#112 Abhay Kumar: Why Ecosystem Success Leads To Customer Success

Your ability to build solutions together with partners determines your ability to deliver on customer success. 

Because a healthy ecosystem with win-win partnerships drives value to customers, as well as your business.

In this episode, Abhay Kumar, Senior Vice President, Global Business Development and Ecosystem at SAP, explains SAP’s approach to a holistic ecosystem. 

Abhay also explains:

• How partners use the SAP cloud platform to build solutions. 
• How partner ecosystems offer competitive advantages to customers.
• How to build scalability and resilience into software.

How Partners Build Solutions on the SAP Cloud Platform

Driving value to customers doesn’t just come from within. Kumar and his team know that co-innovation through partner ecosystems is vital to customer success, which is why they have 1,700 partners building solutions using the SAP Cloud Platform. By bringing SAP assets together with their partners, the SAP Cloud Platform allows partners to build unique solutions at an accelerated pace. This increases accessibility for partners by providing all the necessary tools to expedite development and commercialize the solution through SAP’s App Center.

The entire joint-solution process is mapped out, making it easier than ever for SAP to go to market with a variety of partners, ultimately creating value for the end customer. With nearly 700 solutions already in the App Center, this is not your grandfather’s SAP!

Offering Competitive Advantages to Customers with Partner Ecosystems

Managing such a large partnership enterprise illuminates the role of partner ecosystems. Automation plays a key part for Kumar’s team, where customers can order solutions with a click of a button. Tying the business processes together ensures that the customer has a consistent end-to-end experience. The additional value that customers are looking for, however, often comes through the SAP partner ecosystem, which allows for a key feature - customer choice.

The way in which partners ultimately provide value to customers has changed greatly in the world of cloud solutions. With customer value as the key goal, there is a greater level of alignment between partners and what they deliver. SAP has the entire package, from the application to the infrastructure, and innovation on top comes from partners. This provides a unique, but superior, joint solution for the customer.

Building Scalability and Resilience Into Software

 The bread and butter of SAP’s Cloud Platform comes in its standardization and replicability. For customers, they know that available solutions have been tried and tested, and partners know they don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time they go to market. While 20% will be tweaked and customized for each customer (often covering regional regulations), the other 80% stays the same.

Leveraging replicability in best practices builds the resilience into the software. And the best way to measure this? Customer success. This is key for Kumar, who understands that while both partners need to come out of the solution winning, ultimately the value created for the customer will create success again and again.

To contact the host, Chip Rodgers, with topic ideas, suggest a guest, or join the conversation about alliances, he can be reached by:

• Email: chip@workspan.com 
• Twitter: @chiprodgers
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/chiprodgers