RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT

To harness the power of diversity, SAP distributes the development of its software solutions across locations in strategic markets worldwide. In addition, together with leading universities, partners, and customers, we cultivate new IT trends and technologies on a global scale.

Worldwide Distribution of Development

SAP employs 15,547 people in software development, at development centers in nine countries. The biggest of these SAP Labs is in Germany and has 6,434 employees. The next is in India and has 3,085 employees, followed by one in the United States with 1,906 employees.

Thinking globally, acting locally, the network of SAP Labs aims to generate significant and lasting competitive advantages for SAP. Thanks to our strategy of locating our labs across the globe, we can benefit from highly qualified employees from different cultural backgrounds with the most diverse expertise and use our resources in an intelligent and efficient way.

We devised the structure of the SAP Labs network to accelerate product innovation and raise productivity. Due to the network’s flexibility, we can quickly react to new customer and market requirements. Furthermore, the global arrangement of our development organization enables us to develop products and services in collaboration with leading customers and partners, the objective being to give us access to the best know-how to match our needs. In 2008, SAP invested € 1.6 billion (2007: € 1.5 billion) in research and development for business software solutions.

SAP Research

Our research organization is dedicated to capitalizing on pioneering trends and technologies in IT that we can incorporate into the development of our products. SAP Research consists of 14 interconnected research centers on five continents. Each center is located in close proximity to an SAP development center or on a university campus.

The Global R & D Network

SAP Research operates a model of co-innovation: Hand-in-hand with prestigious universities, partners, customers, and product development groups at SAP, SAP Research employees pursue groundbreaking ideas and create prototypes – always striving to generate the greatest possible customer value for future markets. To this end, single customers get involved early on in research undertakings within special lighthouse projects, and dedicated “living labs” demonstrate technological research in real-world settings, thus making prospective SAP solutions a tangible experience.

Research Focus

Among the leading research topics in 2008 were the Future Internet, the Manufacturing 2.0 concept, and public security.

The Future Internet comprises three important areas: the Internet of Things, the Internet of Services, and the Internet of Energy. The Internet of Things seamlessly integrates physical objects into the IT world and makes them an active part of business processes. The Internet of Services is about finding, combining, and consuming services. The Internet of Energy is a new generation of a fully interactive information and communications infrastructure for the energy economy. It will draw on innovative technologies to provide reliable, economical energy supplies for private and business customers in deregulated energy markets.