Software giant SAP says it sees Africa as a key emerging market and aims to strengthen its market share on the continent.
This emerged at the SAP Database and Technology Forum, held in Johannesburg, where Stephen Spears, SAP's senior VP and GM for technology and applications life cycle management, was the keynote speaker.
Spears revealed that the German software company, which entered Africa in 1988, already boasts a 70% market share on the continent. SAP has a presence in four regions on the continent - SADC, East Africa, West Africa and Francophone Africa, he added.
He noted that the company will focus on five key sectors - applications, analytics, mobile, cloud computing, and database and technology - sectors in which opportunities abound in Africa.
The company also believes its in-memory computing solution, HANA - a real-time platform for analytics and applications - will be a game changer in Africa.
Spears noted that, with HANA, organisations simplify the IT stack, as it provides processing speed, the ability to handle big data, predictive capabilities and text mining capabilities. HANA also accelerates key business processes with rapid analysis and reporting, he added.
He also pointed out that the company will put strong emphasis on innovations, saying it will continue to expand its partner ecosystem to support solutions development and to leverage sales forces to accelerate innovation and to address different markets and customer segments.
“The African market is critical if SAP is to reach its target of having one billion users by 2015,” Spears said.
SAP ambitiously aims to double its addressable market to $230 billion in 2015; generate EUR20 billion in annual revenue; achieve a 35% non-IFRS operating margin; and generate EUR2 billion in the cloud business.
In a roundtable with members of the media at the event, Pfungwa Serima, MD of SAP Africa, said skills shortages is one of the challenges the continent is facing.
He noted that the company is in the process of trying to attract talented individuals, who have left to pursue opportunities on other continents, back to Africa.
Serima also pointed out that SAP is working on various skills development programmes in Africa. These include university alliance programmes, where SAP is working with 17 universities across the continent, as well as the introduction of ERP for schools.
“We also have a 'start them young programme', which aims at identifying and developing IT skills from an early age and we are also set to invest about R20 million in skills development in Africa.”
Last year, SAP spent EUR1.9 billion on research and development.
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