Apple today announced a new partnership with SAP to "revolutionize" the mobile work experience for its enterprise customers by combining native iPhone and iPad apps with the SAP HANA Cloud Platform. Under the partnership, Apple and SAP will create a new software development kit and training academy to help developers and enterprise customers create tailored business-focused iOS apps.
"This partnership will transform how iPhone and iPad are used in enterprise by bringing together the innovation and security of iOS with SAP's deep expertise in business software," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "As the leader in enterprise software and with 76% of business transactions touching an SAP system, SAP is the ideal partner to help us truly transform how businesses around the world are run on iPhone and iPad. Through the new SDK, we're empowering SAP's more than 2.5 million developers to build powerful native apps that fully leverage SAP HANA Cloud Platform and tap into the incredible capabilities that only iOS devices can deliver."
The new SAP HANA Cloud Platform SDK will be developed exclusively for iOS and will give enterprise customers simple tools for "quickly and efficiently" building apps for iPhone and iPad based on the SAP HANA Cloud Platform. According to the press release, the native apps will provide access to core data and business processes on SAP HANA while also taking advantage of Apple hardware features like Touch ID, Location Services, and Notifications.
Under the partnership, a new SAP Fiori iOS design language will be created, and SAP will also develop a suite of native iOS apps for "critical business operations" built on Apple's Swift programming language.
