Anaplan wants to be the ‘P’ in ERP: Page 2 of 2

The growth agenda
 
The company’s immediate plan is focused on expanding its footprint across the globe, with Samir sharing that the company is targeting to grow it’s revenue by more than US$200 million by the end of 2014.
 
It is currently present in six markets in Europe and by mid-year, aims to expand into another four to six markets on the continent.
 
Within Asia, the business is also expanding its footprint rapidly, with a presence in Singapore, Thailand, Australia and Malaysia with plans to establish itself in Japan and Hong Kong by the end of this year.
 
In line with its regional plans, in late February, the company announced the appointment of Ganapathy Sirgunavel (pic) as managing director for Malaysia and Thailand.
 
Ganapathy was previously from Oracle, where he was the senior director and country manager for Malaysia, responsible for Oracle Applications’ line of business.
 
Prior to that, he was the head of SAP’s Large Enterprise division, overseeing SAP’s sales management to large enterprises and government-linked companies in Malaysia.
 
“When I first saw how Anaplan empowers companies to plan, collaborate and act in real-time, I knew this was the way forward for businesses. In today’s ever complex and rapid business environment, C-level executives and board members need a high-level dashboard view of their organizational health.
 
“I am excited to be part of this disruptive company and welcome the opportunity to expand Anaplan’s market position and champion the innovation in this region,” said Sirgunavel, in a statement issued by the company.
 
Samir said that the decision to invest in Malaysia was a strategic one for the company, the “first step” toward building out toward the enterprise market in South-East Asia.
 
With plans to grow, he also shared that the company is already in discussions with MDeC to base its development centre for Asia in the country.
 
Samir added that most business decisions are still made based on spreadsheets from plans, demand forecasts to cash flow planning.
 
“That’s a tremendous amount of Excel usage, and one key reason for why Anaplan is attractive to enterprises are issues related to the quality of data during the input phase,” he said.
 
The company believes that it can help customers leverage all the benefits of its solutions within the enterprise resource planning (ERP) sphere.
 
“We can be the ‘P’ in ERP. For some reason the planning element of business tends to be forgotten,” noted Samir.
 
When asked what tips he would offer to chief information officers (CIOs), tasked with future proofing their tech investments, Samir had this to share:

• No software company is developing any code to offer on-premise anymore. So when buying software, always buy cloud software that is going to be in continual development with product roadmaps.
• Don't buy any software that cannot be deployed on mobility devices and always look at the mobile capabilities of software without too much middleware for deployment.
• Look at the most agile software out there in terms of implementation and deployment. This reduces total cost of ownership for end customers and also enhances the capabilities of CIOs to support the business in the future.

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