SAP, Europe's biggest software maker, has reported a 19% rise in third-quarter operating profit, excluding special items, due to growth in its mature markets.
SAP said third-quarter operating profit, excluding special items, rose to EUR1.62 billion, beating the most optimistic estimate among 14 analysts, with individual estimates ranging from EUR1.45 billion to EUR1.59 billion, according to Thomson Reuters data.
Europe's largest software maker said it was sticking to its outlook for the full year for non-IFRS operating profit of EUR5.6 billion to EUR5.9 billion at constant currencies, which represents flat growth to a rise of as much as 5% from EUR5.6 billion last year.
"Our strong double-digit growth in cloud and software revenue was mainly driven by excellent results in mature markets," SAP's chief financial officer Luka Mucic said in a statement, adding he expected continued volatility and economic challenges in emerging markets.
SAP, whose customers include the world's biggest multinationals, specialises in business applications ranging from accounting to human resources to supply-chain management.
Like established rivals such as Oracle, IBM and Microsoft, SAP is striving to boost Internet-based sales to head off fast-growing newer competitors such as Workday and Amazon.com's Web software unit.
SAP said its cloud subscriptions and support revenue more than doubled to EUR600 million in the third quarter.
Third-quarter total revenue of EUR4.98 billion was slightly ahead of the average expectation of EUR4.93 billion.
SAP released its key results ahead of the scheduled release data on 20 October.
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