Run better in just weeks in China? – Absolutely!
I need to share that when I wrote my China Sapphire Beijing pre-event blog (July 26 & 27 at the China National Convention Center in Beijing) I was, to say the least, a bit nervous towards my first visit to Asia. I have travelled abroad in the past but I really did not know what to expect going to China. My fears started to vanish as the Beijing Taxi driver, who spoke no English (and I no Chinese) delivered me to the correct hotel in short order from my middle of the night arrival at Beijing Capital airport. Over the next two days, as I adjusted to my new surroundings (and a 12 hour time change) I found the people in Beijing to be both friendly and helpful. I managed to find my way to the convention center, which was located across the street from the Olympic complex, to pick up my badge for the show and … from that point forward all I could say was - WOW - what an event!
Click here for the official results of SAP’s China SAPPHIRE 2012!
I was immediately impressed by how China Sapphire was organized, in 4 levels, with the Keynote Theater on the top level. Even though there were almost 11,000 attendees the overall layout spread out the crowd and made for a very comfortable feel. The overall theme of the keynotes (and the show for that matter) was Innovation. HANA, Managing Big Data and Mobility were the top items presented on both days. I was especially interested in the keynote demo on Day 1 with the “My Runway” app, where users can photo their individual wardrobe items then mix and match items into sets. Very cool and my daughter will go nuts when she gets her hand on this app. Although much of the show was conducted in Chinese, all of the seats in the keynotes came with a translation audio device that translated Chinese to English (and vice versa) for every keynote presentation.
There was a very creative innovation zone located on level 1 (Pictured above). In the innovation zone, attendees could explore a myriad of content across a combination to hot topics including HANA, Mobility, Cloud, Analytics, Rapid Deployment Solutions, and several key industries with stations that simulated different businesses. I really thought the back-loader arm in the construction booth drove home who needed to visit.
SAP Rapid Deployment Solutions were a true hot topic across the show! They were prominently located everywhere an attendee happened to wander. In fact a senior SAP’er commented to me that they could not turn around without seeing or hearing “Rapid Deployment Solutions”. Kudos to the rapid-deployment solutions team for orchestrating an effective suite of the Demo stations (Pictured above), Customer presentations, Solution Presentations, Analyst briefings and Partner briefings activities across the show. There was so much energy and interest by Customers, Partners, Analysts and employees on “what is it and how can it help me” that the team was busy both days with engagement and education on SAP Rapid Deployment Solutions with what could only be classified as a diverse set of attendees. In my opinion, China Sapphire will prove to be a real springboard for SAP Rapid Deployment Solution in the Chinese Marketplace.
For those who may not know what SAP Rapid Deployment Solutions are, let me briefly explain.. They are the next exciting wave in SAP’s drive to simplify our customers experience and speed their time to value. They include packaged preconfigured software, content, and end user enablement plus implementation services, which allow you to get just what you need, when you need it. So for example, if you are running SAP CRM today, but are looking to go mobile with your sales force, there’s a rapid-deployment solution for that…and if you got started on your rapid-deployment solution today, you’d be running a mobile sales force before summer’s end! With over 100 rapid-deployment solutions across SAP’s portfolio of applications there’s a good chance that many of your specific business needs can be addressed.
Our next big event for Rapid Deployment Solutions is SAPPHIRE NOW Madrid which will be in November 2012 Madrid Spain.
Stay tuned for more on SAPPHIRE NOW Madrid and Rapid Deployment Solutions
Dave Fowler
Dave Fowler has been with SAP for 6 years in a variety of capacities and is currently an SAP Rapid Deployment Solutions Marketing Manager.
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