SAP said in its fourth-quarter 2004 earnings call last week that 2005 would be a year of significant investment. Just out of the gate, the companys making strides.
SAP AG, of Walldorf, Germany, announced on Tuesday that it had purchased the rights to DCS Quantum, a vehicle dealer management system that will be integrated into its automotive software set.
At the same time, SAP signed a deal with Mercury Interactive Corp. to incorporate Mercurys LoadRunner performance optimization software into its NetWeaver support services offering.
NetWeaver is SAPs integration platform.
What the alliance with Mercury, of Mountain View, Calif., means is that NetWeaver users will now have the capability to test the performance and scalability of their SAP deployments.
As part of the agreement, SAP and Mercury will codevelop product and service offerings similar to the use of LoadRunner in SAPs Go Live Check Service, used in some NetWeaver deployments to ensure appropriate scale, officials said. There were no additional details regarding product direction.
The deal with Mercury will also enable all SAP global support centers to perform load testing remotely, using LoadRunner.
On the automotive front, SAP will integrate the DCS namesake automotive software into its ERP (enterprise resource planning) software, naming it SAP Dealer Business Management.
Due the third quarter of this year, SAP DBM will help dealer groups and independent dealers to consolidate their sales and service processes.