SOA Feature Article

The partner solutions announced today are developed using the AppExchange on-demand platform and enable organizations to build a bridge between their client-server SAP environments and the new generation of Internet-base systems at the core of an increasing number of companies’ IT strategies.

 

The ratio of salesforce.com’s transactions now occurring through the AppExchange Web services API stands at more than 40 percent and continues to increase. This helps to solidify salesforce.com’s position in the area of Service Oriented Architectures, providing enterprises with a proven way to use this new approach to connect applications in their organizations.

 

By enabling the integration and transparency of critical data such as customer information, sales and orders with salesforce.com’s SFA and Service and Support applications, organizations can extend the value of the data in their SAP systems without the need to exhaust additional resources in the legacy systems that currently manage it.

 

Customers are offered a range of powerful solutions on the AppExchange that can be quickly and easily deployed into their Salesforce implementations to integrate their on-demand CRM solutions with SAP applications.

 

Bill Schlemm, IT Systems Project Manager, Littelfuse, stated that as a longtime SAP professional, he was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to link the two products together. Salesforce knows how important other systems are to the company’s overall success.

 

According to Cindy Warner, senior vice president, Global Integration Services, salesforce.com, customers need the capability to seamlessly integrate world-class on-demand CRM with their legacy ERP applications. Along with its partners, salesforce.com is creating an integration ecosystem that provides customers with flexible implementation options and ultimately on-demand success across their enterprise.

 

The AppExchange is the world’s first on-demand application platform. More than 200 applications created by salesforce.com, its customers and partners are now available. All of these applications can be easily shared, exchanged and installed with one click into any salesforce.com account.

This announcement creates an interesting paradox as SAP has been rumored to be working on a solution that will mirror and compete with the AppExchange. If this solution comes to fruition, will this present a significant obstacle for salesforce.com? Could SAP realistically create a better integration solution between its own systems than third party companies? Maybe; but then again, maybe not.

 

salesforce.com has positioned itself as a strong leader in the on-demand application platform space. The company continues to grow the AppExchange, continually adding solutions and partners. And, the company’s ability to recognize the importance of SAP ERM applications within their customers’ environments has created an even stronger hold on the industry.

 

Whether or not SAP or anyone else presents a strong competitive platform in the Business Web space, salesforce.com has such a strong lead, it would take considerable strategy, partnering and promotion to even enter this space.