SAP Company being one of the global leaders at the corporate applications market held its traditional annual forum on May 23, 2012. This year the forum was dedicated to a couple of big anniversaries at once: 40th anniversary of SAP AG Company and 20th anniversary of SAP official representation in Russia. At SAP 40 Years of Innovations Forum the SAP experts, customers and partners presented their own experience of implemented projects and view as to further development prospects for SAP business in Russia and CIS.

This year the Forum gathered a huge quantity of participants: about two thousand people. In lobby, prior to the beginning of the plenary meeting, they actively exchanged opinions, discussed vital problems lively. Many guests to the Forum being the representatives of various companies were cooperating with SAP for many years. They recalled the past experience of interaction and shared their plans for future.

The Forum's program was very diverse: it includes more than 70 reports on key topics of business optimization under the current economic conditions. In the course of the plenary meeting, the Forum's participants were provided with a possibility to trace back the most significant milestones in the Russian history of SAP, to learn about the company's future plans. "SAP is an encyclopaedia of innovations in the business management area, emphasized Igor Bogachev, Director General of SAP CIS. During the years of work in Russia, SAP has implemented a plenty of projects in strategic industry branches, providing our customers and partners with the advance expertise in the business processes automation sphere. We help our clients to build the business that will be stable and efficiently manageable under  any market  conditions. 20 years of work is the best proof of the fact that SAP technologies can be a reliable basement for steady development for many years ahead".

Within the bounds of the Forum various format events took place: topical sessions devoted to practical issues of business development and application of innovations in economy's industries of whatever type, "round tables" and micro-forums.

The core part of the Forum's exposition was represented by the SAP Innovation Area, where strategic developments of the company were placed. The Forums' guests saw with their own eyes the interface of SAP's next generation solutions, became aware of the possibilities of SAP's mobile analytics, mobile solutions and cloud services. The display stand of the new but already well-known analytical platform High-Performance Analytical Appliance (SAP HANA) was operating in a standby mode.

The event's participants paid special attention to the topical session "Innovations in the Bank Sector" where the SAP representatives and customers spoke with captivating reports that gave rise to vivid and acute discussions. Hosts of the Forum outlined the major, most acute topics for the bank sector. Firstly, these are the risk management, conformity to Basel II and Basel III requirements. In this view SAP proposed the risk management system that had been checked practically in a dozen of financial institutions. Secondly, these are the compliance with the international standards of financial reporting. SAP has already prepared the industrial software for IFRS that is deployed in many banks. SAP's representatives believe that this solution will be demanded at the Russian market.

One more constituent of the above topic is the fulfilment of the Russian accounting requirements. It is well-known that absence of the Russian Accounting Standards in solutions of foreign suppliers is an obstacle to use of their software. The company has launched the project devoted to coordination of SAP solution with the requirements of the Russian accounting in commercial banks.

Mobile platforms and calculations in memory comprise a very important innovative topic that can change the market completely. Mobile platforms are the new opportunities to promote the products, services; it is an expansion and radical acceleration of internal business processes for the organization. A striking example of the above is the project on implementation of SAP mobile solutions into the largest lending institution -Sberbank of Russia.

Maxim Lamskov, Project Manager of OJSC "Sberbank of Russia" informed that in 2011 his company faced a dramatic need in application of mobile technologies and solutions in their corporate landscape. "We were required to deploy the industrial approach which would enable us to have a very fast connection of mobile applications and devices and put them onto a corporate landscape, explains Maxim Lamskov. We started forming conceptual requirements (scalability, universality, support of several mobile operating systems) and considering almost all the suggestions at the market: both in Russia and abroad. As a result we came to understanding that only the mobile platform of corporate applications from SAP Company met all of our requirements".

Sberbank's representative expressed his surety that SAP Company would be able to support the needs of its customers and respond to all the market challenges under such a dynamic industry as mobile technologies. "We believe that SAP company will remain a reliable partner for us. In the previous year SAP made a great step towards the development of its mobile solutions and mobile platform. Therefore I hope that after five years or more the company will follow such high standards", says Maxim Lamskov.