German technology company that more or less invented enterprise resource planning (ERP) in the 1970s. As of mid-2025 it is Europe's most valuable company, worth $380bn.
Roughly nine in ten Fortune 500 firms rely on SAP. Its systems cover a wide range of back-office functions—finances, supply chains, human resources—and contain data that is notoriously hard for non-SAP systems to extract. Its share of the ERP business fell from 21% in 2020 to 14% in 2024, according to Gartner, as rivals like Workday gained ground.
SAP has expanded into front-office territory by acquiring CRM firms (CallidusCloud) and marketing platforms (Emarsys). In February 2025 it teamed up with Databricks, a $60bn AI startup, to help clients deploy its Joule AI agents. Irfan Khan is its data-and-analytics chief.
On January 29th 2026 SAP said it expected a "slight deceleration" in its cloud-based software business in 2026. Its share price plummeted by 15%, dragging down other enterprise-software stocks including Salesforce, ServiceNow and Workday.
Like Salesforce, SAP relies on hyperscaler cloud providers rather than building its own data centres. It does, however, offer a fully sovereign cloud option for selected national governments, with security-vetted personnel and data kept in Europe. Christian Klein is its chief executive.
British education is probably the best in the world, if you can survive it. If you can't there is nothing left for you but the diplomatic corps.