SAP Expands Network of Certified ASP Partners

New mySAP.com Application-Hosting Partners Offer SAP Customers Vertical-Market Expertise, Wide Range of Hosted Solutions

LAS VEGAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 14, 2000--Today at SAPPHIREŽ 2000 Las Vegas, the annual SAP Americas customer conference, SAP AG (NYSE:SAP - news), the leading provider of inter-enterprise software solutions, announced that SAPHosting, a new organization dedicated to delivering mySAP.com(TM) e-business solutions over the Internet, has certified three new application service provider (ASP) partners as it continues to build a robust organization for delivering mySAP.com software and services over the Internet.

The new application hosting partners, PricewaterhouseCoopers, FiNetrics and The Hunter Group, expand the U.S. network of SAP-certified ASPs to 11, each supporting designated industries based on their vertical-market expertise.

SAP works closely with ASP partners, which conduct much of the implementation and support for hosted solutions in addition to providing the technical infrastructure. The expansion of its network of SAP-certified ASPs represents an important step as SAP faces growing demand for outsourced e-business applications. Already an industry leader, with more than 21,000 end users being served by hosted mySAP.com solutions, SAP is responding to a widely recognized trend toward hosted solutions, which allow companies to focus on their primary business, as opposed to expending resources to maintain in-house systems.

``While hosted solutions offer companies many sound benefits, customers have to feel confident that the system will be optimized for their business and run by a team of experts,'' said Tom Melchiore, vice president of SAPHosting at SAP America, Inc. ``The SAPHosting certification process ensures high-quality hosting solutions and customer satisfaction.''

SAPHosting Partners Specialize in Vertical Markets or Cross-Industry Applications

The strength of the application-hosting solutions from SAP is not only that the solutions deliver powerful, end-to-end capabilities over the Internet, but also that they are optimized for specific industries even before they are fine-tuned to individual customer requirements. Because SAP has years of experience serving customers in dozens of industries, it has accumulated valuable business knowledge that it now passes on to customers as mySAP.com Best Practices templates. mySAP.com Best Practices provide customers with business expertise tailored for the evaluation and implementation of industry-specific solutions.

Similarly, certified hosting partners are required to have the industry expertise needed to support each customer implementation. New hosting partners PricewaterhouseCoopers, The Hunter Group and FiNetrics join the existing partners, each with their industry areas of expertise:

  • PricewaterhouseCoopers -- high tech, automotive, utilities, banking, retail
  • The Hunter Group -- human resources
  • FiNetrics -- ASP model for hosting standardized solutions
  • Corio Inc. -- high tech, dotcom
  • EDS -- consumer products, automotive, utilities, business-to-business (B2B)
  • E! Online -- service provider, high tech, automotive, human resources, B2B
  • Interpath Communications Inc. -- human resources
  • HostLogic Inc. -- public sector
  • IBM Corp. -- BPO for B2B procurement
  • Siemens Business Services -- consumer products, manufacturing
  • Qwest Cyber.Solutions -- service provider, automotive, high tech, human resources, dotcom

``SAP got it right when it chose to serve different customer segments with teams that could focus on the industry's unique business models, processes and best practices,'' said John Charters, president and CEO of Qwest Cyber.Solutions. ``As one of the original and largest ASP partners of SAP, we have been very successful in delivering rich business functionality to thousands of users in our key industry sectors. Our ongoing strong relationship with SAP is important as we continue to bring on many new customers.''

Rigorous Certification Ensures Highest-Quality Application Hosting

SAPHosting delivers what customers have always wanted in a hosting partner: the expertise of an experienced hosting provider with the accessibility and control of an in-house operation. As a result, SAPHosting is strict in its technical review of ASP partners' facilities and their abilities to deliver application hosting for mySAP.com e-business solutions. As part of the application hosting certification procedure, SAPHosting dispatches a consultant to the ASP's data center to verify that certain conditions are met. The ASP is required to have sufficient resources available for the development, upgrading and maintenance of its solutions, which must be maintained via a Class A data center with 24x365 support as required by the ASP's contract with SAP.

About SAP
As the market leader of inter-enterprise software solutions, SAP is leveraging its strength in industry-focused business software and the world's largest enterprise software customer base to deliver mySAP.com. mySAP.com provides an open collaborative business environment of personalized solutions on demand. This enables companies of all sizes and industries to fully engage their employees, customers and partners to capitalize upon the new Internet economy. mySAP.com allows people to harness the power of the Internet to work smarter, better and faster by optimizing supply chains, managing strategic relationships, reducing time to market, sharing virtual information, and increasing productivity and shareholder value. SAP is listed on several exchanges including the Frankfurt stock exchange and NYSE under the symbol ``SAP.'' The SAP World Wide Web site can be found at http://www.sap.com.

Copyright (c) 2000 SAP AG SAP, SAPPHIRE and mySAP.com are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and several other countries. Other product or service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respective owners.

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