Emerging countries like India will play a key role in its target to sign one lakh customers globally by 2010, says business software major SAP AG. The company also affirmed plans to invest $1 billion in the country over the next few years.

Briefing reporters here, on Tuesday, SAP CEO & Executive Board Chairman Henning Kagermann said, “We plan to increase our customer base to one lakh by 2010 globally and we will aggressively expand small and medium-sized customer segment as well as emerging markets.”

Mr Kagermann, who is here along with the entire SAP Board for its first meeting in India, said the company has doubled the total customer base in India to 2,000 in just a year. In comparison, it had taken nine years to enrol the first 1,000 clients, he added.

Robust growth

“Today, Indian SMEs are as aggressive in their business outlook as their large counterparts and demand enterprises solutions that are powerful and robust enough to handle strong growth,” SAP Deputy CEO Leo Apotheker said.

The company, which had in August last year announced $1 billion of investment over five years, on Tuesday, reaffirmed its commitment to India, stating that the country would remain a priority in SAP’s scheme of things.
“SAP Labs India is today the largest research and development hub and support presence for us outside Germany,” Kagermann added.

SAP also announced expanding its partnership with Wipro. Wipro will be a SAP global services partner and establish a solutions lab in Bangalore to showcase the benefits of industry best practices.