SAP - Delivering Technology Innovations

SAP - Delivering Technology Innovations

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by SAP.

SAP SE is a German multinational software corporation based in Walldorf, Baden-Württemberg, that develops enterprise software to manage business operations and customer relations.

Their machine learning, Internet of Things (IoT), and advanced analytics technologies help turn customers’ businesses into intelligent enterprises. Their end-to-end suite of applications and services enables the customers to operate profitably, adapt continuously, and make a difference. Know more about the company profile of SAP SE here in this article.

SAP - Company Highlights

Startup Name SAP SE
Headquarters Walldorf, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
Industry Software
Founded 1972
Founders Dietmar Hopp, Hasso Plattner, Claus Wellenreuther, Klaus Tschira, and Hans-Werner Hector
CEO Christian Klein
Area Served Worldwide
Website www.sap.com

SAP - About and How it Works?
SAP - Recent News
SAP - Founder and History
SAP - Logo and its Meaning
SAP - Mission
SAP - Business Model
SAP - Revenue and Growth
SAP - Funding and Investors
SAP - Investments
SAP - Acquisitions
SAP - Partnerships
SAP - Competitors
SAP - Future Plans
SAP - FAQs

SAP - About and How it Works?

SAP stands for Systems, Applications, and Products in Data Processing (Anwendungen und Produkte in der Datenverarbeitung in German). SAP was founded in 1972 in Walldorf, Germany and now has offices around the world.

Originally known for leadership in enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, SAP has evolved to become a market leader in end-to-end enterprise application software, database, analytics, intelligent technologies, and experience management. A top cloud company with 200 million users worldwide, SAP helps businesses of all sizes and in all industries to operate profitably, adapt continuously, and achieve their purpose.

  • The company's official name became SAP AG (a public limited company) after the 2005 annual general meeting. On 21 May 2014, SAP AG announced during the Annual General Meeting of Shareholders held on the same day, 99% of the shareholder votes approved the conversion of legal form to a European stock corporation (Societas Europaea, SE) and at the same time, elected the first Supervisory Board of SAP SE. The conversion of the company's legal form would take place upon entry in the commercial register, expected to be in July 2014.
  • On 7 July 2014, SAP announced it had changed its legal form to a European Company (Societas Europaea, SE). As a result, its German subsidiary was renamed to SAP Deutschland SE & Co. KG.the conversion cost the company approximately €4 million.

SAP - Recent News

As of January 2021, SAP SE Extends Executive Board: Julia White Joins as Chief Marketing and Solutions Officer, Scott Russell Takes Over Customer Success.

SAP - Founder and History

On April 1, 1972, five former IBM employees –Dietmar Hopp, Hasso Plattner, Claus Wellenreuther, Klaus Tschira, and Hans-Werner Hector –started the company SystemAnalyse Programmentwicklung(System Analysis and Program Development), with a vision of creating a standard application software for real-time business processing. SAP stands for Systems Applications and Products in Data Processing.

Their idea was to create standard enterprise software that integrated all business processes and enabled data processing in real time. SAP's founders and employees worked closely with customers –often sitting side-by-side with employees in customers’ offices to learn their business needs and processes. By 1975, they had built applications for financial accounting (RF), invoice verification, and inventory management (RM). Some of their early customers were the nylon factory belonging to ICI in Östringen, Germany, Knoll, Burda, Linde, and Schott.

The blend of real-time data processing, standardization, and integration were the basis for SAP’s transformation from a small German company into a global leader in business software.


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SAP - Logo and its Meaning

SAP decided to run simpler by mastering complexity so their customers can run at their best. The new logo which was explored was supposed to represent this transformation in a warm and friendly way which it does.

SAP's Company Logo
SAP's Company Logo

SAP - Mission

SAP's mission is to help every customer become a best-run business. They do this by delivering technology innovations that address the challenges of today and tomorrow without disrupting their customers' business operations.

SAP - Business Model

SAP has a mass market business model, with little differentiation between customers. Its customers are any enterprises that wants software for the purpose of managing operations and employees. The SAP business model entails designing and developing new software products.

SAP has a value-driven structure, that aims to provide a premium proposition by adding its products with training and consulting services. Its biggest cost driver is sales/marketing expenses, a fixed cost.


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SAP - Revenue and Growth

The SAP revenue streams are as follows:

  • Cloud subscription sales
  • Software licensing fees
  • Service (training and consulting) fees

SAP - Funding and Investors

SAP has raised a total of $1.3B in funding over 2 rounds. Their latest funding was raised on Apr 24, 2019 from a Post-IPO Equity round. SAP is funded by 2 investors. Elliott Management Corp. and EASME - EU Executive Agency for SMEs are the most recent investors.

Date Round Amount Lead Investors
Apr 24, 2019 Post IPO Equity $1.3B Elliot Management Corp.
Jun 1, 2015 Grant €1.3M -

SAP - Investments

SAP has made 26 investments. Their most recent investment was on Aug 4, 2020.

Date Organization Name Round Amount
Aug 4, 2020 Vistex Corporate Round -
Feb 3, 2020 PlainID Corporate Round -
Apr 25, 2019 Ruum Corporate Round €10M
Dec 1, 2018 Inversation Corporate Round -
Aug 26, 2016 Vivanda Funding Round -
Dec 1, 2015 ThreatConnect Series B $16M
Jan 20, 2015 Alchemist Accelerator Venture Round $2.1M
Sep 3, 2014 BlackDuck Series F $20M
Sep 10, 2013 Virtustream Series D $40M
Oct 12, 2011 BlackDuck Series E $12M

SAP - Acquisitions

SAP has acquired 46 organizations. Their most recent acquisition was Emarsys on Oct 1, 2020.

Acquiree Name Date Amount About Acquiree
Emarsys Oct 1, 2020 - Emarsys enables brands around the world to deliver truly personal customer interactions across email, mobile, social, and web – at scale.
Contextor Nov 19, 2018 - Contextor is an independant software vendor, pioneer in robotic process automation & robotic desktop automation.
Qualtrics Nov 10, 2018 $8B Qualtrics is a single system of record for all experience data, managing customer, product, employee, and brand experiences on one platform.
Coresystems Jun 5, 2018 - Coresystems builds mobile and cloud-based field service management solutions to give customers the ultimate real-time service experience.
CallidusCloud Jan 29, 2018 $2.4B Callidus Software Inc provides sales effectiveness software and services.
Recast.AI Jan 22, 2018 - Recast.AI offers a chatbot development platform.
Gigya Sep 24, 2017 $350M Gigya offers a Customer Identity Management Platform that businesses can use to identify customers, aggregate data & personalize campaigns.
Abakus Dec 14, 2016 - Abakus provides online and offline media marketing software solutions for advertisers and consumers.
PLAT.ONE Sep 28, 2016 - PLAT.ONE is the First Enterprise-Grade IoT Application Platform
Altiscale Aug 25, 2016 $125M Altiscale is a Big Data platform that operates through the cloud service.

SAP - Partnerships

SAP partners include Global Services Partners with cross-industry multinational consulting capabilities, Global Software Partners providing integrated products that complement SAP Business Suite solutions, and Global Technology Partners providing user companies with a wide range of products to support SAP technology, including vendors of hardware, database, storage systems, networks, and mobile computing technology.

Extensions partners are companies which provide functionality that complements SAP product capabilities. Their products are certified, sold, and supported by SAP. These partner companies include Adobe, CA Technologies, GK Software, Tricentis, Hewlett-Packard, IDS Scheer, Mendix, OpenText, Knoa Software, and BackOffice Associates.

SAP has also partnered with Apple to work on the mobile experience for SAP enterprise customers. As part of the partnership, a new SAP HANA Cloud Platform SDK would be delivered exclusively for iOS. As a result, developers can build applications based on the SAP HANA Cloud Platform for the iPhone and iPad devices. The partnership was announced in May 2016.

In 2019, SAP announced a three-year partnership "Embrace" with Microsoft that should allow its clients to move their business process into the cloud. SAP teams up on cloud sales with Microsoft

In 2020 SAP announced that together with Wipro it will co-develop and market "solutions for the retail and fashion industry."

SAP - Competitors

The top 10 competitors in SAP's competitive set are Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, Salesforce, Adobe, VMware, Workday, ServiceNow, Symantec and Tableau.


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SAP - Future Plans

SAP knows that to fulfill the expectations of new customers, its required to have the flexible IT systems. It also comes along with changing the business models, which need to be adopted in a very quick manner to stay on top of the market.

  • From a techie-perspective, SAP is engaging in a highly integrated but modular approach to provide an integrated, intelligent suite for customers, for sure based on cloud-native technologies. And here, this will help them to deliver continuous innovations and services to customers.
  • From a business process perspective, ERP is becoming a process as a service, and we will offer the business capabilities that will help companies to run at their best which means SAP enables new business models like consumption-based billing, subscription-based businesses, etc.

SAP - FAQs

What does SAP do?

Originally known for leadership in enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, SAP has evolved to become a market leader in end-to-end enterprise application software, database, analytics, intelligent technologies, and experience management.

Who founded SAP?

On April 1, 1972, five former IBM employees –Dietmar Hopp, Hasso Plattner, Claus Wellenreuther, Klaus Tschira, and Hans-Werner Hector –started the company SystemAnalyse Programmentwicklung(System Analysis and Program Development).

What companies do SAP compete with?

The top 10 competitors in SAP's competitive set are Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, Salesforce, Adobe, VMware, Workday, ServiceNow, Symantec and Tableau.

How does SAP make money?

SAP has a mass market business model, with little differentiation between customers. Its customers are any enterprises that wants software for the purpose of managing operations and employees.

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