SAP simplifies app development

SAP is building a development environment that will let non-coders create applications that mine information from corporate data sources, said Shai Agassi, executive board member at SAP, during the company's TechEd conference.

The project, code-named GUI machine, is expected to be released next month and can be used as part of the company's NetWeaver integration and application development program.

End users can connect and define a number of business objects via a Web browser interface that can be converted into a working application without requiring knowledge of the intricacies of Java. The GUI machine lets users first test their data model to make sure it's valid and then converts the model into a running application. It also will generate documentation for the application.

'Any business analyst can do it,' Agassi said during his keynote at the develop conference that will run through September 12 in Las Vegas.
Agassi demonstrated the application as an enticement for users to sign on to the company's NetWeaver environment.

NetWeaver, unveiled earlier this year, includes a composite application framework for developing cross-functional processes. That component includes an object access layer, so it can access a variety of structured and unstructured data. The product also includes an application server, an enterprise portal, collaboration software and an integration broker. It supports J2EE and .Net.

Components for NetWeaver have been released individually over the year, but a full integrated environment will be ready by early 2004, said Agassi.
He said research firm JP Morgan estimated that 34 percent of SAP's customer base was in active procurement of the environment in late June. The company also announced that Synopsys, a developer of semiconductor design software, and Siemens plan to use NetWeaver.

The push was on at the show to increase SAP's developer ranks, highlighted by the introduction of a development site and support programs.
Moving forward, SAP promised to further define NetWeaver and its Web services strategy. Peter Zencke, a member of SAP's executive board, said SAP was redefining the way CRM, ERP and supply chain management applications interact with each other.

He estimated that only 10 percent of CRM application are currently integrated with ERP, and fewer are integrated with supply chain management.
'There is a wall now in the area of CRM, the front office and ERP, the back office,' he said.

He used pricing as an example. Today, pricing usually sits in ERP because it's also tied to billing. But that model doesn't take into account companies that use multiple ERP systems or interface with third-party systems to help deliver some goods and services.

In SAPs new model, pricing would become a service that interfaces between a number of different applications, from SAP's CRM to third-party ERP applications.
'What you have to do is build this application as a service so that it can be shared, whether that's with CRM, ERP or other applications,' he said.

Zencke said he expects to see some early adopters move to this model over the next several years. But most companies will be changing during the next 10 years, he said.

There's no question executives are serious about the switch to an open-systems, Web services model. 'Big wave changes happen in the industry very rarely, about every 10 years,' Agassi said during a press and analyst session. 'The last time was the mainframe. At that time most of the industry claimed two tiers was enough. Larry Ellison held on to that claim for two or three years.'