????SAP公司也許是世界最大的企業(yè)軟件制造商了，不過(guò)SAP一向以效率低下和官僚作風(fēng)嚴(yán)重而知名。因此去年公司引入了新的管理層，幫助公司簡(jiǎn)化業(yè)務(wù)流程，刺激創(chuàng)新文化。兩位共同首席執(zhí)行官施杰翰和孟鼎銘誓言將加速產(chǎn)品發(fā)布的進(jìn)程，并精簡(jiǎn)內(nèi)部的繁文縟節(jié)。但到目前為止，他們的努力所帶來(lái)的成效還未在投資者身上顯現(xiàn)出來(lái)。上周四這家德國(guó)公司宣布其營(yíng)業(yè)利潤(rùn)在第一季度上漲了26%，但仍沒(méi)有滿足分析人士的預(yù)測(cè)，因此導(dǎo)致SAP的股價(jià)出現(xiàn)了下跌。與此同時(shí)，SAP重申其全年?duì)I收將上漲10%到14%。我與SAP的聯(lián)席CEO施杰翰在該公司位于帕洛阿爾托的辦公室見了面，探討該公司如何能夠通過(guò)發(fā)展新技術(shù)來(lái)實(shí)現(xiàn)增長(zhǎng)。

????《財(cái)富》：您談到SAP創(chuàng)新的三個(gè)方面。它們分別是什么？

????施杰翰：首先是移動(dòng)業(yè)務(wù)，將商業(yè)內(nèi)容搬到移動(dòng)設(shè)備上，我們認(rèn)為這存在著大量的商機(jī)。第二個(gè)方面是云計(jì)算，云計(jì)算讓你無(wú)需應(yīng)付IT的復(fù)雜性。我們提出了一個(gè)企業(yè)方案，可以讓你把整個(gè)企業(yè)都放在云計(jì)算的環(huán)境里運(yùn)營(yíng)。這對(duì)安全性和可靠性等提出了很高的要求。有些人可能會(huì)說(shuō)我們涉足這個(gè)市場(chǎng)較晚，但是我們希望能解決這些根本性的問(wèn)題。第三方面是內(nèi)存運(yùn)算。這是一種技術(shù)引導(dǎo)型創(chuàng)新，它挑戰(zhàn)了數(shù)據(jù)必需在硬盤上存儲(chǔ)的常識(shí)。我們正在試圖把所有的數(shù)據(jù)移到電腦的主儲(chǔ)存器上。

????《財(cái)富》：在移動(dòng)業(yè)務(wù)方面，SAP斥資58億美元收購(gòu)了賽貝斯公司（Sybase），這起收購(gòu)導(dǎo)致了什么成果？我們什么時(shí)候可以看到這筆收購(gòu)的成果？

????施杰翰：你將看到兩方面的技術(shù)成果。首先是基礎(chǔ)架構(gòu)本身，也就是讓你與數(shù)據(jù)和流程進(jìn)行聯(lián)通的移動(dòng)中間設(shè)備。其次是為移動(dòng)設(shè)備打造的應(yīng)用程序。今年我致力于在年底前推出40款來(lái)自SAP的應(yīng)用。不過(guò)我們相信，其中許多應(yīng)用將來(lái)自一個(gè)類似于蘋果公司那樣的應(yīng)用生態(tài)系統(tǒng)——蘋果的許多應(yīng)用都不是蘋果造出來(lái)的。蘋果促進(jìn)了那些應(yīng)用，但它們是由別人打造出來(lái)的。我們即將推出的平臺(tái)包括了一個(gè)軟件研發(fā)工具箱，方便其他企業(yè)利用這個(gè)工具箱來(lái)自行開發(fā)移動(dòng)應(yīng)用。在三周內(nèi)我們就會(huì)推出這個(gè)平臺(tái)，并將它預(yù)聯(lián)到SAP世界中。我們的軟件開發(fā)工具包也允許其他人在這個(gè)平臺(tái)上打造移動(dòng)應(yīng)用。我認(rèn)為，在一兩年內(nèi)，就會(huì)有成千上萬(wàn)款移動(dòng)應(yīng)用從SAP平臺(tái)上誕生。

????《財(cái)富》：你是如何在SAP灌輸創(chuàng)新文化，并加快產(chǎn)品發(fā)布速度的？

????施杰翰：提出創(chuàng)新策略是一回事，但你必須要實(shí)現(xiàn)它。三年前我開始關(guān)注如何在軟件上進(jìn)行創(chuàng)新的問(wèn)題，我發(fā)現(xiàn)SAP的辦法是非常傳統(tǒng)的。我們先會(huì)確定制造一款新軟件，然后進(jìn)行編程，然后進(jìn)行測(cè)試，然后對(duì)第一批客戶進(jìn)行發(fā)布。這個(gè)流程要花費(fèi)15個(gè)月的時(shí)間。后來(lái)我觀察了一下移動(dòng)軟件界，發(fā)現(xiàn)移動(dòng)軟件的發(fā)布速度是以星期為單位，而不是以月為單位的。因此我們做了幾件事以改變這種情況。首先，我們組建了規(guī)模更小的精干團(tuán)隊(duì)，他們可以隨機(jī)應(yīng)變，不必請(qǐng)示管理層的決策。其次，我們一開始就讓他們與客戶進(jìn)行會(huì)談，而不是在最后才讓他們見客戶。而且我們采用了一種迭代的開發(fā)方式，每隔四個(gè)星期就會(huì)研發(fā)新的工作軟件。這種方法在業(yè)內(nèi)又稱“Scrum”，不過(guò)通常小企業(yè)才會(huì)使用這種辦法，而我們有14000名研發(fā)人員。

????《財(cái)富》：這些變革帶來(lái)了哪些成果？

????施杰翰：在改革的路上，我們大概已經(jīng)走了半程。我們的創(chuàng)新周期已經(jīng)從15個(gè)月下降到6至9個(gè)月。現(xiàn)在，我們已經(jīng)能通過(guò)更小型的團(tuán)隊(duì)，研發(fā)出比過(guò)去更好的產(chǎn)品。而且我們把客戶邀請(qǐng)到研發(fā)過(guò)程之中，客戶對(duì)此也非常興奮。我們花了一兩年的時(shí)間才達(dá)到了現(xiàn)在的效果。我們也可以再花兩年的時(shí)間進(jìn)一步進(jìn)行調(diào)整。

????《財(cái)富》：在轉(zhuǎn)型成為一家更敏捷、更迅速的公司的過(guò)程中，最艱難的部分是什么？

????施杰翰：對(duì)一家大公司進(jìn)行改革的難度，總是要大于小公司改革的難度。對(duì)于我們公司來(lái)說(shuō)，創(chuàng)新的潛能一直存在，我們只是在釋放這種潛能。不過(guò)由于我們過(guò)于官僚主義、過(guò)于程式化，因而員工有時(shí)被公司自身限制住了。因此我們正在著手取消這些繁文縟節(jié)，給予員工更多的權(quán)力。我們?cè)谶@個(gè)方向上做出轉(zhuǎn)變后，員工、客戶和合作伙伴給出正面反饋的速度之快，讓我十分驚訝。提出這一戰(zhàn)略只是改革的第一階段，不過(guò)對(duì)于我們來(lái)說(shuō)，最重要的是證明我們能執(zhí)行這一戰(zhàn)略。

????當(dāng)我們提出不僅要擴(kuò)展核心業(yè)務(wù)，而且要進(jìn)入這三個(gè)領(lǐng)域發(fā)展的口號(hào)時(shí)，對(duì)于我們來(lái)說(shuō)，重要的是在12個(gè)月內(nèi)就要顯示出我們的進(jìn)展，而且我們的確做到了這一點(diǎn)。在移動(dòng)業(yè)務(wù)上，我們收購(gòu)了賽貝斯公司。在云計(jì)算方面，我們?cè)谌ツ?月底推出了Business ByDesign，現(xiàn)在我們已經(jīng)有了兩個(gè)后續(xù)版本。在存儲(chǔ)計(jì)算上，我們?cè)谌ツ?1月底推出了（實(shí)時(shí)分析軟件）HANA。這些舉措已經(jīng)形成了一股勢(shì)頭。最艱難的部分僅僅是開頭。當(dāng)時(shí)很多人認(rèn)為SAP很龐大、很復(fù)雜，而且很“德國(guó)”。

????譯者：樸成奎

????SAP may be the world's largest enterprise software maker, but it suffers from a reputation of being slow and bureaucratic. That's why last year new management was brought in to help simplify the business and spur a culture of innovation. Co-chief executive officers Jim Hagemann Snabe and Bill McDermott have pledged to accelerate product releases and cut internal red tape. But their efforts haven't paid off for investors quite yet. Last Thursday the German company announced its operating profit rose 26% in the first quarter, failing to meet analysts' estimates and sending SAP's (SAP) stock down. At the same time, the company reiterated its forecast for full-year revenue to rise by 10% to 14%. I caught up with co-CEO Snabe at SAP's Palo Alto offices to find out how a focus on new technologies could help the company grow.

????Fortune: You talk about three categories of innovation at SAP. What are they?

????Snabe: There's mobile, where we see tremendous opportunity in bringing business content to mobile devices. The second category is cloud computing – the idea that you don't have to deal with the complexity of IT. We came up with an enterprise approach that lets you run your whole business in the cloud. This puts the bar very high on topics like security and reliability – some people would argue that we were late in this market but we wanted to solve these fundamental problems. The third category is memory computing. This is a technologically-driven innovation which challenges the assumption that data needs to be stored on disk. We are moving all data into the main memory of the computer.

????Fortune: On the mobile end, what has the [$5.8 billion] acquisition of Sybase resulted in? When will we see the fruits of the acquisition?

????Snabe: You'll see two categories of technology. One is the infrastructure itself -- the mobile middleware which enables you to connect to data and processes. The second piece is applications built for the mobile device. I committed to delivering 40 applications from SAP by end of the year, but we actually believe that many of them will come from an ecosystem like what you see from Apple, where a lot of the applications are not built by Apple (AAPL), they are facilitated by Apple and built by someone else. So the platform that we will deliver includes a software development kit so that companies can build their own mobile applications. In three weeks we're taking that platform and pre-connecting it to the SAP world. The SDK will allow others to build on top of that. My expectation is that in a couple of years there will be thousands of mobile applications on SAP.

????Fortune: What have you done to instill more of a culture of innovation and get new products out the door faster at SAP?

????Snabe: It's one thing to articulate an innovation strategy but you need to deliver on it. Three years ago I started looking at how we innovate software and found that SAP was very traditional in our approach. We would specify a new piece of software, then program it, then test it then launch it for the first customers. That process takes 15 months. But then I looked at the mobile world, where new things come out in weeks, not months. So we did a couple of things to change this. First, we made smaller teams that don't have to ask management for decisions. Second, we put them in the room with the customer from the beginning, not at the end. And we switched to an iterative approach where every four weeks we produce working software. This is a methodology known in the industry as Scrum, but it's typically used by small companies. We have 14,000 developers.

????Fortune: What kind of results have you seen from these changes?

????Snabe: We're about halfway through the transition. Our innovation cycles are down to six to nine months instead of 15 months. We see better products built by smaller teams than in the past. And customers are totally excited that we invite them in to be part of the process. We spent a couple of years getting to where we are now. We can do another two years of fine-tuning.

????Fortune: What is the hardest part of making this transition to a more nimble and quick company?

????Snabe: It always takes more effort to change a bigger company than a smaller company. In our case we are helped by the fact that we are unleashing a potential for innovation that was always there. But [employees] were somehow limited by ourselves because we were too bureaucratic and too structured. So we are taking structures away. We are empowering people. I was surprised by how fast employees, customers and partners gave us positive feedback on this new direction. The first phase was articulating the strategy. But the real moment for us was proving that we can execute the strategy.

????When we said we want to not only extend the core business, but go into these three areas, it was important for us that within 12 months we would show progress and we did that. In mobile we bought Sybase. In [cloud] we delivered Business ByDesign at the end of July and we're now two versions later. In memory computing we delivered [real time analytic software] HANA at the end of November. That's what's been building this momentum. The hardest part was just to get it started. There were a lot of assumptions that SAP was large, and complex, and German.