SAP Expands Public Sector Reach and Gains Ground With State of Louisiana

BATON ROUGE, La. and MILWAUKEE, Wis. - SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) today announced that the state of Louisiana has selected SAP to run all of its financial and procurement business processes. The deal marks a strategic win over competitors Oracle and CGI, while building on SAP’s momentum in U.S. public sector. The announcement was made at the National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO) 2008 Annual Conference in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The theme of this year’s conference is “A Focus on the Enterprise: Driving Efficiency and Innovation.”

The state of Louisiana retains 50,000 employees and oversees $8 billion in procurement each year. The SAP software will be deployed throughout the entire state, with the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (LADOTD) as a key project participant. The compelling event driving Louisiana’s search was LADOTD’s potential risk for accurately matching federal highway funds with its existing IT system. The state of Louisiana therefore conducted a thorough search to find a solution with the depth and breadth necessary to meet and exceed its challenges. The state’s intensive search ended with the SAP® ERP Financials solution, the SAP® Procurement for Public Sector package and the SAP® Service and Asset Management solution.

“Based on the robustness of its comprehensive product offering while providing the lowest total cost of ownership, SAP is a key solution provider that can adapt to our constantly changing needs,” said Edward Driesse, chief information officer for the state of Louisiana. “Not only does SAP provide a 360-degree view of state finances and operations, it offers tight integration with our SAP ERP Human Capital Management functionality as well.”

“Efficiency and innovation are increasingly important for state governments in order to make informed and well-founded decisions,” said Patrick Bakey, president, SAP Public Services, Inc. “We are honored that the state of Louisiana has selected SAP as a partner for this purpose.”

The implementation of the software has already started; the project is currently in the blueprint phase.