SAP SME World Tour reaches out to Kenya's small and mid-size companies

Issued by Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide for SAP Africa
Kenya, Nairobi, 29 Oct 2009

SAP Africa will host the SAP World Tour at the Holiday Inn, in Nairobi, Kenya, on Thursday, 29 October.

The roadshow, which marks its fifth stop in Africa this year, is aimed at every professional who wants to harness technology to run lean operations, capture greater market share and gain business openness and transparency in this challenging economic climate.

SAP brought this event to Africa for the first time late in 2008, as part of a global initiative across 50 cities in 10 countries, to educate users on SAP solutions for small businesses and midsize companies.

“This decision was taken as a result of the success and overwhelming response from customers and partners who attended the SAP SME World Tour that was held in Johannesburg, in November 2008,” says Derek Kudsee, Director SME, SAP Africa.

In today's economy, best-run businesses must be transparent and accountable, lean and agile, customer-centric and collaborative. Now more than ever, meeting these challenges requires a highly focused business strategy and streamlined execution. This is what the SAP World Tour aims to address.

“There is a perception that our solutions are aimed only at large enterprises, yet more than 65 000 SAP customers are small or medium sized companies, which makes up more than 75% of SAP customers worldwide,” says Kudsee. “The SME World Tour brings an understanding about the solutions we offer closer to our customers and prospective customers who wish to learn more about the solutions we provide. We have tried and tested solutions for the SME market.”

This year, the roadshow has already been hosted in Johannesburg, Durban, Cape Town as well as Lagos, Nigeria, attracting over a thousand customers. SAP Africa Managing Director Pfungwa Serima will open the event.

“We are extremely excited about being able to reach out to the other centres around the continent. This will bring us closer to our customers and help us get an even better understanding of their business environment and challenges,” says Kudsee.

The event is designed to be highly interactive and focused on the needs and challenges of specific industries to ensure that delegates can hone in on the issues that are upper-most on their minds.

“In addition to talking to our customers about our solutions and how we can help them improve their operations, this is also an opportunity for them to interact with their peers, industry partners and SAP executives,” explains Kudsee.

For further information on the SAP World Tour and how to book, please visit the World Tour Web site: http://www.sap.com/southafrica/about/events/smeworldtour09/index.epx or e-mail us on events.southafrica@sap.com.

SAP solutions for small businesses and midsize companies

With more than 37 500 small and midsize customers worldwide, SAP is a leading provider of business applications and an established and highly successful player in the small and midsize enterprise (SME) market. SAP offers a broad and innovative solution portfolio for small businesses and midsize companies to meet the heterogeneous demands of SME customers. SAP solutions for small businesses and midsize companies include SAP Business One, a single integrated application for successfully managing small businesses; SAP Business ByDesign, the software industry's most complete, integrated and adaptable on-demand solution for midsize companies; and SAP Business All-in-One, a customisable and extensible solution for midsize companies with deep industry best practices built in. Sold, implemented and maintained through SAP and an expanding network of qualified partners, all of the solutions are competitively priced, easy and quick to implement and scalable to customers' growing business needs. The SAP solutions specifically designed for SMEs help enable small businesses and midsize companies to lower operating costs, improve operational excellence, gain better business insight and control, and grow their businesses flexibly. Additional information is available at www.sap.com/solutions/sme

SAP

SAP is the world's leading provider of business software (*), offering applications and services that enable companies of all sizes and in more than 25 industries to become best-run businesses. With approximately 75 000 customers (includes customers from the acquisition of Business Objects) in over 120 countries, the company is listed on several exchanges, including the Frankfurt stock exchange and NYSE, under the symbol “SAP”. (For more information, visit www.sap.com)
(*) SAP defines business software as comprising enterprise resource planning and related applications.

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SAP SME World Tour reaches out to Kenya's small and mid-size companies

Roadshow focuses on how businesses can benefit from cost-effective solutions for their industry, and shares insights on strategies for success in the new reality.