SAP has MYOB in its crosshairs

SAP is looking to snatch a piece of MYOB’s SMB business with a new product designed to undercut the pricing of the Australian software company and other competitors.

Starter Pack is a precursor to SAP's business management application Business One, a product which SAP launched in a number of markets earlier in the year.

In Australia SAP is using its channel to push the product out to local customers who previously were unable to afford the integrated Business One offering.

Key Business Solutions has been appointed as SAP's first Australian partner for Starter Pack.

SAP’s Business One channel sales manager Vince Cordi said the company had signed between six and eight customers in Australia with its existing partners, but was on the hunt for between 10 and 20 new SMB-focused partners by the end of the year.

“Existing partners have the option to sell, but they service a higher end of the market, so any sales they make are purely on a opportunistic basis,” he said. “We want to recruit a channel that would be more suited to taking the Starter Pack to market.”

Also referred to as the “light version” of Business One, SAP said Starter Pack is designed for scalability. It retails at $1400 and is available for purchase for up to five users, after which the offering is automatically upgraded to the Business One solution, at a base cost of $3500. Both products allow for additional components to be added at extra cost.

SAP is targeting partners in the MYOB and QuickBooks space.

“We’re looking at a volume recruitment strategy, and consequently we’ve lowered the entry point for Business One,” he said. “And we’re also lowering the entry point for partners interested in selling the Starter Pack.”

The company will soon launch a partner recruitment campaign with the initial aim of recruiting what SAP describes as 'ideal partners'.

SAP said that Business One, an application integrating financials, sales, customer relationship management and inventory, has over 1000 user customers across Australia and New Zealand.