SAP upgrades Business ByDesign

SAP Business ByDesign allows in-memory database analytics

German enterprise software giant SAP today upgraded its Business ByDesign (BBD) on-demand enterprise resource planning (ERP) package.

The upgrade, Feature Pack 2.5, allows real-time in-memory database manipulations, which speeds up database analytics.

The package also delivers an improved user interface, says SAP, and the ability to run web browsers based on rich internet architectures (RIA) such as Microsoft Silverlight.

Browser plug-ins can also integrate with Microsoft Office and IBM Lotus Sametime.

SAP executive vice president Peter Lorenz said the general availability of Feature Pack 2.5 was a major milestone for SAP.

"The on-demand services for SAP Business ByDesign are operated on the most modern cloud infrastructure allowing for true volume business," said Lorenz.

SAP released its second-quarter 2010 results recently with total revenue increasing 12 per cent to €2.89bn (£2.42bn) year on year. Profit after tax increased 16 per cent to €491m from 2009's €426m.

Although the results were generally solid, growth in Europe was much lower than that registered in the US.

In addition, SAP shares dipped two per cent following the announcement because of its conservative forecasts for the coming year.

There are also concerns that BBD will have a negative impact on SAP's margins. SAP denies this, but Gartner research director Tomas Otter said that until SAP announces customers, no one will know.

Analyst IDC recently produced a report on software-as-a-service (SaaS) packages and profitability. This showed $13.1bn (£8.2bn) for SaaS revenue in 2009, predicted to grow to $40.5bn by 2014.

Robert Mahowald, SaaS and cloud services expert at IDC, said: "working out how to find and capitalise on the enormous cloud services transition is the biggest strategic goal of most IT product vendors."