Sybase, Qualtrics, Signavio, LeanIX

With the necessary small change, anyone can buy a Porsche, see SAP. A small selection of acquired companies: Sybase, Qualtrics, Signavio and LeanIX. But mastering a Porsche and being able to drive it is a completely different story.

Earlier this year, I was invited to the Porsche Experience Center at the Hockenheimring. There were three options for journalists: a ride in the simulator, a real ride in a Porsche, and a ride-along with a Porsche instructor. I chose the latter and had sore muscles all over my body the next day.

The Porsche instructor drove a Taycan Turbo S with a maximum output of 560 kW or 761 hp and accelerated from 0 to 100 km/h in 2.8 seconds. But even more impressive for me was the deceleration. The brakes are literally breathtaking. On the short straights, we thus accelerated to well over 100 km/h, only to turn into the corner at the very last second. I trusted the instructor, who knew the circuit like the back of his hand. But with the centrifugal forces, I had the greatest difficulty not slipping off the seat, keeping my hands and facial muscles under control.

Even at the wheel of a Porsche, a good 100 km/h would probably have been the maximum, and I would never have been able to push the brakes to the limit. So with an expert I was able to experience what is possible in terms of vehicle technology. For all Porsche fans and potential buyers of a Taycan: The acceleration from 0 to 100 at 2.8 seconds will hardly be improved in the near future. What Porsche engineers are working on, however, are even better brakes, i.e. deceleration values, and the recovery of energy (recuperation). So nothing stands in the way of a further increase in my muscle ache. But I will probably never own a Porsche of my own-too much respect for this technical wonder machine!

But SAP lacks respect! With its pockets full of money, SAP bought everything that glittered and corresponded to the current IT trend in recent years. Did ex-SAP co-CEOs Jim Hagemann Snabe (l.) and Bill McDermott (r.) really understand what they were buying with Sybase? Sybase was cannibalized: SAP kept the databases, the rest was sold on. Qualtrics was swallowed up, including its management. But SAP quickly had to admit that it had no idea about customer experience management and was therefore not in a position to manage the American company properly. Bill McDermott failed and his successor, SAP CEO Christian Klein, sold Qualtrics.

But SAP CEO Klein bought the Berlin-based start-up Signavio out of spite for not getting the Munich-based company Celonis. As another department in the SAP universe, Signavio is currently eking out a miserable existence. There is hardly anything left of the once innovative start-up. And Christian Klein has done it again: SAP plans to acquire LeanIX by the end of the year. The focus of LeanIX is enterprise architecture management, another area in which SAP has no idea. From today's perspective, it is doubtful whether Christian Klein will be able to lead this start-up without intellectual property. (pmf)