, the SAP community needs a user association like DSAG and a partner association like IA4SP more than ever!

SAP's erratic behavior, its hostile licensing policy, and its desire to maximize profits make the two clubs the most important hopefuls in this still-functioning community of values.

Now it's time to stand up, support, and ask questions. But the two bodies - DSAG and IA4SP - must also consistently strive for quality in order to do justice to the SAP community as a community of values:

Lazy compromises and superficial concessions regarding "indirect use" (SAP NetWeaver Foundation for Third Party Applications) are not enough.

SAP's haphazard actions must be countered by real values. The SAP community needs strong interest groups.

Due to transformation, disruption and paradigms, it seems to be an imperative that all existing customers get behind DSAG, all partners get behind IA4SP.

The painful experiences on the topic of "indirect use" should be a lesson for DSAG and IA4SP and a warning for the SAP community. We must fight to preserve and expand the SAP value communities.