SAP teams with Samsung for wearable tech push

Partnership with Samsung will create wearable and mobile technology for industrial and enterprise use

BERLIN: Cloud will be at the centre of a partnership between SAP and Samsung to create wearable and mobile technology for specific industrial use.

The partnership was announced at SAP's TechEd event in Berlin, and will focus on developing mobile technologies and platforms for use in retail, finance, healthcare and the oil and gas industries.

The goal is to use SAP's Mobile Platform to create an enterprise-grade mobile ecosystem based on Samsung's mobile devices and wearable technology.

The cloud-powered nature of SAP's Mobile Platform will be core to achieving this, according to Dirk Boessmann, senior vice president of mobile development at SAP.

Boessmann explained in an interview with V3 that the cloud is needed to efficiently handle the volume of data moving between wearable and mobile devices if they are to be used in industrial and enterprise situations.

The throughput of data on mobile devices has always been a challenge for technology companies, Boessmann said, but the growth of the Internet of Things and wearable technology has greatly increased the volume of data being channelled to and from devices.

"You suddenly go from a throughput issue to solve, into a big data issue to solve; this is why we have the HANA cloud platform," he added.

"And what I have done is take the mobile platform and make it into mobile services on the HANA platform."

Boessmann went on to explain that a cloud-powered app platform will replace separate wearable and mobile platforms in the future.

Providing a cloud-platform that incorporates wearable and mobile technology and that handles big data should provide developers with a foundation to easily develop apps without the need for in-depth technical knowledge, according to Boessmann.

This approach will open up the wearable technology ecosystem and enable developers to create apps with innovative uses, particularly in industrial environments.

Boessmann explained how SAP has already created glasses that display technical manuals and work orders via augmented reality to service technicians who need both hands to manipulate tools.

SAP hopes that the partnership with Samsung will see such wearable use in the oil and gas industries where field worker safety is paramount.

V3 asked Boessmann whether offering developers an easy platform to build on will help SAP to capitalise on a potential market and put it in the centre of the next wave of wearables, but he declined to speculate on the subject.

SAP is not the only company developing a wearable technology-friendly platform. Salesforce recently revealed its Salesforce Wear development kit.

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