Where do new ideas come from? Startups and developers prove persuasive channels for innovation, according to Camilla Dahlen.

The VP of ISV, cloud and OEM North America Partnerships at SAP SE, spoke with John Furrier (@furrier) and Peter Burris (@plburris), cohosts of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, at the recent SAP Sapphire 2016 event in Orlando, FL. This week we are highlighting Dahlen for our Women in Tech spotlight because of her determination to help the technology sector innovate and become successful in the enterprise. Partners are key to this success, and she outlines some promising developments happening in iOS and SAP’s own platform, HANA.

Her program explained

“Our organization works with partners to help them to enter the digital world. They can take existing partners with existing business and extend those products or platforms that they have, move them to the cloud using the HANA Cloud Platform or HANA on premise, and add new functionality that’s required for their various markets. And they can do that quickly and safely.”

Startups add flavor

“Another idea (involves) startups. So they can build and develop and extend into SAP applications or develop something completely different and unique on HANA Cloud Platform supported by SAP. And we have great examples at SAP Sapphire this year. We have multiple partners that are here talking about showcasing their solutions that they built on HANA and HANA Cloud platform.”

Partner success is SAP success

“Our organization works full circle with our partners. We start by identifying where the market opportunity is or is there an idea and that idea can completely stand alone. It has nothing to do with SAP, or it can be a way to extend an SAP application or solution into a new industry or into the cloud, etc. We develop a business plan for our partners, and we work with them on a go-to-market and the live launch of the actual solution, as well as ongoing go-to-market and technical support. So we are really partners with them. Their success is our success.”

SAP on the periphery of a project

In regards to helping customers with success through the HANA Cloud Platform, she said: “There are a few different ways to look at that; there are HANA Cloud customers that use the platform to extend their own business. Everybody customizes their solution for their particular needs. That would not be part of what we do. However, some companies may want to offer an extension of a subscription service to the market as a whole we can get involved in that kind of scenario.”

An Apple opportunity

“We think we are going to see a whole new set of developers now developing iOS solutions and extensions for SAP software or completely new products. We are going to be delivering an iOS SDK on the cloud platform that they can use to extend out into these mobile applications. So we expect our ecosystem to grow exponentially.

“I think we are going to see a lot of new solutions we haven’t even thought of yet that will also be available. We will enable them. So we will provide the technology, the platform, the tool set as well as regular training and enablement to take that to market.”

The thrill of innovation

“We have so many partners, more partners than we’ve ever had before with really new and cool solutions. I attend some of the presentations and demonstrations that are doing and its full. It’s packed. So I see lots of excitement around that area.”

Watch the video below to hear more from Camilla, who spoke to theCUBE at SAP Sapphire 2016 with co-guest Jeff Thurston, director pf ISV, cloud and platform partnerships at SAP.

Photo by SiliconANGLE