SAP: Russian SMB customers ready to invest

18.12.2006
Of Russia's 500 SAP corporate users over 200 are small and mid-size businesses. They chiefly use SAP Business One and MYSAP All-in-one business solutions specifically designed for this sector. All of these projects were completed in less than three and a half years. SAP has been doing business on the Russian SMB market since the summer of 2003.

According to Boris Volpe, Executive Director SAP CIS, today mySAP All-in-one is used by around 30 percent of Russia's SMB corporate users. Others prefer a more affordable small-business solution SAP Business One. SAP expects the number of Russian small and mid-size businesses that use SAP solutions to grow to 3,000 by 2010.

The SMB-client survey SAP conducted together with Economist Intelligence Unit says that many Russian companies are ready to use information technology more actively. 51 percent of the surveyed enterprises say IT is very important for their business development. 68 percent are convinced that IT will give them critical competitive advantages. For 76 percent of the polled companies IT is essential for realizing their business strategies. 40 percent think IT a necessity to preserve flexibility in conditions of growth. Besides, most Russian mid-size companies are striving to match their IT strategies to their business strategies, however, only in 50 percent of such companies the key IT decision-making is done by business managers. This is probably one of the things that make Russian mid-size businesses different from foreign ones where business managers mostly make such decisions.

According to the survey, for 48 percent of Russian companies the main driving force behind investment into IT will be the need to be capable of competing with bigger companies. 36 percent of the polled feel a need to replace their obsolete IT systems and solutions with new ones. 34 percent are concerned with information security. Also 34 percent of the polled are willing to invest into upgrading their IT solutions to be able to maintain competitiveness on the overseas markets.

As for the factors that will hamper the growth of the IT investment over the next three years, for most of the polled companies (58 percent) it is going to be the IT systems purchase and installation costs. There are also a few other factors that might make businesses have second thoughts about upgrading their IT infrastructure, but these are a cause for worry for a rather small number of companies. Only 33 percent of the polled described technical IT-related problems as reasonable concern. Another 31 percent do not see IT as a priority in doing their business; and an equal share of the polled said that their personnel are not properly trained to operate complex IT infrastructures.