SAPPHIRE Now 2015 - the wrap
- Summary:
- SAPPHIRE Now 2015 was much better than 2014 but there are genuine challenges for both customers and SAP.
What was to like
As I have said before, the redesigned exhibition was truly refreshing and easy navigated. Usually, it is difficult to see different exhibitors but that was not the case this year. I was particularly pleased to see the Hasso Plattner Institute (HPI) with a stand. HPI produces some brilliant engineers but more important is the fact that one of the co-founders not only retains an active interest in computer science education and learning but funds it as well.
Each of the keynotes and the main analyst sessions featured live customers. This is a departure from past practice that adds a sense of authenticity to proceedings you cannot get with canned video.
While we were led to understand that the two main keynotes would run 90 minutes, both finished about half an hour early. Bill McDermott, CEO said afterwards that they were always meant to run shorter but somehow that didn't get onto our schedules. As one wag said - maybe they can be shaved down to 30 minutes for 2016.
Keynote product content was a tad thin. That's understandable given the fact that the S part of S/4 is a massive work in progress. Bernd Leukert member of the Executive Board and the Global Managing Board of SAP with global responsibility for development and delivery of all products made the point that 25 industry solutions are close to delivery although he acknowledged they're a but rough underneath the covers. SAP says simple finance and logistics are here but back channel conversations consistently suggest that customers should likely wait before committing. End of year is the next check-in point because that's when McDermott has said the main functions will all be delivered as S/4.
Something must be going right because Hasso Plattner, co-founder SAP was in good form, smiling a lot, giving arch nemesis Oracle a hard time in an amusing way and even busting my chops.
The HANA use cases presented by customers were mostly eye popping with presentations demonstrating the value of high speed predictive modeling in business critical situations. The new 'digital' applications and especially customer engagement are compelling, if lightweight in the context of long run business processes.
We have a slew of great videos to produce. I am especially pleased with the one where I am both interviewing and being interviewed by a couple of sassy high school girls. Watch for that in the coming days.
Finally, an SAP event always has a classy, if expensive feel about it that takes the edge off the slog.
What was not to like?
In its current form, the S/4 HANA migration story is very difficult to sell and the cloud sell is almost impossible. If anything, the company is gifting cloud competitors an opportunity to walk in and steal their business. The losers are SAP customers because TCO in the older products is diminishing and ROI for the new is questionable except in the biggest most exotic cases.
I have been asked whether the questions raised prior to the conference were answered. Kinda but not in a manner that I could definitively say make a coherent whole. We will be following up in the coming weeks and months.
If you look at what's happening with SAP, all its growth is coming from acquired products. Nothing it does today will help change the secular decline in sales of the older products. I'm truly baffled why SAP hasn't understood this and why it continues to argue against the very statistics that clearly show a disconnect between what customers report and what SAP says. It's not helpful and makes Geoff Scott's life as CEO ASUG all the harder. The tragedy is that Scott wants to work alongside SAP for mutual benefit.
Internally, it looks like all the excitement is coming from the cloud solutions groups. Conversations with leaders were animated and interesting. they have a 'get go and can do' attitude that has none of the defensiveness I usually associate with SAP. That's really good to see but you have to wonder just how long that enthusiasm can be maintained when large parts of the organization are in a funk and highly defensive.
The sense I get from attendees is that 2015/16 is the year when SAP finally figures out how this transition stuff is done or....completely loses its way.
Disclosure: SAP is a premier partner and covered most of my T&E for attending SAPPHIRE Now