We had the opportunity to attend SAP Ariba's user conference in Ariba Live, held in Las Vegas at Ceasar's Palace from March 5th till 8th 2018. The conference saw record attendance, it had to move from the Cosmopolitan.
Don't want to read - but prefer to watch - here is a short video (if it does not show up - please check here)
And here is the 1 Slide summary from Slideshare:
Prefer to read - here is my 5 Tweet event sequence on Twitter:
MyPOV
A good event for Ariba. Progress on product, a new UX is always positive. Short on new announcements, capabilties - but that's the usual 'lull' with an executive transition. Padgett seems to get started and the next quarters will be important, next year's Ariba Live will be the full record card.
On the concern side, SAP Ariba did not talk and show as much AI / ML and Blockchain that it talked about in 2017. Though the contract text analysis in the partnership with IBM has been delivered, it is not the broad uptake the technology needs in Procurement. Did anybody say software agents?
But for now, a good event. The mix or more soft / feel good topics vs. product and customer news is new - and I am very curious to talk more to customers, prospects and partners to see how it was accepted. Stay tuned.
