Business

SAP S/4HANA Gets More Nordic Attention (MESA)

More and more Nordic countries are looking to SAP’s S/4HANA software to help with both finance and supply chain management, and to adopt blockchain, according to a new report. The study from tech research and advisory firm Information Services Group (ISG) — “ISG Provider Lens SAP HANA and Leonardo Ecosystem Partners Report for the Nordics” — found that enterprises in the region are adopting public cloud services for S/4HANA, with SAP-related providers building solutions for the ERP (enterprise resource planning) software suite.

Nordic enterprises are looking to SAP solutions to achieve faster time-to-market for their products, according to the report.

“SAP HANA technology has had a strong impact in changing the market,” said Barry Matthews, partner and head of ISG North Europe. “SAP S/4HANA allows users to radically simplify database structures within the SAP Business Suite, and updates to SAP’s software give customers agility and the ability to speed up innovation.”

However, the report notes that providers are faced with a shortage of SAP talent in the Nordic region, and are addressing the staffing problem by entering into new partnerships, training college students early, cross-training employees and setting up nearshore facilities in Europe (with Poland emerging as a nearshore option for SAP services).

SAP providers also using software bots and other automated tools to offer support and resolve incidents, according to the report, with bots also helping service providers reassign staff to higher value tasks.

Looking at the SAP Leonardo market, the report found many Nordic enterprises are slow to adopt that software and microservices package, one that enables customers to leverage technologies like the Internet of Things (IoT, machine learning, blockchain, analytics and big data.