Last week, in a SAP land just a mouse click away from you…

• Mark Yolton writes about SDN passing the 2 (!) milltion member mark. Congratulations, guys!
• It doesn’t come as a surprise that at the ageing and cast-aside CeBIT 2010 Salesforce.com and Adobe representatives spoke about the “decade when enterprise software died”. The argument is not new and was also reflected in recent posts by -amongst others- Marc (End Of Software) Benioff, Vinnie Mirchandani and SAP’s Charles Zedlewski. Whilst I appreciate the long overdue look towards consumer software, I tend to agree with some of Zedlewski’s arguments. I also think that changing enterprise software and IT just for hipness sake -which is what a some of this sounds like- would be a fallacy,
• “RightNow” making a bold stand with revamped services model for its SaaS CRM suite. An attempt to push envelope on enterprise value. Frank Scavo comments: “The large vendors will look at this, see that RightNow is a relatively small company, dismiss this as a sideshow and carry on as though nothing has happened. At least in public.”
• ZDNet’s Paul Greenberg thinks that SAP has got “The Message back on Target” on Sustainability.
• By a similar token, SAP’s co-CEO Bill McDermott and Jim Hagemann Snabe released an open letter, trying to bring the customers back on target.
• excellent post by Gartner’s Thomas Otter on “Excel Hell“

and Twitter strikes back…

• Z_BASIS_ADM: Working through some silliness that is SAP on windows. Kind of like putting the Porsche logo on a Volkswagon and thinking it will be fast.
• vendorprisey: Was very refreshing to hear a SAP board presentation that didn’t make any anti-oracle digs. #sapcebit
• hkisker: McDermott @ #SAP CeBIT: We will make SAP a lean co & become double digit growth again (expect +4-8% SW rev in 2010). #sapcebit
• finnern: @c821311 – Tony that stopped my breath for a second. R/2 ABAP Quick reference guide. Sweet.

Come and feast your eyes on this week’s SAP news bounty:

• SAP announced the “BI toolset for the casual user”.
• “Is SAP not even bothering to pretend it has its own on-demand CRM product anymore?”, asks Barney Beal on ITKnowledgeExchange. A reaction to SAP’s SaaS BI announcement.
• Thomas Wailgum on the same. Although he thinks SAP’s move is smart, as it focuses on the casual user.
• Peter Evans Greenwood stipulates that “”. Interesting points.
• “…while all the buzz may be around the cloud, the business reality is one of extension and transition.” – Dennis Howlett on ZDNet, talking about SAP ecosystem and SMB focus.
• blogging about a fantastic SAP Mentor organised event: Thorsten Franz talks about SAP Inside Track Bonn

Here is the Twitter Pick’n’Mix:

• @thorstenster: Having great fun at#SAPInsideTrackBonn. Atmosphere is very good, wonderful crowd.
• @chiprodgers: Just blogged: 62,000 Views of SAP TechEd Live Videos #sapteched
• martin_english: FYA: SAP cancels rampup for NetWeaver BW 7.2 – functionality to be rolled into BW7.3 later this year  (via @cbjorlin)
• siliconchris: SAP cancels the planned BW 7.2 RampUp. Instead functionality will be available in BW 7.3 later this year 
• qmacro: Why does everyone seem to be an Architect these days?#
• yojibee: I just heard the words SAP, installation and easy being used in the same sentence. I am sceptical but let’s see how this goes #bobj
• rhirsch: don’t know how people can say that SAP isn’t seriously looking at the cloud as a app platform. I’m seeing it in a variety of settings

Another week, another pick of blogs worth a bedtime read (maybe)

• “From punch card to Cloud Computing” – a nice trip down memory lane (and some dodgy suits)
• Frank Scavo’s “SAP pushes back on Gartner for its ranking of Business Objects”
• SAP Inside Track Bonn 2010: it’s all happening in Bonn tomorrow. All the best for you guys. Sadly I can’t be there this time.
• Helmuth Guembel refers to a Wirtschaftswoche article in which Michael Kroker claimed that Leo Apotheker had to go as he was holding meetings with potential buyers without Hasso Plattner’s endorsement. Here’s another post by him around the delicate position Plattner finds himself in as he is Exec and on the supervisory board. Oh, and a 10% shareholder.
• Jon Reed with some in-depth analysis on Panaya’s SAP Salary review from last week.

Twitterverse was mostly about Chuck Norris (or so it seemed)

oliver: @thorstenster Chuck Norris does no need a SAP Business Suite. He has everything in-his-memory database

vijayasankarv: When Chuck Norris types data itab ..with header line, ABAP does not dare to say it is obsolete..instead, it shows a “Success” Message

openczun: ok, I’ve got to get in on this – Chuck Norris writes such performant ABAP code that the programs are finished before they are executed

martin_english: @pixelbase Chuck Norris uses MAYBE clause in SQL

se38: Chuck Norris´ Pretty Printer converts Java source into ABAP

vlvl: Chuck Norris can calculate the ROI of installing CE

vijayasankarv: SAP runs Chuck Norris

some other Tweets spotted by yours truly:

SAPMentors: Nominate the next SAP Mentor 

dparnas: SAP Fact #95 now comes with a drawing from an 11 year old son of a norwegian SAP employee 

yojibee: RT @vlvl: New Silverlight Drawing board in Visual Composer –  << more Adobe tech being replaced with Silverlight #SAP

@yojibee @pixelbase SVG maintenance ended two years ago, don’t blame only one side…. (in response to yojibee)

ITSinsider: RT @jimworth: Sometimes we get caught up in the “cool of the tool”, but we need to look at the strategy #acweb4

Blimey! What a week this has been… There were so many news that I had to kick-start the blog press last Tuesday for a “Leo Special” (#leogone). The second half of last week was mainly dominated by discussions whether SAP is now an acquisition target and newsitems regarding further SAP board reshuffles. Let’s have a look at what we’ve got…

• Forrester’s Paul Hamerman reports on the departure of John Schwarz and elevation other board level changes. He also sees a commitment from SAP to “changing its meandering position”.
• Redmonk’s James Governor chimes in with a wonderful summary on Leo Apotheker’s biggest legacy at SAP: Sustainability.
• TechTarget’s Courtney Bjorlin asks whether SAP would be in a better position “if Shai Agassi never left“. This is a conversation that has bounced around the Blogs and Twittersphere for a while now and is a moot point. My take is that Agassi, as disruptive as he has been during his tenure at SAP, created a lot of fronts within the software house. Surely SAP would be different had he remained in power, but I’m not convinced if it would be a better place (no pun intended, haha!). I’m also not sure about the point that is made around “innovation around SAP”. SAP’s Composition Environment does exactly that. It’s there!
• Stop-Rewind-Play: Josh Greenbaum talks about “SAP restarts the post-Kagermann” era.
• Panaya came up with an analysis of SAP salaries. Interesting and sobering fact to note here is the gender bias “The median salary for women is 8-12% less than men in Europe and North America.“

Tell us about it, Twitterverse!

• twailgum: What if Shai Agassi never left SAP? by @cbjorlin>sap’s problem is b/c ‘outsiders’ like shai do leave. promote fr w/in!
• jonerp: Very interesting update from @sambayer on “What is SAP CRM really being used for?” (w/Survey data)
• SNCSocrates It may be stressful, frustrating, and incredibly confusing, but I’m actually starting to enjoy ABAP programming.
• sapcebit: SAP combines CeBIT with World Tour in Halls 19 and 20. Reg show floor Hall 4, D12; Hall 5, A04
• cote: Man, seems there’s executive musical chairs going on over at SAP:

Leo Apotheker (source SAP)

Typical! After last a slow news week it’s all happening within 48 hrs. I thought I provide a little summary of the best SAP, Hasso and #leogone related posts of the last 2 days.

• Dennis Howlett only minutes after the news broke that Leo Apotheker and SAP have parted ways.
• Thomas Otter weighs in with about “Hasso and SAP”. I guess the core of this piece is “SAP’s challenges are bigger than simply replacing the CEO. It needs to recover its geist.“
• CIO’s Thomas Wailgum predicts a competition between Snabe and McDermott in his “So long, Leo. We hardly knew ye.“
• Dennis Howlett with a good summary post the press conference during which Plattner was announced as back at the helm.
• Vinnie Mirchandani with an interesting contribution, linking into arguments with Apotheker last year. He’s defiant that ERP needs its soul back. A commenter quite rightly points out whether it ever had a soul, but I can see where Mirchandani is coming from. There needs to be more Wow! for Innovation (not just slideware).
• Computerworld with a good round-up of the events up to Tuesday
• Hasso means business with regards to gaining trust of customers back. Sapphire 2010 to be held in Europe and US in parallel, using real-time connected sessions.
• InformationWeek’s Bob Evans probably strikes the hardest with this lengthy analysis of the change at the SAP helm. Poignant phrase referring to Plattner’s suggestions how to bring back trust: “look at where customers rank in the great chain of being constructed by Plattner: dead last. Almost an afterthought.“

Achtung, Twitterverse, Baby!

• nenshad: #SAP‘s Apotheker built one of the most formidable enterprise software sales machines and delivered YEARS of record growth
• yojibee: @nenshad @rwang0 Great sales guy, less great CEO – as simple as that (IMO of course) #SAP
• dahowlett: RT @jhurwitz: Oracle buys another company: AmberPoint- SOA management < blimey !!!!
• monkchips: so Hasso runs SAP. tell us something we didn’t know. #leogone
• dahowlett: At last: “WE made a mistake” – re: maintenance
• rwang0: RT @kitson: #Plattner: “the average age of the typical #SAP installation is quite substantial.” #erp #crm #sap
• paulhamerman #SAP Hasso sets a tone for accountability, admits mistakes.This transparency will be important in helping SAP regain trust
• twailgum: #leogone I said it last night, and I’ll say it again: “SAP, Who Are You?” Hasso offered direction this a.m. We’ll see where this all goes.
• @InFullBloomUS: “It’s time #SAP announced a next gen product strategy that twill take their R/3:#ERP6 customers to the future.
• @sapnews: SAP to Hold SAPPHIRE® 2010 Customer Conferences in Europe and U.S.: