On the move

CXO: What is your view of the current state of the mobile market? Do you think there are particular areas that require greater levels of investment and innovation if true enterprise mobility is to be achieved?

KR: Mobile enterprise software market is a dynamic area that is growing very rapidly. Look at level of penetration that mobile devices have in the enterprise: in most regions it surpasses the 50 percent mark. Handheld devices, including connected and wireless handheld tools, have successfully made the transition from being personal productivity tools for the professional consumer market into being enterprise deployed business solutions. Leading analyst firms all assert that mobility is one of the top five priorities of many CIOs today.

We see more and more companies looking to move beyond mobilising personal information management functions like email to give their workers the same access to enterprise data and business processes, regardless of whether they are in the office or in the field. The most important factors that will continue to drive mobility investments in enterprise are worker productivity, return on investment and customer satisfaction.

Mobile solutions vendors need to deliver ubiquitous access to enterprise data and processes that are available via any device, regardless of the state of connectivity. Security features and device and lifecycle management are also critical for achieving enterprise mobility. That is why SAP’s mobile offering contains both a platform and applications for specific roles.

CXO: How has the market for enterprise mobility changed since SAP first entered the sector? Can you identify any advances that have been particularly significant?

KR: There are several important trends that affect the enterprise mobility market today. First of all, the deployment of 3G and 3.5G networks and coverage now allows transmission of high volume of data over the air, thus fuelling the adoption of the mobile solutions within the enterprise market. Furthermore, availability of enterprise class devices with high processing power and memory capacity make it possible to deploy solutions that were not previously feasible.

At the same time, mobile users are becoming more adept at using mobile services. They now have experience coming from the consumer spaces and web 2.0 service offerings from various established and new vendors.

Enterprise now consider mobile to be critical for improving worker productivity, getting close to real-time visibility of field activities and delivering impeccable customer service. These are the drivers of growth in the enterprise mobility market. At the same time, security and manageability are still the main concerns when mobilising enterprise.

CXO: What industries are benefiting from mobile solutions offered by companies like SAP? Why are they investing in such solutions?

KR: We see the highest demand for our mobile solutions in utilities and consumer products industries. We also have vertical-specific Global Trade Management (GTM) strategies for defence and retail industries.

Energy and water utilities companies rely on their supply grids and customer services for success. Mobile solutions such as SAP xApp Mobile Asset Management allow these companies to integrate their field service activities into the asset management and customer service processes. They can improve the quality of the equipment maintenance and asset life-cycle strategies as well as manoeuvrability of the field service organisation. It also supports compliance with new regulatory requirements.

The consumer products industry faces fierce competition and challenges abound for manufacturers that want to achieve growth on a consistent basis. Therefore, consumer products companies have a vital interest in direct interaction with their customers. They want the most accurate and immediate customer data, careful auditing of product placements at points of sales and flawless execution of marketing campaigns. That is where mobile solutions such as SAP xApp Mobile Sales and SAP xApp Direct Store Delivery have proven to be effective with high return on investment. These solutions extend sales methodologies and other business processes to the field and equip the sales force with tools to capture customer data and respond to customer requests immediately.

CXO: What are the main challenges of implementing mobile enterprise? How do you see the field developing over the coming months and years?

KR: Within the next two years we believe that the adoption of mobile enterprise software will accelerate due to the reasons outlined earlier. Enterprise applications vendors will also capture more market share within the next 18¬ – 24 months. The main barrier for adoption is security concerns. Companies are still struggling to ensure that mobile IT is as secure as the one in the office.

Mobilising enterprise requires tight alignment with the overall strategy of the company and a clear understanding of the requirements from the lines of businesses and end users. Only then can companies achieve a high level of adoption and realise the true benefits of deploying mobile solutions.

CXO: What does SAP do that makes it stand out from its competitors? Which of your technologies do you consider to be the most valuable?

KR: We are best at mobilising SAP mobile applications that are pre-integrated into our enterprise applications. We offer mobile solutions that have out-of-the-box integration with SAP business suite. These can be focused for specific roles within the organisation such as information workers, sales, service and delivery drivers.

Our mobile offering also includes an integrated mobile platform as part of SAP NetWeaver. Our mobile platform includes development capabilities, middleware, device management, security features, lifecycle management, system administration and smart client. With flexibility and integration as core guiding principles, SAP can deliver specific differentiating features within the unified modelling and development framework, component repository and the flexible middleware. SAP is investing in modelling and development tools which allow customers to maximise the reuse of efforts via a unified meta-model concept. TCO related to mobile solutions is also reduced because SAP provides a repository of pre-built, reusable UI and business logic components. No other vendor can provide application components with as extensive an array of out-of-the-box SAP business logic. For customers and partners, this represents a mobile business process platform they can leverage and extend rather than build from scratch.

For SAP, NetWeaver Mobile middleware creates significant value in the overall solution landscape by providing highly scalable data staging capabilities able to draw from both SAP and non – SAP systems and to seamlessly manage asynchronous and synchronous communications with mobile devices.