blog Those of you who watch such things closely may recall several weeks ago that a sudden decision by German software giant SAP to end active development of its ailing Business ByDesign online software suite left the New South Wales Government’s premier cloud computing business systems pilot stranded without a future roadmap. Well, it appears that the NSW Department of Trade & Investment didn’t take SAP’s move sitting down. An article published by iTNews yesterday (it’s long and detailed, we really recommend you read it if you have an interest in SAP), reports:
“NSW Trade CIO David Kennedy immediately contacted SAP on the day of the leak, seeking both an explanation and formal advice that it would meet its commitments to the government. Several weeks on, his department now has that formal advice, and SAP executives have been allowed the freedom to speak.”
When the SAP news initially broke, I wrote: “If I were NSW Trade and Investment, right now I would urgently be seeking meetings with my SAP account manager, to find out what the future of the “service” I had bought from the company was.” And now it appears that that is certainly what happened. However, I’d also point out that other commentators such as Ovum research director Steve Hodgkinson were also correct in their comments at the time that SAP would definitely deliver a migration path forward for ByDesign clients such as NSW Trade & Investment. If the plethora of articles published in the Australian technology media this week with respect to the ByDesign decision (with reassuring quotes from SAP executives a-plenty), there is every indication that SAP is conscious that it has shocked the market with this decision and has some placating to do. We’ll see how it goes.
Image credit: amadeusm, public domain
