The intelligent enterprise with Google Cloud and SAP–webinar featuring METRO AG

SAP customers today are challenged managing mission critical business applications with the added pressure to drive revenue and new business models. The migration to S/4HANA is also a key consideration and often linked to the move to the cloud….but what is the right timing and will the cloud truly deliver on the promise of innovation?

Since the SAP–Google strategic partnership announcement in March 2017,  teams from both companies have been hard at work building innovative solutions for joint customers–much more than just making Google Cloud a place to run SAP applications.

Experts from both companies, joined by METRO AG, a Global Wholesaler operating in 35 countries, talked about how to build an intelligent enterprise with Google Cloud and SAP during this on-demand webinar

A few key take-aways from the webinar:

• Transitioning core enterprise applications into the cloud is not just about infrastructure cost savings, it’s about accelerating innovation–to come up with new business models, transform customer experiences, and differentiate against competitors.
• The intelligent enterprise construct consists of a suite of packaged SAP applications to manage day-to-day business processes–with S/4HANA being the digital core, and SAP Cloud Platform for rapidly building and testing innovative, differentiating capabilities. Think about specific capabilities for Cyber Monday for retailers, or this cool demo (watch from about 00:59) illustrating how social media can be integrated into the manufacturing process to transform customer experience.
• SCP on GCP allows customers to easily consume cutting edge innovation from Google Cloud, e.g. ML/AI, natural language processing, image recognition, and infuse that into core business processes–intelligent enterprise is not just about data and analytics, but also the closed-loop implementation for true differentiation.
• METRO AG is a perfect example of building the intelligent enterprise with SAP and Google Cloud. METRO started with an innovative e-commerce platform on GCP–leveraging machine learning for demand forecast as an example. Now METRO is streamlining their SAP finance landscape from 100 different instances to one S/4HANA system, and innovating with SCP, on GCP. Read more about METRO’s story here.
• Google Cloud is making engineering investment on the infrastructure level to make it a better place to run SAP applications in the cloud–take their recent HANA VM announcement as an example. More importantly for customers probably, is the innovation power behind the partnership. Towards the end of the webinar, see how a robot can be dispatched from a command in S/4HANA, read labels, identify boxes, and communicate inventory info back to the SAP system–great efficiency gain!

Moving to the cloud can offer benefits such as less up-front investment and flexible capacity.  But don’t stop there. Think about how you can leverage the cloud to innovate and transform your business. Again, I encourage you to check out the webinar to get inspired on how you might leverage the combined strength of SAP and Google Cloud to build an intelligent enterprise.