SAP goes USA! Really?

SAP As a founder-managed Group, we have always had only a low level of fluctuation on the Executive Board, although we were able to compensate for the departure of two of the five founders and the changes in the then extended Board of Directors must not forget.

In the meantime, a few double peaks and major acquisitions later, it is only Gerhard Oswald and Werner Brandt who have been working continuously since 1996 and 2001 respectively at the SAP–Board of Directors are.

By the way, it is a good thing that Oswald wants to extend his contract, which expires in 2014, until 2016 and that Werner Brandt has built up a competent long-term successor in Luca Mucic.

New language: English

The or the Spokesman of the Board have not originated from the country of origin for years. SAP.

What is new, however, is that with Bill McDermott For the first time, a non-European was the sole Spokesman of the Board will be.

However, he already manages his business primarily from the USA. The fact that he is learning German intensively, as he likes to emphasize in interviews, is due more to politeness than to the language culture in the USA. SAP.

Already today, most cross-border meetings are held at SAP in English.

Also development, Marketing, training and even the sales programs have been available in English first for many years.

In what other language?

AG becomes SE

Together with the long-planned transformation of SAP AG into a European Public limited company (SE), it was rumored that an important step had been taken to expand the headquarters of the SAP to the USA.

Really? An SAP SE can indeed move the company headquarters abroad more easily, but only within Europe.

In the days of a board spokesman like Léo pharmacist that would have fueled the rumor mill. He often complained about the provinciality of Heidelberg and praised Paris in the same breath.

When I was still at the SAP I worked on, there was a program called NextGeneration@.SAP. A small group of employees was allowed to spend a whole day with the complete Board of Directors discuss future developments and market opportunities.

At the time, Hasso Plattner was a Spokesman of the Board in doing so. When it came to implementing an idea proposed by a colleague, he said that the conviction of Board of Directors and employees is not enough.

When the middle Management does not go along, there is no implementation.

We laughed. Later we learned that he was right.

Today would Hasso Plattner laugh. In the meantime he is chairman of the Supervisory Board and more (or less) inconspicuously steers many developments and provides impulses.

Vishal Sikka's career was also actively supported by him. At the current pace of change in the Board of Directors it is good that the Management under the Board of Directors is stable and it is the SAP forward.

Let's face it, who among us has been regularly using the Board of Directors to do?

Implementation happens at another level

If you look at the organizational chart of the SAP When you look at the history of the company, you see that internationalization has long since taken hold. Many new initiatives are no longer being launched by Walldorf started from, but come from somewhere else.

From the USA, of course, but increasingly also from Asia and even South America.

Is that a bad thing? It's probably more a question of expectations.

Many new technologies have to prove themselves first. SAP has not been the great innovator so far, but has observed the market and cautiously adapted successful models.

This strategy suited the SAP-partners worldwide. They had time to take up new topics and implement new projects with pilot customers.

SAP-This way, customers always had the guarantee of mature functionality.

Global market

As SAP-We are increasingly selling our services globally as a cloud partner. In the cloud-based environment, further boundaries are disappearing.

What we need is early information, reliability in implementation, and support where necessary.

With strong partner solutions, the customers of the SAP better supported.

A sole Spokesman of the Board, a genius salesman from the USA to boot? Why not? The past few years were among the most successful of the SAP.

What do you think of this scenario:

Jim Hagemann Snabe will be launched in 2014 in the Supervisory Board elected and increasingly assumes the tasks of Hasso Plattner.

Bill McDermott, who is already closely tied to the U.S. political establishment, will take on other responsibilities after his term is over.

When then Michael Kleinemeier in the Board of Directors moves up, the circle is closed.

What is common to all possible scenarios:

SAP goes (more and more) international. That's a good thing. For the customers of SAP, for the partners and the Employees.

Also for the Employees from Walldorf.