SAP, the German enterprise-software firm whose name stands for System Applications and Products in Data Processing, has frozen most new hiring and paused non-essential travel to redirect spending toward artificial intelligence, as chief executive Christian Klein forecasts a 'very, very different' workforce within a few years.
The plan reached staff in an internal email on the evening of Wednesday, 2 July. Bloomberg, which reviewed the memo, said the executive board at Europe's largest software company told employees that new recruitment would be limited almost entirely to core AI roles. Internal travel unrelated to AI development was placed on hold, and the German group said it would look to cut spending with suppliers.
