SAP has selected a former Siebel Systems sales executive to head
its troubled US operations.
William McDermott, 41, who left his job as executive vice-president
of worldwide sales at Siebel earlier this month, will replace SAP's
US interim chief executive officer, Leo Apotheker.
McDermott will be the enterprise software company's fourth US chief
executive officer in three years, including Apotheker. He will
start work next week, reporting directly to Apotheker, president of
global field operations. He will be responsible for all SAP's
business activities in the US and Canada.
Siebel and SAP are fierce rivals in the market for enterprise
resource planning (ERP) software, and in the late 1990s, Siebel
hired more than 20 employees away from SAP America, including the
division's former president, Jeremy Coote.
One of the immediate challenges facing McDermott, who was CEO of
Gartner before joining Siebel, will be to boost SAP's US software
licence sales, which plummeted more than 30% in the second quarter.
