Eursap's Ask-the-SAP-Expert – Pierre Col

Eursap's Ask-the-SAP-Expert – Pierre Col.

This month, we feature Pierre Col. Pierre is based in France and has a very long history at SAP. His broad IT experience spans over 40 years and he has been involved in IT start-ups right through to corporate giants. His expertise in the SAP area lies in the areas of SAP Build and the SAP Business Technology Platform. Pierre has a huge 25,000 strong following on LinkedIn and despite officially retiring this year, he just can’t stay away, with investments in three start-ups in the last 1-2 years alone.

1. Hi Pierre, thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us. Normally recently retired people have some time on their hands, but you seem to be busier than ever! For our readers who do not know you, would you be able to give us a quick overview of yourself and your background?

Sure! 

I was born in 1963, and I was 15-year-old when I put my hands on a computer for the very first time. Indeed, in 1978 one of my uncles who had a hi-fi shop in Grenoble went into selling the very first micro-computers, imported from the US. I was in high school and after classes I was in his shop, learning how to code in Z80 assembler. Then I discovered BASIC programming on TRS-80 and Apple II…

In the early '80s I learned Computing Science in Toulouse for 3 years, graduating as an engineer with a major in Artificial Intelligence. At that time, I experienced coding Expert Systems in programming languages such as LISP and Prolog II…

Then, 40 years ago, in August 1986, I started working at Infogrames as a developer and project manager for a small vendor developing Unix-based software for Minitel servers. After a few years I moved to pre-sales and customer enablement roles and finally fell into the dark side 😉 of marketing and communications, with various roles in software and Internet services for the last 30 years.

2. You started writing code in C for Minitel services at Infogrames back in 1986. That's a long way from SAP BTP. How do you reflect on that journey when you look back at it as a whole?

It has been quite a journey indeed! I’ve been very lucky to be involved in the IT sector from the early adopters’ time to the AI era we see today. The evolution of the AI industry has been incredible, with technology waves reshaping the way companies are operating: the personal computer in the 1990s, the Internet in the 2000s, the cloud in the 2010s and the AI in the 2020s. Having been part of this industry during these four decades was extremely interesting, because I really love learning new things… and sometimes challenging.

3. Contextor was acquired by SAP in 2018, which brought you into the SAP world. Was joining a corporate giant after years in smaller, agile companies a culture shock?

It was not really a shock, because the onboarding process has been very well driven and all our new colleagues have been very kind. I would like to thank my first manager at SAP, Sebastian Schrötel, who was leading the SAP Intelligent RPA team: he took great care to ensure that everyone could find the role that suited them best within the new SAP team. Of course, in such big companies there are a lot of rules and processes you have to follow and comply with, but the teams I worked in, from SAP Intelligent RPA to SAP Build, were quite agile.

4. You moved from RPA at Contextor into SAP Intelligent RPA, then into SAP Build and BTP more broadly. How did you see that product story evolve from the inside?

Contextor was acquired for the RPA technology we had, which accelerated the release of SAP Intelligent RPA. At that time, we were part of SAP Leonardo area, also with AI, as SAP acquired another French startup, Recast.AI, to create SAP Conversational AI, and we already worked together before both companies were acquired, Contextor six months after Recast.AI. Many product teams reached out to us to figure out how RPA could improve their own products, and we had very good internal cooperations, especially with the S/4HANA product team which developed a lot of RPA bots around the cloud ERP to ease the lives of their customers.

In 2021 we had a big move, SAP Intelligent RPA becoming the Process Automation component of SAP Build, alongside SAP Build Apps for low-code/no-code app development, SAP Build Work Zone for creating unified workspaces, and later SAP Build Code for pro-code app development. It was meaningful, and we have seen many customers who were using one of the components of the SAP Build “suite” adopting the others.

5. Nearly four decades in marketing and communications across internet, telecoms, and enterprise software gives you an almost unique outlook on the development of the IT landscape. What's the one thing that never changes, no matter how much the technology does? 

I do think that what does not change is how people react and adapt to changes. Some people are enthusiastic, sometimes too enthusiastic in the beginning, when the new technology does not fully deliver the expected benefits yet, and some people are afraid of the changes and reluctant to adopt what’s coming. That’s why the introduction of a new technology should always be driven by showing the outcomes for the business and for the employees. That is why I’ve spent a lot of time in supporting the release of customer stories clearly showing what the technology brings, without marketing fluff: examples here and here for SAP Intelligent RPA.

6. You've worked with startups, scale-ups, and a global enterprise like SAP. Where did you learn the most, and where was it hardest? 

I learned a lot in many different circumstances: in small companies you can be very reactive and proactive, which makes it possible to develop and release a new feature in a few days, and it’s great! 

But when you work at SAP, you realize how big the customer base is, and you measure that if the new release of your software has a bug, it could put a lot of customers in big trouble. So, you understand why there are so many rigid processes and compliance rules in big companies. 

7. You were CMO at Contextor when it got acquired by SAP. What did that M&A process teach you that you couldn't have learned any other way?

I discovered that big companies are ecosystems: as a team and as an individual, you have to develop your own business network with other teams and colleagues within the company to support the internal adoption of your product.

Like many colleagues at SAP, I experienced a lot of product rebrandings and reorganizations: it can be very disturbing, especially for young colleagues, but I haven’t been pretty harmed 😉  

8. Low-code/no-code was a big part of your brief at SAP. Has the reality lived up to the promise for SAP customers, or has it been oversold? 

I really believe the low-code/no-code promise was not oversold: when AppGyver was acquired to create SAP Build Apps, they already had a wide customer base, and their clients were really creating apps without coding. 

Let me tell you a story: we did an internal workshop with SAP Build Apps in our communications teams. My colleagues, mostly young ladies who had never coded in their lives, were able to create an entire customer loyalty application, with a mobile front-end for the end customer and a back-office as an ERP extension. All of this in four hours!

And now it is going way further, with generative AI able to code applications from scratch. But it has to be done carefully, under the supervision of experienced software architects and developers to fully comply with the IT rules and best practices within the company.

9. AI is now central to everything SAP is doing. As someone who lived through several waves of enterprise tech hype, how confident are you that this one is different? 

Yes, I truly believe that this AI wave which started 3 years will have a bigger impact on the way we work. 

On one hand, I'm impressed how well SAP is positioned on the market and how powerful SAP AI is.

On the other hand, I'm more and more worried by the impact humanoid robots and AI, from SAP and all vendors, will have on so many jobs everywhere.

In December 2025 I’ve shared my views on this topic in a blog post on SAP Community: “How far will AI go... and what will it mean for your job? ”. Feel free to read it and to bring your comments!

10. What's your honest assessment of where SAP BTP is headed, and what would you change about the strategy if you could? 

First, it was SAP Cloud Platform, then it was SAP Business Technology Platform, and now SAP Business AI Platform. These evolutions in the names follow the strategy: at SAP, cloud software is provided for the sake of customers' business, and it helps customers adopt AI everywhere. They need it in order to be more efficient and run better (you remember the motto? 😉), on the path to the autonomous enterprise if it makes sense for them.

Honestly, I share the vision and I would not change the strategy.  

11. You took early retirement in April 2025. Was that a difficult decision, and what finally made it the right moment? 

It was not really a difficult decision, because the perspective of being paid 80% of your salary for not working during 18 months, before fully retiring, is extremely attractive. But I had mixed feelings for sure, because I was working in a great team, with very nice colleagues. I’m still in touch with most of them… even if the team was dismantled in the last reorganization mid-2025, which led me to think that it was effectively the right time to leave. 

12. You've already invested in three startups since retiring. Is that your way of staying connected to the world of work, or is it something else entirely?

Yes, somehow it is. And if I can help with my experience, I’m happy to do so!

13. You're backing electric bikes, classic car models, and a radio station. That’s quite a mix. What draws you to those particular ventures, and do you miss the enterprise tech world at all?

In fact, I invested in companies founded by people I already knew, and who have a strong track record of launching new businesses. I also chose the projects because of the product/market fit, in markets I’m personally interested in.

14. Finally, our favourite question: What advice would you give to SAP consultants who are trying to build skills and stay relevant over the next five years?

My advice is simple: always be curious, and learn continuously!

And I think it is particularly relevant now, with AI: indeed, SAP launched “Joule for Consultants”, which brings guidance from SAP's up-to-date knowledge base. The purpose is to make consultants more productive with very relevant AI assistance, and from what I see from early adopters, it works.

So, give it a try and let us know!