Vishal Sikka is a member of the executive board of business software giant SAP AG and heads the technology and innovation areas in the company. He is responsible for the company?s technology platform and products, including database, application platform and middleware, collaboration, business analytics and search. He is also in-charge for the development of new products and business. Sikka was in India recently and took time off to talk to Goutam Das on the demand for business software in an uncertain macro climate, SAP?s technology bets and the firm?s performance in India. Excerpts:

How do you view the demand environment for business software?

We are seeing very strong interest in our software, both in our existing customer base and from new ones. We are the beneficiaries of an overarching trend, which points out that more and more physical institutions, structures and layers are being replaced by information. For instance, books are being replaced by information. If you are an existing customer of SAP, then being able to non-disruptly renew existing products as well as surround them with new innovation, especially in the areas of mobility and cloud computing or in the area of in-memory technology, is an incredibly powerful proposal. New customers see a consistent core in our business suite and we surround that with fundamental innovations.

In our markets, we are outperforming our competition. Overall, I see quite a positive environment. Of course, the macro environment can change and there is uncertainty over the economic situation in the world. But as a technologist, I am an optimist.

How has your in-memory platform (HANA) done globally and in India?

HANA has delivered the fastest revenue growth of any product in our history; also, the fastest pipeline growth of any product in our history. It has been received incredibly well by our customers. Countries such as Japan, China, US, Germany, Brazil and Mexico have adopted HANA extremely well. We have many customers in each of these countries. In India, it could have done a little better than expected. Overall, we have customers in single digits in India. Even though I launched it here and my heart is here, India is not at the forefront. I think it could be because of lack of understanding or lack of awareness. We have demonstrated it to many customers now and I think this will change. HANA is one of those ground breaking technologies that gives a tremendous competitive advantage to companies (the platform can query multiple types of data sources in real time, at very high speeds). If you can close your books two days earlier than your competition, it is tremendous business value.

How has SAP progressed in cloud computing?

We expect cloud to pervade in many dimensions, in many aspects of our business. Last year, we released Business ByDesign, which is a mid-market suite. But we have been doing work in other areas of cloud. We have put Business One, our small business software on the cloud. We are doing large enterprise on-demand applications and most importantly, today, we have business intelligence on-demand.

In terms of the technology roadmap, what can we expect from SAP in the next one year?

The roadmap is multi-faceted and is continuously growing. The most exciting things are in new applications. We are building new applications which were not possible before. This is possible now because of in-memory technology and the combination of in-memory, cloud and mobility. Then, there is the evolution of all our ongoing technology products such as business intelligence. We are doing amazing work in end-user empowerment, in our middleware products.

You are on the board of SAP. How does the company view India? Is the board happy with the growth story in India?

India, both as a market and as a development centre, is extremely strategic to SAP. It is one of my endeavours to make sure that this is the case. We have 5,000 people in our labs in Bangalore and Gurgaon. We have long moved past the cost thing. India has been a strategic development centre for a while. But now, we want to make India an innovation centre. I want to unleash the power of our creativity and intelligence to innovate. In terms of sales, it can always be better. But we have been growing remarkably here.