SAP sees a silver lining to Brexit
The software giant says geopolitical upheaval, especially the UK’s planned exit from the EU, will boost rather than hinder future growth
Berlin — Software giant SAP said on Tuesday that Brexit and geopolitical upheaval would boost rather than hinder future growth as it upped sales and profit targets for the next few years. SAP, the German Dax index’s biggest company by market capitalisation, said demand for its cloud services in a changing world would provide the bulk of coming growth. The company made the forecast as it released its 2016 results, which showed net profit at €3.6bn, up 18% on 2015’s figure, as revenues grew 6% to €22bn. In a conference call on Tuesday, CEO Bill McDermott disagreed with analysts’ fears that geopolitical turbulence, especially Brexit, could lower corporate spending on IT. "Public or private sector entities, they are going to need digital transformation to handle new processes and new outcomes" in a changing world, he said. In a separate statement, McDermott pointed to "strong software sales, fast cloud growth and operating income expansion" as factors giving him "enormous confidence in ...
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