SAP – Amid Distractions, It’s Back to Business

By Sam Sliman
President, Optimal Solutions Integration, Inc.

Despite Oracle’s dubious claim of “theft on a grand scale” and Shai Agassi’s untimely departure, by all accounts SAP remains in great shape. These developments make for great drama and the company is no doubt irked, but with Kagermann at the helm, Apotheker on deck, and Plattner helping to chart the course, SAP customers should brush aside these distractions and drive on with their strategic initiatives.

Oracle’s headline grabbing lawsuit against SAP has prompted close examination and forced some probing questions. In their ‘Between the Lines’ blog, industry watchdogs Dan Farber and Larry Dignan expose what may be Oracle’s true motive when they ask, (perhaps rhetorically), “why are expired [customer] accounts allowed to log in to an Oracle server unless Larry Ellison & Co. was looking to trap SAP?” It’s possible, given Oracle’s history of clever antics, but we will probably never know for sure.

According to Farber and Dignan, “folks just don’t seem to believe [Oracle’s charges].” Farber and Dignan title their post straightforwardly enough: “Will Oracle’s Perception Issues Hurt SAP Lawsuit?”

Industry analyst Josh Greenbaum credits the lawsuit to Oracle’s outrage at losing maintenance fees to SAP’s TomorrowNow unit. For Greenbaum, it all comes down to a question of trust. He’s familiar with Ellison’s disruptive, lawsuit-wielding tactics (e.g., PeopleSoft, JD Edwards) and sketchy practices (the infamous Microsoft dumpster dive). Greenbaum clearly trusts SAP over Oracle, which seems to be the prevailing sentiment. For all the hoopla, in the end, the greatest impact of this incident may be that it educates the broader industry regarding the enormous cost savings available through 3rd-party maintenance of Oracle software.

Then, on the heels of the Oracle lawsuit comes news of Agassi’s departure. On its surface, the timing could not be worse. But if we pull up a bit and look at the question of timing from a broader perspective, there is likely method to the madness.

It was probably not long after Kagermann’s CEO extension when Agassi knew that a 10 to 15 year commitment to SAP did not jibe with his personal aspirations. We might speculate that the details of Agassi’s departure from SAP had pretty much been worked out a while back, and all that remained was to decide on the least disruptive time to make the announcement. It’s not hard to imagine all parties agreeing to postpone the news until after SAPphire ‘07. But then Oracle dropped its bomb.

SAP’s reaction was a quick denial of the allegations, a stern vow to defend itself “aggressively”, and a nonplused ‘we’ll get back to you on this’stance. SAP then releases the Agassi news, in effect, lumping Agassi’s resignation together with the Oracle noise as if to deal with both in one fell swoop, as quickly and cleanly as possible.
Sure, Agassi’s departure stings. But it’s a reality of business. Executives leave. SAP’s short, medium and long-term NetWeaver/ESA strategy has been well articulated, so Agassi’s future value is questionable anyway. Time to move on. Which is precisely what SAP wants to have happen on a ‘grand scale’ at SAPphire. No distractions. No disruptions. No petty spitball lawsuits. Just the nuts-and-bolts work of execution.

Of course, all of the above is speculation. But just the same, we may very well be witnessing how an industry stalwart quickly dispatches distractions and gets back to business.