SAP PartnerEdge is the SAP ‟ s umbrella Partnership program that was originally developed for channel partners ( resellers ) and has been extended to all partner categories such as software partners and service partners . It consists of a tiered system with commitments and associated benefits : Associate , Silver , and Gold Advancement from one level to the next depends upon earning Value Points in two categories :
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Business performance and transactions – SAP license sales to new or current customers for channel partners and SAP software sales positively influenced by a Service partner in Large Enterprise Capability building – Submitting success stories or technology white papers , providing customer references , taking part in the SAP PartnerEdge P2P Network for business collaboration , adding trained and certified employees , taking higherlevel sales or technical exams , and more .
Service partners can specialise based on their value point in Industries and Solutions through Vertical and Special expertise Partnerships .
On the development side , SAP has an open ecosystem allowing software partners to integrate their solutions with SAP , and SAP then certifies these interfaces .
One step further are the Endorsed Business Solutions that fill in the white spots in the portfolio . There are higher requirements for integration , and a shared roadmap . SAP promotes the use of these solutions in its extensive client base ; in return SAP receives a fair percentage of the turnover .
The last category comprises Solution extensions : these are sold and supported by SAP . Examples are Open Text , Adobe , Streamserve . To be able to deliver solution extensions a company must have worldwide presence , 24 / 7 operations and considerable support and presales . In this case SAP receives more than half of the turnover .
Erast Wortel : “ The revenue from these solutions is a limited part of our turnover . We have no target to significantly expand it . The key of these partnerships is that business processes supported by SAP can be extended with functionality of partner products and therefore provide value and better integration for our customers and help us to compete in the best way .”
Creating cost advantages
Enlarging your customer relevance or developing a unique product yields durable competitive advantage . However , alliances can also be used to achieve cost advantages , though these are often easier to copy . In this paragraph we discuss three forms of alliances that are geared to costs : shared investment , reciprocal hiring agreements , and unusual supplier risk .
Shared investment
In some cases scale advantages can be achieved by jointly investing in means of production ; for example , two construction companies that decide to operate a cement factory together . Alternatively , parties may choose to merge a number of supporting activities such as administration , personnel affairs or ICT ( for companies with offices in a shared building ).
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