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By Gina Roos

SAP AG has selected Ingram Micro to help expand its enterprise mobility solutions in the small- and midsize-business market by leveraging Ingram Micro Mobility’s large base of SMB businesses and broad VAR channel in North America.

“We believe their broad and deep VAR channel, as well as experience in working closely with many mobile suppliers, will help drive SAP solutions further into the SMB market,” said Adam Stein, senior director, Mobile Product Marketing, SAP. “SMBs are important to SAP’s long-term growth strategy and its goal of doubling our addressable market and reaching 1 billion people by 2015.”

Approximately two-thirds of SAP’s and Sybase’s 230,000 customers are SMBs, with the majority of those customers coming through partners and other channels, said Stein.

Under the agreement, Ingram Micro Mobility’s VAR channel will have access to the SAP mobile platform, which includes the SAP Afaria mobile-device management solution and portfolio of more than 300 mobile apps. These apps support tasks ranging from simple productivity to complex transactions across 24 different industries, using mobile devices that run on a variety of operating systems, including iOS, Android, Windows and BlackBerry.

The SAP apps will be available on-demand to the VAR community and end customers through the Ingram Micro distribution model. The two companies expect the relationship to benefit VARs and users by providing a cost-effective enterprise-class mobile solution for SMBs, which will help them improve their productivity.

“The SAP mobile platform is the market leader in EMM [enterprise mobility management] and is the best platform for VARs to add on mobile services,” Stein claimed. “With 40 percent of SAP’s total software revenue coming from partners and SAP’s nine consecutive quarters of double-digit growth, the opportunity for VARs and mobile productivity gains for their enterprise customers is enormous.”

End customers also will benefit. “The mobile revolution is affecting enterprises of all sizes, and SAP recognizes that SMBs stand to benefit from securely mobilizing their workforces,” said Stein. “SMBs are experiencing many of the same things that are driving the need for mobile management in enterprises, like employees using their personal apps and devices for work.”

Gina Roos, a contributing writer for Channel Insider, specializes in technology and the channel.