SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) has announced the expansion of its industry cloud solutions portfolio to serve the needs of three new industries: retail, professional services, and industrial machinery and components (IM&C).

SAP’s industry cloud portfolio delivers specialized applications designed to address specific industry needs.

Built by SAP and partners on an open platform as a service, these solutions help customers to rapidly adopt innovations as part of their IT landscape.

“The speed at which companies have to operate today calls for technology-enabled agility,” said Peter Maier, president, Industries and Customer Advisory, SAP. “Innovative companies successfully strike the balance between optimizing their current business operations and innovating at the ‘vertical edge’ to discover and develop new revenue streams. Our industry cloud portfolio delivers solutions to help drive business transformation profitably and sustainably, enabling our customers to adapt to changing business environments in their industries.”

Continuing to Grow an Ecosystem for Innovation

Industry cloud solutions are built and run on the open SAP Cloud Platform. They use intelligent technologies such as artificial intelligence and advanced analytics to create compelling user experiences and to digitalize and automate operations. SAP and partners focus on solutions for the core business of our customers in their industries to help optimize end-to-end processes and to enable the development of new and differentiating business models. The three new industry cloud offerings address each industry’s unique challenges, such as:

• Retail: Retail brands are facing increased pressure to invest in innovative business models and new ways of creating value for their ecosystem, especially as consumers call for purpose-driven retail and expectations of experience reach new levels. Industry cloud solutions for the retail industry include, for example, machine learning algorithms to uncover unspoken needs and create more relevant, personalized offers.
• Professional services: Firms are often seen as the vanguard of digital transformation for clients, but they are now experiencing disruption themselves with major trends impacting how they engage with clients, how they are structured and who they compete against. Industry cloud solutions for the professional services industry enable, for example, firms to deliver services digitally through subscription platforms for great client and employee experiences.
• Industrial machinery and components: Leading companies move to delivering tailor-made solutions at scale and as a service to address global trends that are reshaping the industrial manufacturing landscape. These trends include digitalization, ever-more demanding customers, a changing playing field and globalization and right-shoring. Industry cloud solutions for the IM&C industry provide, for example, the ability to interact with customers on a constant basis through multiple channels, from Web to direct, and include Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity.

“SAP’s industry cloud provides a way to deliver industry-specific extensions that complement its intelligent enterprise strategy. With a robust ecosystem of partners that can deliver innovative applications with SAP, this endeavor can help customers be successful in growing markets,” said Leslie Hand, GVP, IDC Retail and Financial Insights.

Partnering for Success

SAP partners are a vital component of the industry cloud initiative. With open APIs, process and data models, as well as a wealth of cloud native technologies to innovate at the vertical edge, SAP’s industry cloud is attracting partners who are looking to accelerate solution innovation and development. SAP and partners are jointly creating “next business practices” for enterprises and business networks that will help accelerate the pace at which customers can address shifting business demands. 

Customer Success

SAP customers are embracing the industry cloud solutions and using these offerings to accelerate their business transformation. Whether their end-user is a consumer, an employee or another business, companies are using technology to deliver experiences that are increasingly user-oriented as digital interactions gain dominance in personal and business lives. The industry cloud solutions allow businesses to help digitally transform and deliver a better experience to the user.