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Robert Enslin, who joined SAP in 1992 and had served on its
board since 2014, had been tipped by some as a potential
successor to Chief Executive Bill McDermott.
During his two-year tenure as head of the cloud business group,
Enslin helped build out SAP's cloud portfolio including its $8
billion deal last year to buy Qualtrics, which specializes in
tracking online sentiment.
Enslin's exit follows other high-profile departures, including
Bjoern Goerke, chief technology officer and head of SAP's cloud
platform business, and Bernd Leukert, the board executive who
ran global service and support.
Programming guru Rich Heilman - who was highly respected in the
wider SAP developer ecosystem - has also left.
The departures underscore McDermott's long-stated ambition to
transform SAP into a digital platform business, but the exit of
long-serving and well-regarded staff with extensive know-how
also risks alienating the company's core customers.
SAP said in January around 4,400 people would leave under the
restructuring. Arch-rival Oracle has also announced layoffs and
some of its top talent has defected to Google.
SAP said board member Jennifer Morgan, who joined the company in
2004 and most recently co-led SAP's global customer operations,
would succeed Enslin as president of the cloud business group
with imminent effect.
Adaire Fox-Martin will take sole responsibility of global
customer operations as president.
SAP will report its financial results for the first quarter as
planned on April 24.
(Reporting by Caroline Copley and Douglas Busvine; Editing by
Mark Potter)
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