KUALA LUMPUR, 22 MAY 2009 – Malaysia-based consulting firm Vantage Point Consulting (Vantage) has announced Asia Pacific’s first SAP-based on-demand solution.
Vantage chief executive officer Rahim Osman said the on-demand model is a first in Asia Pacific and was to help chief executives looking for new ways to optimise cost management during the economic downturn. “Business owners can then stay focused on their core business values to innovate and deliver refined products and services while outsourcing the operational functions.”
"The recent economic crunch could not have come at a more opportune time to develop ways to ride out the current global economic woes,” said Osman. “In conjunction with this, Vantage releases its latest offering—Service beyond Software—or commonly known as software-as-a-service (SaaS), whereby a provider licenses an application solution to customers for use as a service on demand.”
Established in 1997, SAP services partner Vantage now has more than 30 major projects through its services. Clients include Telekom Malaysia, Permodalan Nasional (PNB), Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC), Mimos, Proton Holdings, Takaful Malaysia and Perbadanan Putrajaya. Vantage is an associate company of HeiTech Padu, a public listed company on the main board of Bursa Malaysia Securities Exchange.
In December 2007 Malaysia Venture Capital (MAVCAP), a government-backed venture capitalist acquired a stake in Vantage. The proceeds of the funding will be used to grow Vantage business globally.
In line with IDC
Osman said this move is in line with analyst firm IDC’s Top 10 Predictions of the IT services market for Malaysia. “One of the predictions is that SaaS would make greater strides in Malaysia in 2009 due to the changing market dynamics. Trying times such as this will be a push factor for organisations to adopt the SaaS model because of its low upfront cost compared with traditional licensing.”
“SAP applications and data are hosted remotely which includes infrastructure and connectivity,” said Osman. “All you need is an Internet connection. It is fundamentally different from traditional software deployment as the Service beyond Software model presents significant efficiency and cost-saving advantages to customers.”
