Now, SAP is aiming to use the same "blueprint" in going after non-manufacturing industries, such as retail, insurance, education, banking and public sector. "Over the next several years we expect to see SAP devoting a great deal of effort to increase its presence and enhance the applications in these segments," Shepherd writes. "It is also likely that SAP will use acquisitions, investments, and partnerships to address industry requirements and buy some customers and industry expertise."

As SAP aims to solidify its offering in these industries, Shepherd predicts that customers in industries where SAP is very well established "may find that their enhancement requests have a somewhat lower priority than industries that SAP has designated as strategic." On the other hand, he notes, "customers or prospects in those non-manufacturing industries are likely to find SAP very willing to commit resources and sponsor joint development projects in order to fill holes in industry applications. Companies in these industries that are willing to be highly visible lighthouse accounts will have lots of negotiating leverage if they are willing to tolerate applications that are still rather immature."

5. Product Strategy. Before 1999, SAP was known as a one-product company, which a much less confusing naming convention for its products and releases (R/1, R/2, R/3).

"Since then, SAP has accumulated dozens of products with a bewildering set of options, variants and names," Shepherd writes. "One of the reasons for this product proliferation is the software industry consolidation that has resulted in large ERP vendors like SAP competing in many other adjacent software categories, such as CRM, supply chain management, and product lifecycle management." SAP has also brought to market other complementary products not named ERP and not aimed at the CIO and IT but at the business users, he notes, in areas like performance management, regulatory compliance and analytics.

It's critical that large enterprises, especially, must take a very long view of their application strategy. "One of the important issues for large customers is knowing what happens after 2013," Shepherd writes. "The SAP Business Suite looks stable until then, and [customers] like the idea of regular enhancement package releases rather than major upgrades. That said, they live in fear that after 2013 they may be faced with another product transition like the one from R/3 to mySAP."

Shepherd predicts that the current Business Suite will remain SAP's flagship product line well beyond the 2013 maintenance window. "While the mySAP.com product was officially launched in 1999, development just recently completed on a fully SOA-based suite, and there are still a significant percentage of customers that haven't upgraded from R/3," he notes. "Launching another new product would unduly jeopardize that very important base. Furthermore, SAP is under no pressure from its customers or its competitors to move to a new technology and it is unlikely to be in the next few years."