SAP hires execs from Siebel, Oracle

As reported earlier, the German software maker has been working to amass new talent as some of its rivals, namely Oracle and Siebel, work to get their houses in order. Siebel has struggled to meet earnings expectations and continues to face criticism from some of its shareholders, and the company recently launched an employee retention program. Oracle has been fighting to integrate the numerous products and employees gained through its acquisitions of PeopleSoft and Retek.

In all, SAP said Monday that it has attracted more than 200 new workers from "competitive organizations" during the last 18 months, with much hiring being done in Silicon Valley in particular.

Among the new employees announced by SAP are several well-known names, including Nimish Mehta, formerly of Siebel. Mehta has been appointed SAP's new senior vice president of enterprise information management. Mehta, who will focus on creating product strategy with an emphasis on structured and unstructured data, was formerly Siebel's group vice president of customer data integration. He had previously been at Oracle more than 10 years, SAP said.

Also coming to SAP from Siebel are Richard Campione, who is SAP's new senior vice president of industry solutions marketing, and Bob Stutz, who will be senior vice president for SAP's product and technology group. Campione had been serving as general manager for Siebel's financial services and public sector group, while Stutz had been working on the company's industry-specific products.

Joining SAP from Oracle are Mike Mayer, who moves into the role of vice president for international association project development, and Dan Rosenberg, now senior vice president for user experience in its product and technology group. Mayer had been working as senior director for international projects at Oracle, and Rosenberg was the company's vice president of research and development for usability design. According to SAP, both executives had been with Oracle for more than a decade.

Another executive coming to SAP from Oracle is John Zepecki, who will act as vice president of products for the company's xApps software unit. Zepecki is the former vice president of development for enterprise performance management at PeopleSoft, and had been working to help integrate the technologies acquired by PeopleSoft via its buyout of rival J.D. Edwards in 2003.

BEA Systems, a maker of application server software, is another company from which SAP has successfully lured talent. SAP said it has hired Gordon Simpson to be vice president of applied technology in its product and technology group. Simpson had been deputy chief technology officer at BEA.

Joining SAP from Quest Software, which makes application and database tools, is Doug Merritt. He will act as the company's new general manager for suite optimization.

SAP also recently hired George Paolini as its executive vice president for platform ecosystem development. Paolini, who came to SAP in January from application development specialist Borland Software, where he served as general manager, is most widely known for his previous work at Sun Microsystems, where he helped build that company's Java development community.

While SAP is based in Walldorf, Germany, industry watchers have observed that the company is working hard to expand its U.S. operations, which are anchored at its offices in Palo Alto, Calif., and Newtown Square, Pa.

In Silicon Valley, much of SAP's hiring activity has been focused on software developers, where experts have said Shai Agassi, president of the company's product and technology group, is attracting top talent through his work on the company's enterprise service architecture program. The initiative aims to help other technology providers build closer ties to SAP's products.

"Over the past several months, we've augmented our current team's expertise with new talent that together will lead SAP in the enterprise application and platform markets for the next decade," Agassi said in a statement. "This wave of incoming talent proves that SAP is attractive not only to outside companies seeking a strong partner, but also to leaders outside our organization who are looking to influence the industry through their work at SAP."