SAP, meet Force.com #socialenterprise

Image via CrunchBase

Last week salesforce.com launched a new campaign targeted at SAP customers: “Unlock your back office and become a social enterprise.” The message is clear – build a layer of agility around your legacy ERP system and immediately increase the business value of your existing investment.

SAP, meet Force.com…

How is this possible, you ask?

“By unlocking and extending the data trapped in your SAP ERP deployment with mobile and social apps built on Force.com.”

The campaign clearly highlights the benefits of establishing the right cloud integration strategy early. It also highlights specific cloud application integration and data management partners, which is nice to see.

Here’s a presentation outlining some of the considerations, best practices as well as an Informatica Cloud demonstration of SAP and Salesforce integration. I’ll also be hosting a webinar this week that will focus on Oracle EBS integration with salesforce.com. Clearly cloud integration is in the spotlight.

Salesforce and SAP Integration with Informatica Cloud

View more presentations from Darren Cunningham

Related articles

• ERP cloud wars – Vendor Innovation & Competition Will Benefit Businesses (zdnet.com)
• Oracle floats Fusion apps, puffs up public cloud (go.theregister.com)
• Backed by H-P, SAP Jumps On Cloud Bandwagon And Rides To $62 (forbes.com)

Data Integration in the Cloud (via Business Analytics 3.0)

This post provides a comprehensive overview of cloud integration use cases, options and approaches. It’s definitely worth reviewing if you’re interested in the topic.

The growing enterprise adoption of Salesforce SFA/CRM, Workday HR, Netsuite ERP, Oracle on Demand, Force.com for apps and Amazon Web Services for e-commerce will result in more fragmented enterprise data scattered across the cloud. Automating the moving, monitoring, securing and synchronization of data is no longer a “nice-to-have” but “must-have” capability. Data quality and integration issues — aggregating data from the myriad sources and servi … Read More

via Business Analytics 3.0

Informatica Marketplace Overview

Informatica recently announced that the Informatica Cloud Mall now includes 45 Informatica Cloud plug-ins, including Salesforce Chatter, Eloqua, Netsuite, Quickbooks SAP, TAM, Ticketmaster, TruckMate and Xactly. Here’s an overview of the Informatica Marketplace:

Related articles

• Informatica Cloud Summer 2011: Powering Hybrid IT (cloudintegration.wordpress.com)
• NetSuite, Informatica Team up on Two-tier ERP (pcworld.com)

Cloud Integration for Hybrid IT

Last week I posted a short video and some the coverage for the latest Informatica Cloud integration as a service release on the Informatica Perspectives Blog.

Here are a few videos highlighting some of the new functionality in the summer release:

Mission Critical Cloud Integration

Looking for an example of how cloud data integration can deliver both business and environmental impact? Check out this story: Informatica Cloud Helps RAE Systems Respond Quickly to Gulf Oil Spill. It’s also an example of a company that has the best of both worlds: Salesforce CRM integrated with Oracle ERP.

Speaking of the Best of Both Worlds, the billboards are all over San Francisco ahead of Oracle OpenWorld. Salesforce is also promoting their integration whitepaper.

Related Articles

• Top 10 hot topics at Oracle OpenWorld (infoworld.com)
• Will Oracle Buy Informatica Next? (nytimes.com)

Strategic Integration: 10 Business-Building Tips

Check out this great slideshow article by Loraine Lawson @ IT Business Edge: Strategic Integration: 10 Business-Building Tips. They are:

1. Think Big Picture Integration
2. Squeeze More Value from CRM & ERP Integration
3. Stop Bickering and Help
4. Stop Customers from Abandoning the Web Sale and the Company
5. Make Users More Efficient with Better Application Integration
6. Use MDM to Fix Spend Analysis
7. Address Integration: Pre-Merger and Acquisition
8. Ask the Right Questions to Find the Business Payoff
9. Explore New Technology Solutions
10. Innovate with Existing Tools

My advice? Turn it into a poster and put it on your wall/cube! And be sure to check out Loraine’s blog here.