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SAP swapped some costly AI models for cheaper ones, its CFO told Reuters. It bills per task, so savings can lift profit.

Dominik Asam, SAP's chief financial officer, told Reuters the company had replaced some of its most expensive models where cheaper ones performed as well, ERP Today reported on 6 November.

ERP LEADERS news desk · · First reported by ERP Today · Edition no. 61
Photo: Lear 21/Wikimedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 · original

Asam said SAP increasingly picks the cheapest model that can do a task to the required standard.

Customers pay for completed tasks rather than the computing behind them, so a cheaper model can improve SAP's profitability. The report does not say whether the price per task changes. The company expects the changes to contribute to more than €2 billion in AI-driven efficiency gains.

Customers do not choose the model inside SAP's own features. SAP provides access to more than 70 models, from providers including OpenAI, Anthropic and Google. Asam said buyers increasingly ask where a model comes from and whether their data could "end up in places where it shouldn't end up."

SAP plans its Enterprise AI Gateway, which tracks and audits AI traffic, for the first quarter of 2027.

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For your next steering committee

Questions for your own programme. They are not findings about any company in this story.

  1. 1Ask which AI tools already touch your ERP or finance data, including the ones nobody approved.
  2. 2Ask what each tool is allowed to change, and who reviews what it changed.
  3. 3Ask how the result is measured, and who decides to switch a tool off.

Issue 01 of the ERP LEADERS brief puts a timeline, the three-number review and six questions on one page. Read issue 01

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