More Than 200 Customers Have Taken “Safe Passage” to SAP

More Than 200 Customers Have Taken “Safe Passage” to SAP
Customers Migrate Away From Uncertainty During Program’s First Year


WALLDORF, Germany - March 20, 2006 - SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) today announced that more than 200 companies have taken advantage of the Safe Passage program to migrate away from the uncertainties arising out of Oracle’s acquisition of PeopleSoft, JD Edwards, Siebel and Retek. These results provide further evidence of SAP’s growing leadership position in providing enterprise solutions to companies of all sizes. Since the program’s introduction in January 2005, companies around the globe have utilized the Safe Passage program as a means to secure long-term IT investment security and gain access to market-leading solutions.

Among those companies that have made the move to market-leading SAP® solutions are: Altana Chemie AG, Areva T&D India, Arizona Electric Power Cooperative, Inc., AXA, Bilcare, CLLS, Diesel, Foodstuffs South Island, GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals, Holland Casino, Riddell Bell, Rotkäppchen GmbH, Swiss Army Brands, Thakral, Twit Wing, UniLab, Veka AG, Waste Management, Winkhaus Data GmbH, Ya.com and YAZAKI Europe Limited.

The Safe Passage program offers companies SAP solutions, technology, maintenance services, investment protection and a clear road map to the next generation of business software. The program includes immediate access to the SAP NetWeaver® platform to help customers simplify integration of applications and, when customers are ready, migration to other SAP solutions such as mySAP™ ERP, the market-leading enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution.

“Customers of all sizes, competing in a cross section of industries have one consistent requirement: they want to innovate and grow their businesses,” said Léo Apotheker, member of the executive board, SAP AG. “The overwhelming success of our Safe Passage program serves as tangible evidence that customers are abandoning their legacy solutions and confidently selecting SAP to run their businesses without the risk of interruption. This is especially true in the enterprise software marketplace, which is experiencing an unprecedented amount of industry consolidation, coupled with the promise of rationalizing disparate software code.”

SAP said that customers cite the strength and availability of SAP business solutions and technology for their industries, the SAP commitment to their business goals, and solid vision and strategy as the top reasons for making the move to SAP:

Foodstuffs (South Island) Limited
Foodstuffs South Island Limited will transition away from its existing J.D. Edwards legacy applications for financial management, under the terms of Safe Passage.

“Our current IT landscape for wholesale and retail is mainly supported by in-house systems that have been developed over a number of years in conjunction with a J.D. Edwards financial solution that has been in place for 15 years,” said Phil Wright, general manager of Information Technology, Foodstuffs (South Island) Limited. “A strategic review identified that we required more integrated data across our organization, and a fully integrated ERP platform was the best option. The SAP solution suite will allow us to optimise business processes and leverage industry-specific capabilities which are designed to lead to greater business benefits and IT support benefits. This strategy is intended to deliver full supply chain visibility, improve our ability to collaborate with suppliers and improve the information systems that support our owner/operators.”

Holland Casino
As the only legal casino-operator in the Netherlands, Holland Casino runs twelve national casinos. Holland Casino’s IT-landscape consisted of PeopleSoft solutions for human resources (HR), enterprise performance management and finance, as well as several other legacy systems. Payroll was executed by means of a lot of customizations in the PeopleSoft payroll interface. When PeopleSoft was taken over by Oracle, Holland Casino decided to replace its solutions in the areas of finance, HR as well as payroll. Of these systems, HR, including payroll, was considered most critical due to its comparatively high complexity.

After evaluating options including SAP and Oracle on the basis of their key selection criteria: trust, sound vision, market power, reliability and functionality; Holland Casino decided that SAP applications for HR, payroll and finance were the best choice. Holland Casino also decided to replace its existing hard-coded interface with SAP NetWeaver® Exchange Infrastructure.

“We were very impressed by SAP’s sound vision and trustworthiness,” said Gijs Houtzagers, program manager, Holland Casino. “At the solution level, we were very pleased that we were able to not only migrate rather easily from PeopleSoft but actually improve and standardize processes at the same time, especially the payroll process. No other vendor could have come close to providing the levels of functionality and stability right out of the box. Last but not least, participating in the Safe Passage program made the transition to SAP for us very attractive from a financial point of view.”

Riddell Bell
Riddell Bell Holdings is a midsize business in the equipment, sports accessories and team sales markets in the United States and internationally. The company was formed more than a year ago through the marriage of three brand leaders in the head protection and sporting accessories sector of the consumer products market: Riddell, Bell and Giro. With manufacturing both internally owned and externally managed, Riddell Bell has a sophisticated and challenging business environment to manage.

Riddell Bell needed an IT platform and business solutions to grow and manage its business. After evaluating the alternatives, the decision was made to host applications including mySAP ERP, supply chain planning, SAP Apparel and Footwear (SAP AFS), CRM sales and service, financials and analytics.

“Business growth by acquisition had created a heterogeneous business process and systems environment,” said Sharon Nelson, CIO of Riddell Bell. “The breadth of our undertaking spans from design, to manufacturing, to distribution, sales and service, global trade, and partner management. In order to serve our customers with speed, excellence and purpose, we elected to standardize our business and technical environment through deployment of SAP.”

About Safe Passage
Safe Passage programs from SAP are comprehensive offerings from SAP addressing the concerns of Oracle customers of all sizes facing the uncertainties of the end of life of Oracle, PeopleSoft, JD Edwards, Siebel and Retek solutions. The elements of Safe Passage programs include: access to SAP’s best-in-class enterprise resource planning (ERP) and other market-leading solutions; financial protection for a customer’s existing investment in Oracle EBS, PeopleSoft, JD Edwards, Siebel Systems and Retek; SAP Financing options; immediate integration benefits through the SAP NetWeaver® platform; and migration support services. In addition, third-party maintenance for certain PeopleSoft and JD Edwards solutions is available through SAP subsidiary TomorrowNow and SAP’s network of channel partners focused on small and midsize enterprises