Saudi Arabia Becomes First in the World to Host SAP Business Network for Public Sector with Full Data Sovereignty Compliance

Riyadh – Asdaf News:

SAP today announced the planned public sector deployment of the full SAP Business Network in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, hosted on Google Cloud. This milestone makes Saudi Arabia the first country in the world to host the entire suite of SAP Business Network solutions within a cloud environment that enables both local data residency and global interoperability.

SAP has added SAP Business Network Commerce Automation to its existing public sector deployment, with SAP Business Network Supply Chain Collaboration to follow at the end of Q4 of this year. This new deployment builds on the existing availability of SAP Business Network for Logistics and SAP Business Network Asset Collaboration, bringing the entire capabilities of SAP Business Network to the region. Together, they enable public sector customers to run end-to-end procurement and supply chain processes within the Kingdom, fully compliant with national data residency and cybersecurity regulations (CCC-2020).

SAP’s federated architecture allows government buyers to store data in-country, while transacting securely with global partners across SAP’s international network. Suppliers, including OEMs, logistics providers, and service vendors, can register in other regions and seamlessly collaborate with Saudi-based public sector entities through a federated trading partner model.

“Saudi Arabia is setting a global benchmark for sovereign digital transformation,” said Muhammad Alam, member of the Executive Board of SAP SE, SAP Product & Engineering. “This deployment is more than a technical landmark. It’s a strategic enabler for the Kingdom’s public sector to lead with agility, resilience, and global reach. By bringing SAP Business Network into the region, we’re helping customers strengthen procurement, operations, and partnerships while ensuring full compliance with national standards.”

The deployment in Saudi Arabia also represents an early milestone in SAP’s broader data federation strategy for regulated markets. The approach is designed to give governments and enterprises in countries with strict compliance requirements the ability to maintain full data residency in-country, while remaining seamlessly connected to the global SAP Business Network.

The public sector environment is hosted on Google Cloud, SAP’s selected hyperscaler partner in Saudi Arabia. A parallel environment for the private sector is planned for release in Q1 2026, with the same benefits of local data residency, Arabic right-to-left (RTL) language support, and federated global interoperability.

Customer Success
Saudi Awwal Bank (SAB) is among the national enterprises welcoming the announced expansion of SAP Business Network in Saudi Arabia. Building on the success of its initial migration to the existing platform, SAB has already shifted 40% of its procurement processes and achieved measurable improvements in efficiency and transparency.

Ata Elyas, Head of Procurement at SAB, said: “By migrating more than 40% of SAB Procurement processes to SAP Business Network, we’ve already achieved significant gains in efficiency and transparency. With real-time dashboards, we provide our business partners better visibility on their requirements while ensuring strong governance and compliance. By year-end, we are aiming to have 80% of our procurement processes managed through the Business Network. We plan to leverage advanced solutions such as spend analytics, risk management, and SAP Business AI to enhance operational accuracy and effectiveness further. SAP’s in-region deployment provides us the scale and regulatory assurance required to support our business growth.”

Over the past 12 months, more than USD 6.1 trillion in business transactions globally were facilitated on SAP Business Network. If measured as a national economy, the network would rank as the third-largest GDP in the world, underscoring its role as a strategic infrastructure for global trade.

SAP will showcase the capabilities of SAP Business Network at its SAP NOW event in Riyadh on 3 November 2025, where customers will also have the opportunity to explore the latest innovations across the company’s portfolio.