SAP Africa will be hosting the third Startup Focus Forum in Johannesburg that aims to empower start-ups and entrepreneurs to grow their businesses.
It also seeks to help fledgling businesses build applications on the SAP HANA cloud platform and accelerate their go-to-market strategy, says SAP.
The aim of the programme is to introduce ICT start-up companies, including established organisations that are branching out into the big data arena, to SAP's flagship in-memory platform HANA, says Elke Simon-Keller, innovation lead at SAP Africa.
Simon-Keller says participating organisations should have a use case that involves large quantities of data that need to be processed very quickly.
He says the attendees will be part of a 12-month accelerator programme to develop enterprise apps.
The primary benefit of attending the programme is entrepreneurs and small business owners will meet and learn from successful start-up founders who are currently thriving in the SAP programme, she notes.
Start-ups will have the opportunity to pitch their business ideas to a distinguished panel of venture capitalists, enterprise customers, and accelerators as well as SAP executives, says Simon-Keller.
"Getting ahead in today's competitive digital economy is no mean feat but many of these start-ups demonstrate the potential to harness digital transformation through technology in the industries in which they plan to do business.
"The programme is enabling a platform for innovative technology companies to present their ideas and gain invaluable information about big data and from experienced members of the start-up community."
According to Simon-Keller, current top technology trends rely on hyper-connectivity, super computing, cloud computing, a smarter world and cyber security. All these drive the digital economy (the 4th industrial revolution) in which organisations that are not in-tune get left behind, she says.
Simon-Keller believes SA is the ideal breeding ground for the development of software solutions catering specifically for developing world challenges that are not necessarily well-understood by first-world countries.
The unique challenges, in combination with the top technology trends, provide distinctive opportunities for businesses to develop software locally, she adds.
Many software start-ups are concentrating on certain niche areas, says Simon-Keller, adding the challenge remains to develop start-ups to their full potential and ensure longevity.
She points out start-ups face different challenges ranging from lack of technical and business skills to difficulty in raising capital.
Barriers of entry can also be high when developing highly technical software for the formal business sector, says Simon-Keller.
However, the rise of cloud-based solutions, new business models and innovation have levelled the playing field and is resulting in the ability of local businesses to compete with global competitors, she adds. "Think about Uber, Airbnb and other global organisations that are available locally."
Qualifying start-ups will get direct access to global SAP HANA technical experts to assist them to develop their solutions quicker, says Simon-Keller. They will also gain access to the HANA developer community as well as assistance to market and commercialise their final products, she concludes.
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