November 2012 - Innovate. Integrate. Transform. Run.

SAP Third Party – Indirect Usage Licensing Part 1
SAP Third Party – Indirect Usage Licensing Part 1

SAP Third Party – Indirect Usage Licensing Part 1

By Bill Wood|November 26th, 2012|

Many SAP customer license contracts contain either a direct or an indirect reference to SAP’s third party usage licensing requirements. That requirement is referred to as “indirect usage” and carries a hefty potential financial penalty. The basic idea is that if you use any non-SAP system to access SAP data, the user of that external system must acquire an SAP Named User License. I understand SAP's argument that if you use portions of the SAP software (BAPIs, RFCs, Function Modules, etc.), you [...]

Storms Coming on the Salesforce.com Cloud Front
Storms Coming on the Salesforce.com Cloud Front

Storms Coming on the Salesforce.com Cloud Front

By Bill Wood|November 19th, 2012|

Salesforce.com financial clouds I recently ran into a post from a pretty well respected investor blog over at “Seeking Alpha.” The basic takeaway is that the Salesforce.com cloud business is not all it is hyped up to be and that shareholders may be in for a seriously rude awakening [FN1]. -------------------- The way it is described there sounds a LOT like Enron accounting. They called it a Ponzi Scheme and here is how it works: Employees receive stock options INSTEAD OF cas [...]

Where Does Agile Fit in SAP Projects?
Where Does Agile Fit in SAP Projects?

Where Does Agile Fit in SAP Projects?

By Bill Wood|November 12th, 2012|

After offering insight based on my personal experiences around "Agile Project Methods for SAP ERP Projects?" I wanted to highlight a few areas where Agile does work: Design sessions Development efforts (i.e. coding) Data conversions Once you begin to move beyond these areas, you quickly encounter dependent workstreams that need much more coordination. Those additional dependencies make it difficult to apply Agile methods. While Agile tends to emphasize the one-week to one-month "sprint," I woul [...]

Building an Effective SAP ERP Delivery Organization
Building an Effective SAP ERP Delivery Organization

Building an Effective SAP ERP Delivery Organization

By Bill Wood|November 5th, 2012|

There are generally three major components for improving SAP delivery. These three components can improve SAP and technology delivery in general while impacting corporate business performance and marketplace success. Delivery Approach Delivery Methodology IT Organizational Development The following content is written with a focus on SAP; however, it can be completely generalized to virtually any IT organization. You need a careful focus on the delivery approach. Here there are two key paradigms [...]