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May 08, 2007 | Comments: (0)
SAP draws a line in the sands of the Middle East
We all know that much of Asia is booming -- manufacturing, outsourcing, and, I suppose, capitalism in general is reinvigorating many economies and, it is to be hoped, raising the standard of living of its populations.
See my Reality Check blog, The Truth About China.
With that in mind, I asked Hasso Platner, founder of SAP, if he saw any signs of high tech life in the Middle East.
My thinking was that if companies in the Middle East require the kind of software and technology that SAP offers, it might be a leading indicator of change taking place in that part of the world.
Platner's answer surprised me.
"Many, many years ago I made a decision that we don't go to the Middle East directly. Actually we sold the label SAP to an organization which is serving from Morocco to Iran. East of Iran SAP starts again and west of Morocco is the ocean.
"The whole Arab world, the whole Middle East excluding Israel, is not served by SAP."
I asked the next obvious question.
"Why not?"
"We didn't want to go there...."
Considering past history, Germany, Israel, and the Arab world is a very sensitive issue and would require a very long blog with many, many comments. So I will just say, you can draw your own conclusions as to "why not?"
However, as far as I can tell Platner's business philosophy is at least in part based on what he believes is the right thing to do.
This is in sharp contrast to companies like Yahoo, which is willing to turn over the names of dissidents in China to the government-- "we adhere to local laws" --for the sake of a profit.
Posted by Ephraim Schwartz on May 8, 2007 03:20 PM
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Hooray for Hasso Platner. I think he is wise to wait for the environment to change.
Posted by: John at May 9, 2007 01:27 PM"However, as far as I can tell Platner's business philosophy is at least in part based on what he believes is the right thing to do."
That is rather vague. "right thing" might be connected with ethics or with PR, the latter as in cultural sensitivity.
Sincerely,
Gene Wirchenko
Re: Is it cultural sensitivity or ethics?
You're right. However, once I asked Platner why and he said he "didn't want to go there," I don't feel I should make a conjecture as to his motives. That in fact is why I said I leave it to the readers to decide.
Ephraim
Editor-at-Large
InfoWorld
let's not be naive...
read http://www.ibmandtheholocaust.com/
Posted by: Brad Hofman at May 10, 2007 06:03 PMI think it's a very dumb position . Actually SAP is losing a virgin market to oracle. Who would ignore dubai and iran and egypt in the business today. Maybe it's Shai Aghasi decision .
Posted by: ali at May 13, 2007 07:12 PM
