Apple & SAP announce partnership on iOS SDK, apps & training

Posted:
in iPhone
Apple and enterprise software firm SAP on Thursday announced a partnership that will see the creation of a new SDK, allowing the latter company's clients and developers to produce iOS apps exploiting the SAP HANA Cloud Platform.




Coming alongside the SDK will be a new "SAP Fiori for iOS" design language, and "SAP Academy for iOS," intended to supply tools and training. All three elements will roll out sometime before the end of 2016.

SAP is meanwhile expected to build native iOS apps for business operations, using Apple's Swift programming language and Fiori-based interfaces. Apple gave the example of a field maintenance worker using an app to order parts or service, or a doctor sharing patient data with colleagues.

"This partnership will transform how iPhone and iPad are used in enterprise by bringing together the innovation and security of iOS with SAP's deep expertise in business software," said CEO Tim Cook in a prepared statement.

The deal bears similarities to Apple's last major enterprise deal, forged with IBM in 2014, intended to spur iOS adoption in the workplace by creating MobileFirst "template" apps that can quickly be adopted by different industries.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 21
    ericthehalfbeeericthehalfbee Posts: 4,485member
    Makes sense, considering iOS dominance in corporate use.
  • Reply 2 of 21
    sflocalsflocal Posts: 6,092member
    First IBM, now SAP.  Don't hear Android's name being mentioned much.  Even if they quietly include Android down the road, it will just be to have a Plan B, but as anything else Android... it will just be left on the vine to rot.
    argonautpalomine
  • Reply 3 of 21
    mazda 3smazda 3s Posts: 1,613member
    Maybe this is just a coincidence (announcements like this don't just magically appear like unicorn farts), but when iPad sales started tanking, Apple announced its partnership with IBM. Now iPad sales are still plummeting and iPhone sales are down YoY and we see a SAP partnership.
    edited May 2016 singularityargonaut
  • Reply 4 of 21
    sog35 said:
    This is pretty big news. 
    Don't you mean something along the lines of "Wow! Great job Tim Cook! I'm glad to see progress coming out of you!"?
    slprescottRayz2016argonaut
  • Reply 5 of 21
    rogifan_newrogifan_new Posts: 4,297member
    sog35 said:
    This is pretty big news.

    Now Apple just needs to build desktops that run iOS. Those units could compete on price with Windows and offer a far better user experience and way less IT maintenance.

    AppleBox

    A10X CPU
    4 GB RAM
    128 GB flash memory
    Wired keyboard and Mouse with TouchID
    $399

    A10X dual CPU - add $100
    8GB RAM - add $100
    256 GB flash - add $150

    Run all your favorite iOS Apps.
    Seemless integration and sync with your iPhone/iPad.
    Small size (little bigger than AppleTV4) 
    Uses very little power
    Super fast boot up






    iOS with mouse support? Please God no. 
    londorargonautpalomine
  • Reply 6 of 21
    slurpyslurpy Posts: 5,382member
    sog35 said:
    This is pretty big news.

    Now Apple just needs to build desktops that run iOS. Those units could compete on price with Windows and offer a far better user experience and way less IT maintenance.

    AppleBox

    A10X CPU
    4 GB RAM
    128 GB flash memory
    Wired keyboard and Mouse with TouchID
    $399

    A10X dual CPU - add $100
    8GB RAM - add $100
    256 GB flash - add $150

    Run all your favorite iOS Apps.
    Seemless integration and sync with your iPhone/iPad.
    Small size (little bigger than AppleTV4) 
    Uses very little power
    Super fast boot up







    A "box" that runs iOS, comes with a WIRED keyboard and mouse, and NOT a touchscreen, even though 100% of iOS apps are touch exclusive, and rely on touch as an input- not only that, but rely on having a touchscreen of specific quality/specs/resolutions and optimized for that purpose? 

    Every idea you provide is somehow stupider than the one before, and yet you have the gall to rant and rave about how Tim Cook isn't "fit" to be CEO and is incapable of handling such a position. He'd be incapable the second he signs off on such moronic and unmarketable propositions such as what you suggested, but so far, he's avoided such idiotic moves and has done a pretty damn good job. Unless, of course, you do nothing but obsess about the stock in order to determine the success of a company and nothing else - which of course defines you. 
    londorbrucemcRayz2016argonautsingularitydamonf
  • Reply 7 of 21
    karmadavekarmadave Posts: 369member
    This partnership makes perfect sense for Apple to extend it's products further into the Enterprise...
  • Reply 8 of 21
    VisualSeedVisualSeed Posts: 217member
    sog35 said:
    Don't you mean something along the lines of "Wow! Great job Tim Cook! I'm glad to see progress coming out of you!"?
    There are some things that Cook is really good at:

    1. Supply chain
    2. Inventory managment
    3. Closing deals - IBM, China Mobile, DocoMo, SAP

    He is absolutely great at those things. But that does not make him a great CEO.

    It really isn't a knock at Tim. Some people just are not meant to be CEO of the most powerful company on the planet. NO shame in that.

    Apple needs a CEO who is a visionary and motivator. 
    A CEO who is not afraid to call out the media/Wall Street.
    A CEO who is willing to get his hands dirty and go to 'war' against his competitors.
    No matter how great Jobs was as an idea man he sucked at managing a company. Had Cook not been there Jobs' second tenure at Apple would have looked like his first or like NeXT's. Great ideas and bad execution. Most companies do not rely on the CEO to think up new products ideas. They come from inside the company and the CEO's job is to cultivate the best ones and provide business conditions for making them successful. CEOs that spend their time arguing with wall street or blabbing about the future are usually not doing a good job running their companies. Cook has done a very good job at going to war against the competitors.. he decimated them. I see no evidence that Cook lacks vision and motivation. On the contrary, I see one of the most successful CEOs in history rightfully ignoring the distraction of millions of talentless armchair CEOs. Apple is behaving as Apple has always behaved, keeping its cards close to its vest and playing only the hands the are sure to win. 
    edited May 2016 mike1londorfoadpatchythepiratejony0roundaboutnowbrucemcRayz2016argonautlatifbp
  • Reply 9 of 21
    rob53rob53 Posts: 3,241member
    sog35 said:
    This is pretty big news.

    Now Apple just needs to build desktops that run iOS. Those units could compete on price with Windows and offer a far better user experience and way less IT maintenance.

    AppleBox

    A10X CPU
    4 GB RAM
    128 GB flash memory
    Wired keyboard and Mouse with TouchID
    $399

    A10X dual CPU - add $100
    8GB RAM - add $100
    256 GB flash - add $150

    Run all your favorite iOS Apps.
    Seemless integration and sync with your iPhone/iPad.
    Small size (little bigger than AppleTV4) 
    Uses very little power
    Super fast boot up

    With this configuration, all you'd have is another slow PC. I know you're trying to configure something that challenges the cheap price of commodity PCs but Apple isn't going to deliver those. Apple does have a problem putting inexpensive desktops, laptops, and tablets into enterprise installations that only look at the initial purchase price because they can't compete on price alone. Apple's competition in this market is Windows PCs and Windows servers along with linux servers. From the sound of it, the backend servers probably wouldn't change unless customers changed from Windows servers to IBM servers. I don't know what kind of desktop configuration is needed to run SAP applications. It might not take much so a fairly "dumb" terminal-based desktop might be enough. For that, your configuration might be overkill. 
  • Reply 10 of 21
    mike1mike1 Posts: 3,275member
    mazda 3s said:
    Maybe this is just a coincidence (announcements like this don't just magically appear like unicorn farts), but when iPad sales started tanking, Apple announced its partnership with IBM. Now iPad sales are still plummeting and iPhone sales are down YoY and we say a SAP partnership.
    This is called looking at the big picture and thinking long term, not just worrying about YOY sales figures. I'm not sure if everybody realizes how huge this is. Between IBM and SAP, you've got two of the big three software powerhouses writing software specifically for your device. And when these roll out, companies tend to buy big quantities of devices. I'm not even sure if these enterprise sales are captured in most of the sales stats that get thrown around.
    argonautpalomine
  • Reply 11 of 21
    Rayz2016Rayz2016 Posts: 6,957member
    sog35 said:
    This is pretty big news. 
    Don't you mean something along the lines of "Wow! Great job Tim Cook! I'm glad to see progress coming out of you!"?
    No he means, "Tim should be fired for not coming round to my house and personally boosting my stock."
  • Reply 12 of 21
    crowleycrowley Posts: 10,453member
    sog35 said:
    This is pretty big news.

    Now Apple just needs to build desktops that run iOS. Those units could compete on price with Windows and offer a far better user experience and way less IT maintenance.

    AppleBox

    A10X CPU
    4 GB RAM
    128 GB flash memory
    Wired keyboard and Mouse with TouchID
    $399

    A10X dual CPU - add $100
    8GB RAM - add $100
    256 GB flash - add $150

    Run all your favorite iOS Apps.
    Seemless integration and sync with your iPhone/iPad.
    Small size (little bigger than AppleTV4) 
    Uses very little power
    Super fast boot up
    No touchscreen = useless.
  • Reply 13 of 21
    As happy and optimistic as I am about these enterprise agreements I'm still left wondering whether the IBM deal has born any fruit yet (aside from selling more units within IBM itself).
  • Reply 14 of 21
    slprescottslprescott Posts: 765member
    So... is SAP hiring? And where will the development center be: Germany, US, ...?
  • Reply 15 of 21
    karmadavekarmadave Posts: 369member
    As happy and optimistic as I am about these enterprise agreements I'm still left wondering whether the IBM deal has born any fruit yet (aside from selling more units within IBM itself).
    IBM has nowhere near the clout, with Enterprise customers, they once had. However, they still have a deep presence in some industries and their services arm is still growing. I think it makes perfect sense for Apple to strike partnerships with companies like IBM, Cisco, SAP, and others and let them focus their own marketing efforts on consumers. That's what they are good at. As for Enterprise customers, the iPhone as their 'trojan horse' and a way to pull other products along including iPads and some Macs. 
  • Reply 16 of 21
    So... is SAP hiring? And where will the development center be: Germany, US, ...?

    Palo Alto
  • Reply 17 of 21
    bobcat62bobcat62 Posts: 28member
    Historically, SAP has been the worst of the worst when it comes to supporting Apple hardware.  Bar none in the Enterprise space.

    It wouldn't be a shock to find at least one group in Walldorf actively trying to sabotage this partnership and SDK.

    When it comes to SAP support of Apple products, only believe what is shipping & only when there is a large number of success stories involving this SDK.

    Any partnership involving SAP & Apple products isn't worth the paper its printed on.
    edited May 2016
  • Reply 18 of 21
    Rayz2016Rayz2016 Posts: 6,957member
    sog35 said:
    This is pretty big news.

    Now Apple just needs to build desktops that run iOS. Those units could compete on price with Windows and offer a far better user experience and way less IT maintenance.

    AppleBox

    A10X CPU
    4 GB RAM
    128 GB flash memory
    Wired keyboard and Mouse with TouchID
    $399

    A10X dual CPU - add $100
    8GB RAM - add $100
    256 GB flash - add $150

    Run all your favorite iOS Apps.
    Seemless integration and sync with your iPhone/iPad.
    Small size (little bigger than AppleTV4) 
    Uses very little power
    Super fast boot up






    Well I can't really add anything that other people have said to trash this terrible idea, other than to say that you can already use a Bluetooth keyboard and connect a monitor to an iPad, so what's the point of this? Ah, let me guess. You're one of those people who thinks cheap = marketshare = revenue = profit. 

    You've come up with a cheesy iPulledItOutOfMyButt kind of product that Apple has avoided because it has no value to them or their customers. 
    edited May 2016
  • Reply 19 of 21
    damonfdamonf Posts: 229member
    I love the stock photo of an iPad 2 at the top of the article.  No, not the Air 2, the iPad 2.  Wish the AI story author would've just cut-and-paste the screen image into an Air 2 / Pro body.
  • Reply 20 of 21
    danoxdanox Posts: 2,799member
    bobcat62 said:
    Historically, SAP has been the worst of the worst when it comes to supporting Apple hardware.  Bar none in the Enterprise space.

    It wouldn't be a shock to find at least one group in Walldorf actively trying to sabotage this partnership and SDK.

    When it comes to SAP support of Apple products, only believe what is shipping & only when there is a large number of success stories involving this SDK.

    Any partnership involving SAP & Apple products isn't worth the paper its printed on.

    SAP and IBM aren't known for writing good software, just sending you the inflated bill at the end of the day, if they really wanted to support OS X or iOS all they had to do was buy some Mac computers and download X-Code, like everyone else. In the end the smaller software developers will be the people moving the football forward.
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