SAP 'Ecosystem' Is a Booming Economy Unto Itself
So says an IDC analyst who cites SAP's expansive list of partners (developers, resellers and integrators) and its huge market share. Is this a good thing for the rest of us?
So what does all of this mean for CIOs? Good question. Pang doesn't think CIOs have to worry much about SAP's god-like influence. "In the past, there was tremendous segmentation in the enterprise applications space, creating a lot of inefficiencies and incompatibilities among ERP systems and underlying technologies," he says.
Now, CIOs can expect to see the establishment of "technology camps" among vendor partners, which he thinks will become "vital forces for end users." While CIOs have been trying to standardize and integrate enterprise systems for many, many moons, Pang is confident that this consolidation will make CIO's lives easier. "[CIOs] will now find a reliable set of vendors that they can turn to," he says. "And what I see is that the emergence of the SAP economy will facilitate that."
CIOs better get used to this new way of thinking. "I can say with a great degree of certainty that this is the future," Pang notes, "and there's no turning back."
