SAP’s silence on Business ByDesign speaks volumes

Following an event designed to talk up the strengths and benefits of SAP business software aimed at small-to-medium sized enterprises (SMBs), an analyst has questioned its progress with Business ByDesign.

The software-as-a-service (SaaS) package is just one of three SAP products aimed at SMEs that were discussed by SAP executives, customers and industry watchers at the London event last week.

Pierre Audoin Consultants (PAC) managing consultant Hassan Hosseini observed that the software firm was tight-lipped about further developments almost one year after its launch.

"Of course no one expects SAP to successfully implement this right away and that they would not be subject to a learning curve first," he said. "But silence was kept about the success and progress of this solution."

Hans-Peter Klaey, SAP SME president told IT PRO after the event that Business ByDesign would not be suitable for every SME. "If a lot of business-specific functionality is required then I would go immediately for Business All-in-One, which can also be hosted. Then BusinessOne comes in below Business ByDesign in terms of scale and organisation size. The business functional need defines which product is best."

PAC also pointed out that SAP has had to reign in ambitious sales targets for the SaaS offering of one billion dollars and 10,000 customers by 2010.

SAP had previously said customers had demanded a higher scope of functionalities than initially expected, which also resulted in more manual interference to be required in the upgrade process. It has met these challenges with an adjusted development plan and is working on automation routines that are to diminish manual interference.

But Hosseini suggested SAP is doing little to prove this development work's success.

Pentagon Chemicals, a UK-based Business ByDesign user at the event, reported internal resistance to its adoption BusinessByDesign. But SAP offered training evaluation sessions in response.

The firm added that it had originally been attracted to the idea of 24-hour availability, automatic updates and the flexibility of selecting the business processes required as part of the SaaS offering on a fixed price basis, regardless of whether it wanted to add all the business processes available.