SAP AG’s venture capital arm this week took a stake in its twelfth start-up, this time pouring money into MarketFirst Software Inc, a provider of software that lets companies carry out marketing campaigns over the web. A spokesperson for SAP said it wasn’t the company’s policy to disclose the size of the equity investment but added that the fund only invests innovative companies serving high-growth markets. Our aim is to find companies that will earn us a solid return on our investment, the spokesperson said.
SAP’s venture capital division was set up two-and-a-half years ago and since then, of the ten US companies it’s invested in, two have gone public; Streamline and Commerce One (which floated on the stock market yesterday); one, Smart Technologies Inc, has been acquired, by supply chain vendor i2; and one more, the Linux OS reseller Red Hat Software, has recently filed for an IPO.
The spokesperson said SAP chose MarketFirst because it believed the company, which makes software that helps companies leverage the internet to plan, design and execute one-to-one marketing campaigns more effectively, offered the best product in its marketplace. He added that just because SAP has invested in the company it doesn’t mean the parent company, SAP AG, will use MarketFirst’s technology in its products. We operate like a completely normal venture capital company, he said, our activities in no way direct SAP’s product strategy.
