SAP Phils. bares revenue growth

Leading e-business solutions provider SAP Philippines announced yesterday that new license and maintenance revenues grew 18 percent during the first quarter of the year compared to the same period in 2001.

SAP Phils. managing director Ian Black said that the company had an "exceptional quarter." New licenses included both existing and new clients. Splash Corp., Lapanday, and First Sumiden acquired mySAP.com, which is SAP’s e-enterprise suite of applications.

Current clients Smart Communications, Del Monte Phils., and Hitachi, among others, acquired additional licenses.

SAP, meanwhile, launched its mySAP supplier relationship management (SRM) solution yesterday. It manages interactions with suppliers, enhancing the ability to plan, respond and execute new products and services, quickly adjust to rapidly emerging shifts in market demand, and increase profitability through overall tighter supply chain management.

The company also announced it has signed an agreement with leading Philippine e-commerce hub BayanTrade to resell the mySAP SRM solution. BayanTrade CEO Carol Carreon said they will resell the product to help local companies gain the benefits of enhanced supplier relationships.

As this developed, SAP and AT Kearney noted that Philippine firms are well positioned to levarage demand for online services.

During a supply chain management conference sponsored by SAP Phils., supply chain management expert AT Kearner vice president Zafar Momin said that in recent years, the role of soft-asset companies in the overall supply chain has become increasingly significant. Soft-asset firms include those involved with consumer services, networks, media, software, and business services, and financial services.

Because the Philippines is emerging as a center for e-services, Momin emphasized that Philippine firms seize the opportunities presented by managing the supply chains online. "Local companies should consider restructuring hard assets such as manufacturing plants and retail stores, in order to invest in soft assets, such as people, new product development, marketing and communications," he said.

For his part, Black pointed out that the Philippines is well positioned to levarage demand for online services, especially with e-services projected by the Department of Trade and Industry to grow 67 percent a year over the next five years.

The potential for Philippine firms is attractive. The share of soft-asset companies in the overall income generated across the entire supply chain (from raw material suppliers to the customers) in the US grew to 42 percent in 1997 from 17 percent in 1947, data from the US Department of Commerce shows.

One manifestation of this trend is the emerging popularity of managing online entire supply chains.

Momin cited several reason why it has been fairly easy for companies worldwide to shift from traditional supply chain management to the online method.

First, propriety information is disappearing as networks based on open Internet standards grow. Second, a company does not need to invest a lot in technology infrastructure, and third, companies have easier access to capital. And lastly, growing globalization is allowing more companies to do business in more and more regions and industries.

Meanwhile, SAP AG of Germany increased its revenues nine percent over the same period. Revenues in the Asia-Pacific region grew four percent.

SAP AG is the world’s largest inter-enterprise software company and the world’s third largest independent software supplier. It has 10 million users 36,000 installations, 1,000 partners, and 21 industry solutions worldwide.

"Against a very strong first quarter last year and despite tougher market conditions, our first quarter turned out largely as we expected. As the new year began, companies in the Americas approached new software investments cautiously. Europe once again delivered an encouraging performance and contributed significantly to our overall revenue figure," SAP, AG co-chairman and CEO Henning Kagermann noted.

Officials also said that conditions for software purchases are challenging, and while Europe remains relatively strong, businesses in the Americas are taking a more deliberate and measured approach to new software investments.