Why leo apotheker resigns from sap

The resignation, which was reportedly by mutual decision, is effective immediately. My Profile Log Out. Join Discussion.

Add Your Comment. Did he play well with the Board? Did he fully understand the difficult transition SAP needs to make right now to have a successful future? Good questions. There were missteps, for sure: The 'Olive Branch' to Larry Ellison re: Sun and European holdup that backfired ; the ill-advised "pledge" to get to 10, Business ByDesign customers by ; the maintenance embarrassment and flap with SUGEN ; and simply not having the ability to anticipate and act on the historic transformation happening in enterprise software, and why Big ERP is D.

But somebody at the top had to be out, right? Somebody had to be the fall guy, right? Somebody needed to be blamed for SAP's misfortunes, right? In many respects, I always felt like Apotheker's reign was similar to U. SAP raised maintenance fees for its customers by 5 percent when Apotheker took over as sole CEO in July after keeping rates stable for several years unlike rivals, which raise fees annually. SAP competes with companies such U. The company eventually backed down after clients complained and asked SAP for performance indicators by which to measure improvements that would justify an increase in maintenance fees.

The company in January reported sales of Despite the downturn, overall fourth-quarter sales and especially those from software-related services beat estimates from both the company and analysts. Operating margins for the full year also were better than expected.

SAP attributed the improvement in part to cost cuts and layoffs it had announced earlier in the year.