About 50% of Procter & Gamble's products are
developed by outside partners.SAP co-CEO Leo Apotheker used this
illustration to highlight the importance ofcollaborative IT infrastructures in modern business
atSAP TechEd in Berlinthis
month.
Most IT suppliers have realised the importance of fostering
closer ties with customers and partners if their business is to
survive and prosper.
SAP itself has recently announced enhancements to its
Business ByDesignoffering, which is delivered exclusively by
outside partners.
But its launch of
EcoHub, a website designed to enable SAP customers to find,
evaluate and initiate the purchase of SAP-based applications
developed by certified partners, has caught a few envious
glances.
The idea is to benefit SAP users by helping them find the most
appropriate applications to meet their business needs and to help
extend the value of their existing SAP implementations.
Customers can search by industry or category of applicationand
can evaluate products through user feedback, customer ratings and
demonstrations.
Warren Wilson, principal analyst at Ovum, says although SAP
still has some work to do, EcoHub's richness of its user
interaction goes beyond traditional product and services
catalogues.
"It also goes beyond what Salesforce.com or any other suppliers
have for interacting with customers and partners."
EcoHub offers clear benefits to SAP by deepening the firm's
relationship with its partners and providing an online marketplace
for their products.
The response from SAPs partners has also been positive,says
Jochem Hager, director of SAP business development at software
house170 Systems.
But users at TechEd were at least partly sceptical. They
questioned how objective and free feedback on products would
be.
Wilson saysEcoHub is a smart strategy over the longer term. SAP
has recognised that customer and partner loyalty is of great value
strategically. EcoHub is aimed at cultivating that, he says.
Its launch has been fortuitously timed,with IT managers battling
budget constraints in light of the recent financial turmoil.
SAP appears firmly committed to a customer and partner-centric
approach to business, which although aimed at sustaining business
in the long term, should bring real benefits to end-users.