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The Data War: SAP vs. Celonis Lawsuit Explained
In a high-stakes battle over customer business data, German process mining leader Celonis is taking on enterprise software giant SAP in a lawsuit filed on Monday. The conflict centers around who controls access to business data and highlights the growing importance of process mining technology in business operations.
What’s Process Mining?
First, let’s understand what process mining is. Imagine you’re a secret agent trying to figure out how a business works. Process mining is like having a magical tool that highlights all of the hidden pathways and bottlenecks.
In more technical terms, process mining analyzes event log data from business systems to show how processes function in reality rather than how they were designed to work. For example, when a pharmaceutical giant used process mining, they discovered more than 30,000 different variations for what should have been a standardized process.
The Adversaries
Celonis: This Munich, Germany-based, company pioneered commercial process mining software. Valued at $13 billion last August, Celonis’ software extracts data from business systems like SAP, Oracle and Salesforce, analyzes it, and helps companies improve their operations.
