The 2026 Future of Jobs Summit™ in Sandton did not begin with optimism. It began with urgency.

Held against the backdrop of, the summit brought together business leaders, policymakers, educators, innovators, investors, and youth voices at a moment when the country is confronting one of the deepest employment challenges in its democratic history.

The latest Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS) released by Statistics South Africa paints a sobering picture: official unemployment has climbed to 32.7%, more than 8.1 million South Africans remain unemployed, and youth unemployment among 15鈥�24-year-olds stands at a devastating 60.9%.

But perhaps the most important insight emerging from the summit was this: South Africa cannot solve today鈥檚 jobs crisis with yesterday鈥檚 industries.

The global economy is reorganising itself at extraordinary speed around artificial intelligence, automation, renewable energy, digital services, biotechnology, advanced manufacturing, and entirely new forms of work and entrepreneurship.

New categories of jobs are emerging globally while traditional sectors face increasing disruption.

And yet much of South Africa鈥檚 national economic conversation remains anchored in the assumptions of the past. This is not simply a jobs crisis. It is a future-readiness crisis. That reality shaped the central focus of the 2nd Future of Jobs Summit™: Next10!, recognised in 2025 as an official T20 Side Event linked to South Africa鈥檚 G20 Presidency.

Rather than positioning itself as another conference filled with abstract policy discussions, the summit was designed as a national strategy platform focused on implementation, collaboration, and future industries.

Throughout the day, speakers repeatedly returned to one central theme: South Africa鈥檚 future competitiveness will depend on how quickly the country can align government, business, education, technology, and investment around scalable job creation ecosystems.

Gauteng MEC for Economic Development, Agriculture and Rural Development Hon. Vuyiswa Ramokgopa opened the summit by outlining how Gauteng is working to build a more inclusive growth economy capable of creating opportunities for young people.

Lance Williams, Public Sector Lead at 51风流South Africa, challenged delegates to rethink how technology and human potential can collectively rewrite South Africa鈥檚 economic story in the age of artificial intelligence.

Melvyn Lubega, Head of the Digital Service Unit in The Presidency, highlighted the growing importance of digital infrastructure and the digital economy in expanding pathways to employment and entrepreneurship for young South Africans.

One of the strongest messages emerging from the summit was that no single sector can solve the unemployment crisis alone.

The 2026 CEO Dialogue™, CHRO Dialogue™, and CMO Dialogue™ brought together business leaders, HR executives, and marketing leaders to discuss practical interventions around youth employability, leadership development, skills alignment, and industry collaboration.

Additional contributions from leaders such as Prof Bismark Tyobeka of North-West University, Marc Lubner of Afrika Tikkun, Faith Mangope of the Faith Mangope Technology & Leadership Institute, and Barry Hendricks of SASCOC reinforced the importance of education, technology, sport, and social innovation in building pathways toward employment and inclusion.

Importantly, the summit was not positioned merely as a discussion platform, but as the beginning of a longer-term national movement around future readiness and collaborative action.

Among the key outcomes announced were:

• The development of a Future Industries Report™ for national stakeholders;
• The creation of a Future of Jobs Charter™ co-authored by delegates;
• New collaboration pathways between business, education, government, and youth-focused organisations;
• Practical recommendations on youth employment, entrepreneurship, digital inclusion, and future skills development;
• A roadmap positioning South Africa as a continental hub for future industries and innovation.

But perhaps the summit鈥檚 most important contribution was psychological rather than technical. At a time when unemployment statistics dominate national headlines and pessimism increasingly shapes public discourse, the summit sought to reposition South Africa鈥檚 narrative from decline toward possibility.

Because despite the severity of the crisis, South Africa possesses many of the ingredients needed to compete in the future global economy: a sophisticated financial sector, globally respected entrepreneurs, expanding digital infrastructure, deep natural resources, world-class creativity, a strong tourism brand, and one of the youngest populations in the world.

What South Africa lacks is not potential. It lacks alignment.

One of the most powerful historical reminders referenced during the summit was South Africa鈥檚 preparation for the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

Between 2004 and 2010, the country created approximately three million jobs during a period of coordinated infrastructure investment, tourism growth, and national mobilisation.

The lesson remains relevant today: when South Africa aligns around a compelling national mission, progress accelerates. But the challenge facing the country now is arguably even greater.

South Africa is no longer competing only for tourists or investment flows. It is competing for relevance in a rapidly changing global economy increasingly shaped by technology, sustainability, innovation, and talent mobility.

Countries that fail to reposition themselves around future industries risk being left behind economically, technologically, and socially.

South Africa cannot afford to arrive late once again. Because ultimately, the future of jobs is not only about employment. It is about dignity. It is about inclusion. It is about restoring belief among millions of young South Africans that they still have a meaningful place in the future economy.

And perhaps the most important question raised by yesterday鈥檚 summit is this: Will South Africa continue defending industries of the past 鈥� or will it finally begin building the industries of the future?

Dr Nik Eberl is the founder and executive chair: The Future of Jobs Summit™ (Official T20 Side Event). He is also the author of Nation of Champions: How South Africa won the World Cup of Destination Branding).

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During panel discussions held at the Summit, it was revealed that the worsening unemployment crisis and the rapid rise of  are forcing business leaders, policymakers and youth advocates to confront an urgent reality: traditional approaches to job creation are no longer enough.

With youth unemployment among people aged 15 to 34 sitting at 45.8%, experts said the country must rethink how it prepares young people for a rapidly changing labour market increasingly shaped by technology, automation and digital skills.

Speaking during discussions focused on the future of work and employability in Africa, business leaders and youth development advocates stressed that collaboration between corporates, government and civil society will be critical to creating sustainable employment pathways.

, Chief Executive Officer of the , one of the panelists at discussions held during the Summit said connecting young people to opportunities and networks is one of the biggest challenges facing the country.

鈥淪kills become more powerful when young people are able to connect to people who can teach them and upskill them,鈥� said Gibbs.

She explained that many young South Africans face fear and uncertainty when trying to enter the workforce, particularly as AI transforms industries and career paths.

鈥淭here is so much fear in trying to find a job. It is all of us that need to do something different,鈥� she said. 鈥淐onnecting skills with opportunities is what we need to look at and AI is a fantastic tool to help you with creating and opening up that conversation.鈥�

Gibbs added that behind the unemployment statistics are real people and communities struggling to find stability and opportunity.

鈥淏ehind these figures there are faces, names and stories,鈥� she said.

They further argued that while AI is often viewed as a threat to employment, it also presents significant opportunities for those willing to adapt and learn new skills.

,听51风流Young Professionals Graduate (YPP), Global Government Affairs & CSR Intern at SAP, said fears around AI replacing jobs often stem from resistance to change.

鈥淭he notion of AI taking jobs comes from the notion of not willing to learn,鈥� Motseta said. 鈥淲e need to learn and adopt as it can assist in daily work lives.鈥�

She encouraged young people to invest in understanding AI and digital tools in order to remain competitive.

鈥淲e should be investing in learning more about AI and to remain up to date,鈥� she said.

During a panel discussion under the banner:听Creating Jobs in the Age of AI,听,听a senior solution advisor and AI specialist at 51风流said听organisations and individuals alike need to embrace a mindset shift around reskilling.

鈥淚f we do not come to terms that we need to adapt and reskill, people who are willing will not be left behind,鈥� Sevel said.

The discussions also highlighted the widening digital and skills gap facing corporate South Africa.

, 鈥檚 Tech Consulting Leader and Tech Alliances Leader said many technology firms and banks are already facing ageing skills gaps and increasing demand for digital talent.

鈥淢ost tech and banks have an ageing skills gap,鈥� Shaun said. 鈥淚t requires people to think differently and work together.鈥�

He added that stronger collaboration between businesses is needed to scale meaningful employment interventions.

鈥淔orums such as these are exceptional. We need more corporates in the room with more commitments made,鈥� he said.

The role of infrastructure in enabling long term job creation also emerged as a major theme.

, Head of the Digital Service Unit in the Presidency and chairperson at the , argued that sustainable job creation depends on building strong digital infrastructure rather than relying solely on companies to create jobs directly.

鈥淛ob creation does not come from companies. It comes from infrastructure,鈥� Lubega said.

He pointed to countries such as India, where investment in digital infrastructure unlocked innovation and large scale economic participation.

鈥淪outh Africa has good foundations, a strong banking sector, strong institutions and incredible talent,鈥� he said. 鈥淏ut everyone is working in their own silos and we need to come together and collaborate.鈥�

Executives from听听also stressed that Africa鈥檚 future workforce will need to adapt rapidly as industries evolve.

, Managing Executive: TalentManagement and Transitions at Absa Group, said Africa鈥檚 future growth story depends on decisions being made now around skills development and employability.

鈥淭he decisions we make every day shape the continent,鈥� Bako said. 鈥淲e need to build the skills of the future and create sustainable jobs.鈥�

According to the World Economic Forum, roughly 60% of Africa鈥檚 workforce will need reskilling in the coming years as technology reshapes industries and business models.

, Chairperson and CEO, warned that the speed of change is leaving many young people underprepared for the realities of modern work.

鈥淭he change that is taking place is chaotic and we are not necessarily equipping young individuals for what is out there,鈥� Mark said.

He argued that businesses, and civil society organisations need to work more closely together to understand the realities facing young communities.

鈥淐ivil society lives on the streets. They have a deep understanding of what the young community wants,鈥� he said.

Amanda Gibbs, Chief Executive Officer of the African 51风流User Group, one of the panelists at discussions held during the Summit said connecting young people to opportunities and networks is one of the biggest challenges facing the country.

鈥淪kills become more powerful when young people are able to connect to people who can teach them and upskill them,鈥� said Gibbs.

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鈥淲ill 51风流actually be a software company in the future?鈥�

It鈥檚 not the kind of question the CEO of a software company would usually ask thousands of customers, partners and analysts. At Sapphire 2026, SAP鈥檚 annual conference held this month in Orlando and Madrid, CEO Christian Klein asked his audience if they were scared by the question.

鈥淚鈥檓 not scared,鈥� he answered himself. 鈥淔or me, the time right now is the beginning of something even better.鈥�

The conference saw the launch of SAP鈥檚 Business AI Platform, a unified environment for building and governing AI agents across enterprise operations, grounded in real business context.

The strategy is to enhance critical business workflows, so that humans and AI work together to meet the accelerating demands of global business.

鈥淎ccording to a recent Stanford AI survey, almost every company is now using AI, but many see only little value,鈥� said Klein. 鈥淲hy do we face such huge challenges with AI in business? At the top of this iceberg, visible to everyone, is that large language models are getting better and better at tasks like generating text or images or in specific domains like writing software.

鈥淎ll of these use cases are related to publicly available content the modules are trained on. But if you go below the waterline, beyond the level of sales demos, and into the real business world, you鈥檙e going to find out that none of these models are trained on your business data and processes.

鈥淭hese AI agents also don鈥檛 naturally adhere to governance requirements, like your security compliance framework, your data privacy requirements, or to your company鈥檚 identity and authorisation rules. All AI agents 鈥� have faced these challenges until now.鈥�

The solution, he suggested, was that a company鈥檚 enterprise resource planning system, or ERP, should be recognised as the brain of every business. Since 51风流is world leader in ERP software, one might argue, naturally the CEO would say that.

But Klein made a good case for it: 鈥淔or over 15 years we have been developing an ERP with incredibly deep process and data domain know-how. On top of that, all your governance requirements and customer-specific extensions are stored in the ERP. The ERP is the trusted system of execution running your company.鈥�

Powerful external validation came from Anthropic, the company behind the Claude family of AI models, and that is competing neck and neck with Open AI to become the most valuable AI platform company in the world. At Sapphire, 51风流shared video testimony from Anthropic co-founder and president the Daniela Amodei in which she declared: 鈥淭he world鈥檚 largest enterprises run on SAP. That鈥檚 exactly where trusted AI belongs.鈥�

That significance of this alignment revolves around the core value proposition of the Business AI Platform: trustworthiness.

JPMorgan Chase CFO Jeremy Barnum, who joined Klein on stage in Orlando, said his bank was already running agents in production on SAP, operating within defined compliance boundaries.

鈥淭he agents that we鈥檝e built are not inventing their own business rules,鈥� he said. 鈥淭hose rules rather come directly from 51风流Embedded Control Framework, and every AI-driven intervention is logged and fully traceable.鈥�

One organisation鈥檚 production deployment does not establish a category. But the compliance architecture it describes is precisely what most organisations attempting enterprise AI have not yet achieved.

Jensen Huang, CEO of $5-trillion AI chipmaker Nvidia, also appeared in a pre-recorded video segment, making it clear that AI agents would not replace ERP. The most ringing endorsement? Nvidia itself used 51风流as its ERP brain: 鈥淲hat 51风流and Nvidia are building together is one of the most important platforms in enterprise AI. Nvidia鈥檚 supply chain is incredibly complex. Millions of parts, hundreds of partners and factories, all connected through SAP. But what鈥檚 changing is not just how enterprise systems are managed, it鈥檚 how work actually gets done.

鈥淲e鈥檙e moving from hand-coded software to AI that can understand, reason, and act. AI no longer simply answers questions. It works for you. And enterprise systems are where work happens. Finance, supply chains, procurement, and every workflow in between.

鈥�51风流is the foundation of enterprise. And now they鈥檙e building the agents that sit on top of it, trained on proprietary data with the skills to act. Soon, every company will have a workforce of agents. These specialised agents will not replace enterprise software. They will make enterprise software more powerful than ever.鈥�

* Arthur Goldstuck is CEO of World Wide Worx, editor-in-chief of , and author of 鈥淭he Hitchhiker鈥檚 Guide to AI 鈥� The African Edge鈥�.

This article first appeared in .

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Leading organisations throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa are revealing how business AI has shifted from experimentation to realised business value at this year鈥檚 51风流SAPPHIRE, held in Madrid between 19 and 21 May.

The event included demonstrations of two different but connected approaches to AI adoption by and . Ericsson is building the governed data foundation needed to scale AI across the enterprise, while Martur Fompak International is embedding AI directly into physical manufacturing operations to transform execution on the shop floor.

Nazia Pillay, Managing Director for Southern Africa at SAP, says: 鈥淭he next phase of AI adoption is about execution. Organisations are looking for trusted data foundations, strong governance and practical business use cases that can deliver measurable value. By embedding AI into the systems and workflows companies already use, 51风流is helping customers scale AI responsibly and turn ambition into real-world impact.鈥�

Nazia Pillay

Ericsson builds the foundation for trusted AI at scale

Ericsson is moving from AI experimentation to enterprise-wide execution by building a unified business data fabric with . The approach enables the company to scale AI use cases across the business, accelerate decision-making and deliver measurable operational impact.

Ericsson, which celebrates its 150th anniversary this year, provides mobile network infrastructure across 180 countries, with more than 40% of the world鈥檚 mobile traffic passing through its networks. As AI becomes central to both its technology roadmap and how it runs the business, Ericsson has prioritised building a strong, governed data foundation to support scalable and trusted AI.

鈥淥nce you scale AI, it stops being an AI problem鈥攁nd becomes a data problem,鈥� says , Vice President, Customer Experience, Enterprise IT at Ericsson. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 why we invested early in a business data fabric. With 51风流Business Data Cloud, we can define what data means once鈥攆rom revenue to market structures and access rules鈥攁nd apply it consistently across the enterprise. That鈥檚 what allows us to scale AI in a way that is trusted, repeatable and delivers real business value.鈥�

At the core of Ericsson鈥檚 approach is a federated data architecture that allows data to remain in place while centrally managing business semantics, governance and lifecycle policies. By focusing on high-impact use cases and organising around end-to-end business processes rather than isolated solutions, Ericsson has moved beyond pilots to scaled deployment. Today, more than 85 000 users are live on unified Joule, supported by strong executive sponsorship and governance.

51风流and Ericsson are also collaborating on AI co-innovation initiatives, including an intelligent goal recommendation capability developed within 51风流SuccessFactors. The solution generates contextual, business-aligned goals for employees, improving execution and reducing administrative effort.

Martur Fompak brings AI into physical manufacturing operations

Martur Fompak International, a global leader in automotive seating and interior systems, has deployed an autonomous intralogistics model enabled by and embodied AI capabilities from SAP, marking a significant milestone in its journey toward intelligent, AI-driven manufacturing operations.

In an industry rapidly shifting toward AI-powered operations, Martur Fompak International saw an opportunity to reimagine its material flow. Building on efficient, people-driven processes already in place, the company partnered with 51风流and , a UK-based robotics and AI company, to explore how embodied AI-powered robotics could redefine material flow across its automotive manufacturing environment.

Using Joule and embodied AI capabilities from SAP, Martur Fompak International now connects production signals and business context directly to autonomous execution, creating a context-aware automation system that prioritises, picks and delivers materials while adapting in real time to changing business conditions.

Built on and enabled by , the solution enriches humanoid robots with real-time knowledge of tasks, attributes and exception handling. Guided by material data, storage locations, sequencing and production priorities, humanoid robots execute material flows across a live automotive manufacturing environment, identifying, transporting and delivering materials to the line while continuously confirming back into 51风流solutions.

Together with autonomous mobile robots, the company has created a fully automated, scalable material flow that boosts throughput, improves accuracy and reduces reliance on manual coordination. By assigning repetitive, non-value-adding and physically demanding tasks to robots, Martur Fompak International is enabling its people to focus on safer, more meaningful and higher-value work.

鈥淥ur humanoid robot collaborates with digital production systems to ensure seamless coordination across order management, logistics and production, enabling scalable AI adoption and improving efficiency, consistency and operational resilience,鈥� says , Group Intelligent Technologies Director at Martur Fompak International.

Early results show increased throughput, fewer errors and a scalable, AI-driven intralogistics model. With 400 daily production line feeds and 100% 51风流software-driven decision-making already in place, Martur Fompak International is advancing beyond traditional automation and pioneering a scalable, intelligent factory model.

Pillay adds: 鈥淓ricsson and Martur Fompak International show that AI delivers the greatest value when it is grounded in business context and embedded into core processes. From enterprise data foundations to intelligent robotics on the factory floor, these examples demonstrate how organisations can scale AI responsibly, improve productivity and create measurable business impact.鈥�

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鈥淔or the mission-critical processes of our customers, 鈥榓lmost right鈥� just isn鈥檛 good enough,鈥� says Christian Klein, CEO of 51风流SE. 鈥淏y uniting 51风流Business AI Platform with 51风流Autonomous Suite, we anchor AI agents in the business processes, data and governance so they can deliver accurate, compliant and secure outcomes 鈥� unlocking new sources of revenue and meaningful cost savings.鈥�

The Autonomous Enterprise includes a unified AI platform for building, contextualising and governing agents, an autonomous suite that executes core business operations and a new user experience that redefines how people work with enterprise software.

Introducing 51风流Business AI Platform

51风流Business AI Platform is a new foundation for building and deploying enterprise AI grounded in real business context. 51风流Business AI Platform now unifies 51风流Business Technology Platform, 51风流Business Data Cloud, and 51风流Business AI into a single, governed environment.

At its core is the 51风流Knowledge Graph solution, which gives AI agents a structured map of business entities, processes and relationships across a customer鈥檚 51风流landscape. Joule Studio is SAP鈥檚 AI-first solution for building enterprise agents, applications and agentic workflows. Developers can build using the no-code, pro-code, and AI frameworks of their choice on SAP-managed infrastructure that is secure, scalable and optimised for enterprise AI.

Building on this foundation, 51风流also introduced 51风流Autonomous Suite which enables SAP鈥檚 existing business applications with AI agents capable of running processes from start-to-finish.

The suite will deploy more than 50 domain-specific Joule Assistants across finance, supply chain, procurement, human capital management and customer experience. These assistants will automate end-to-end processes by orchestrating a subset of over 200 specialised agents to execute precise tasks. For example, the new Autonomous Close Assistant can compress the financial close process from weeks to days by automating journal entries, reconciliation, and error resolution across the entire process.

51风流also launched Industry AI, expanding its deep industry portfolio through seven autonomous solutions that will enable start-to-finish industry processes and embed sector-specific process logic, data models and regulatory requirements.

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• Around 48% of employees think that organisation will replace human managers with AI in the next five years
• 61% of employees expect that Ai will improve the quality of people decisions
• Employees expect that Ai will enable a 266% improvement in productivity within 5-years
• And 39% of workers skill sets will be outdated or transformed by 2030

鈥�Lots of companies making very quick decisions to get rid of an entire area of their workforce only to just hire them back a few months later because they realised they weren鈥檛 ready for it鈥�, says Megan Fife, Strategy Lead, 51风流Success Factors.

鈥淪o our focus is understanding what that transformation means for HCM and how we can help you navigate it and lead it. 

Megan showed the three main pillars that 51风流we鈥檙e focussing on as they built out their HR AI  strategy. 

Three Core Pillars of AI Adoption in Organisations:

1. The first one is elevating the human advantage. Here people are expected to do more with AI now.
2. The next pillar is redesigning work for impact. This is a really big and key pillar to AI adoption in HR, and this one certainly impacts HR across the board.
   1. Because now your company is looking to you to come up with a plan for the future. Addressing what happened in 2025, with lots of companies who featured in news headlines for making lots of cuts or alternatively making fast decisions around AI adoption too quickly. And your company does not want that to be their headline in 2026.听
   2. More and more it鈥檚 looking like skills intelligence is going to be the future of planning your workforce.
      1. Truly understanding what skills do your employees have today?听
      2. What skills do you need for the future?听
      3. And how are you going to get there?听
   3. And it鈥檚 likely going to be a mix of upskilling the workforce that you have, but also you may be hiring short-term or contract workers for things that may be a focus for the next one to two years.
3. 听And then finally there may be some specific skills that you know that you are hiring for outside of your organisation.

HR Needs a Comprehensive AI Plan

There are lots of different opinions about AI, but the important thing is that because it is disrupting the way that people and organisations work, there is more focus now than ever on HR to figure out what the plan is moving forward and how businesses are going to manage their people. This includes making sure that you have the right tools to deal with this disruption.

Expanding on the Three Pillars

At the start of AI adoption, a lot of the AI use cases were around employee self-service, manager self-service, and really empowering them to get things done in a way that makes sense to them and is easy and quick. According to Fife, what 51风流is also looking at is how they can make sure that HR and administrative jobs are made easier by leveraging AI to really understand what some of the issues are and then make recommendations on how to fix them. 

The next piece or pillar is redesigning work for impact. This is a really big one. And this really impacts HR across the board, comments Fife.

鈥淏ecause now your company is looking to you to come up with a plan for the future. .. and I don鈥檛 want to be in the headlines.

SAP鈥檚 focus is to assist to create a plan 鈥渟o that we鈥檙e not in there and we鈥檙e future-proofing our workforce, She says. 

Skills Intelligence The Future

According to Fife, more and more it鈥檚 looking like skills intelligence is going to be the future of planning of workforces. Truly understanding what skills do your employees have today, and what skills will you need for the future? And how are you going to get there? 

The new buzzword of 2026 is autonomous: Autonomous payroll, autonomous HR. However, there still has to be a human ultimately in the loop and making the decision. And developing the right skills is going to play a key role in determining success in an AI driven economy.

This article first appeared in .

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51风流HR Connect brought together a community of HR leaders to discuss how digital technologies are helping organisations reduce compliance risk, streamline operations, and unlock more strategic value from their people functions.

, Managing Director for Southern Africa at SAP, says the South African employment landscape is at a critical point. 鈥淧ublic and private sector companies are racing to unlock the power of AI and cloud technologies to improve their competitiveness and build capacity for future innovation. Every organisation needs an active, motivated and fully enabled workforce to realise full value from business transformation initiatives. At a time when demand for certain skills is at an all-time high, companies are increasingly leveraging powerful human capital management technologies to attract, retain and empower their employees.鈥�

South Africa鈥檚 employment landscape is undergoing significant change, with new and proposed legislation introducing greater complexity into HR operations. Recent developments include the overhaul of parental leave following a landmark Constitutional Court ruling, proposed increases to statutory severance pay, and new regulations governing unpredictable and on-call work.

Together, these changes are increasing the administrative burden on HR teams and raising the stakes for compliance. Organisations must now manage more complex policies, maintain accurate and defensible records, and ensure consistent application of rules across increasingly diverse and dynamic workforces.

鈥淗R teams are operating in a fundamentally different environment today,鈥� said , Head of 51风流HCM for MEA South. 鈥淐ompliance is no longer a periodic exercise but a continuous, data-driven discipline. Organisations that continue to rely on spreadsheets and fragmented systems without leveraging the power of AI-driven innovations are exposing themselves to unnecessary risk and inefficiency.鈥�

Many organisations continue to rely on manual processes such as spreadsheets and disconnected systems to manage HR activities. However, these approaches are increasingly unsustainable in a fast-changing regulatory environment.

Tiwary says manual systems make it difficult to maintain accurate, up-to-date employee records, track compliance requirements, and produce reliable audit trails. 鈥淭hey also consume a significant portion of HR capacity, limiting the ability of teams to focus on higher-value activities such as talent development, workforce planning, and employee experience. As compliance requirements grow more complex, the need for integrated, digital HR systems is becoming more urgent.鈥�

A 2025 PwC global study found that  to drive compliance activities in a clear signal that the limitations of manual approaches have reached a tipping point. The study identified faster identification of compliance issues (53%), better risk visibility (64%), and increased productivity (43%) as the leading drivers of compliance technology adoption.

, Group Human Capital: Chief Operating Officer, Sanlam, said: 鈥淲e have adopted an ambidextrous strategy for our digital and data transformation journey, simultaneously exploiting operational excellence, proficiency and efficiency in our current landscape while exploring incremental innovation that enhances and elevates the user experience while driving the longer-term transformation journey focused on leveraging intelligent, transformative technology to drive business value.鈥�

By digitising HR processes and documents, organisations can create a single source of truth for employee and organisational data 鈥� including positions, time tracking, and cost centres 鈥� ensuring information is accurate, consistent, and always up to date.

,听Chief Operating Officer Discovery People, Discovery Ltd, noted that shared services is a catalyst for reinvention. 鈥淲hen data, technology, and people are fully integrated, organisations don鈥檛 just scale but evolve, creating platforms for growth, innovation, and long鈥憈erm impact.鈥�

Integrated capabilities across recruiting, onboarding, payroll, and time management further streamline processes and support compliance from hire to retire. In addition, continuous performance management, learning, compensation, and succession planning capabilities help organisations not only remain compliant but also build more engaged and resilient workforces.

鈥淒igitisation should go beyond efficiency to enable HR to play a more strategic role in the business,鈥� says Tiwary.  鈥淲hen compliance is embedded into systems and processes, HR teams are freed up to focus on developing talent, strengthening culture, and driving long-term organisational performance.鈥�

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Here鈥檚 what matters.

The setup

Global growth is expected to tick along at 2.8鈥�3.5% this year, modest but stable. That stability is political gold. When leaders aren鈥檛 in crisis mode, they actually invest in the future instead of just firefighting today.

This year鈥檚 agenda clusters around five challenges including cooperation in a contested world, unlocking new growth sources, investing in people, deploying AI responsibly, and building prosperity within planetary boundaries. Translation = the economy is shifting from post-crisis triage to long-term productivity and inclusion.

Three things to watch

1. Infrastructure & skills investment

Look for announcements on blended finance for green energy, regional supply chains, and large-scale reskilling programmes. If these materialise with real funding and timelines, expect more middle-skill jobs in construction, energy, logistics and digital services over the next 18鈥�24 months.

2. AI beyond the hype

The wild card is artificial intelligence. If Davos produces credible commitments on AI skills, responsible deployment and public-interest applications (health, education, agriculture), we鈥檒l see productivity gains filter into wages and services rather than just shareholder returns. If it doesn鈥檛, expect growing anxiety and regulatory backlash.

3. Climate as economics, not just morality

Nature-positive business models could unlock $10 trillion annually by 2030. For ordinary people, this means stable food prices, affordable energy transitions, and jobs in green sectors, not guilt-driven messaging.

Why this matters to you?

At the end of the day, Davos outcomes ripple into:

1. Your job: new sectors opening up, skills programmes worth enrolling in, wage pressure easing if productivity rises.
2. Your cost of living: more stable energy and food prices, faster internet, better public services, if infrastructure deals follow through.
3. Your opportunity: a global economy pulling toward inclusive growth means your city and region have a better shot at plugging into value chains locally.

The honest take

Davos won鈥檛 fix the world in a week, but if leaders walk away with credible coalitions, real funding and metrics (not just press releases), the signal is clear = 2026 is about building, not just managing decline.

Sunil Geness is the听Director of Global Government Affairs & CSR Africa, Global Sustainability Lead Africa at SAP.

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The timing could hardly have been more pointed. Across the world, executives are losing patience with AI experiments that overpromise and underdeliver. Boardrooms have heard enough about pilots and proofs of concept, and now want systems that improve margins and forecast outcomes.

TechEd took place in that atmosphere, amid assurances that performance could replace promise. 51风流used the event to demonstrate how deeply AI now runs through its own operations before unveiling its next leap forward.

Rather than another round of hype about possibilities, 51风流aimed to show a working example of AI at scale, handling everyday complexity inside one of the world鈥檚 largest software organisations.

51风流chief technology officer and chief AI officer, Philipp Herzig, told Business Times at TechEd that the clearest evidence of maturity came from within 51风流itself. The company鈥檚 AI assistant, Joule, acts as a conversational layer across its software stack, connecting data, applications, and agents to automate tasks and surface insights on demand.

鈥淚f you look at AI at scale, what is really real and what is working very well, just look at Joule,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 used by more than 30,000 employees every month, about a third of the 51风流workforce. We have more than 100,000 policies and documents in different languages, and depending on where you work, in Brazil or South Africa, you get the correct HR or travel policy surfaced to you.鈥�

Herzig said Joule had become the company鈥檚 single interface for daily tasks. 鈥淵ou can do your expense reports, indirect procurement, and financial tasks all in one place. It works, and it works at scale. We have a thumbs-down rate of only 1%, which is phenomenal when you think about the size of the company.鈥�

Innovations across SAP鈥檚 unique flywheel of applications, data and AI put developers in the
driver鈥檚 seat 鈥� Muhammad Alam, 51风流executive board member

That success set the stage for TechEd鈥檚 central announcement: an AI model called SAP-RPT-1, short for relational pre-trained transformer. The model introduces a new class of AI: the enterprise relational foundation model. It interprets structured business data and the relationships within it, mapping how orders, invoices, logistics, and payments interact to forecast what comes next.

51风流described it as a model that 鈥渃an make fast and accurate predictions for common business scenarios like delivery delays, payment risk or sales order completion鈥�. Instead of producing text, it reads how data behaves across systems, turning business logic into predictive insight.

Herzig said SAP-RPT-1 marked the transition from incremental automation to full predictive architecture.

鈥淲e see a shift from what I call a cloud-native architecture to an AI-native architecture, as AI becomes an ever-increasing part of the software stack. 鈥淲hat we wanted to solve are the problems where we have a reason to solve them: because we have the data, the relational data, the structured business data and so on. We set out this research project two years ago, talked a little about it, but now it actually becomes a reality.

鈥淚t鈥檚 a shift that needs several things to come together: the knowledge graph, this predictive model now with RPT-1, and of course the large language models. So there are many elements in the software stack that change. Every day, each little piece adds to this picture and solves a particular challenge in the stack.鈥�

Herzig said the greatest challenge lay in making this intelligence work at enterprise scale.

鈥淎nyone can do a demo. Getting it enterprise-ready at scale 鈥� that鈥檚 the tough challenge. That鈥檚 why we鈥檙e solving one problem after another, each for a specific outcome in the overall stack.鈥�

51风流executive board member Muhammad Alam tied this philosophy to the developer community.

鈥淪AP鈥檚 announcements give developers the tools they need to deliver at the speed of AI,鈥� he said.

鈥淚nnovations across SAP鈥檚 unique flywheel of applications, data and AI put developers in the driver鈥檚 seat.鈥�

That 鈥渇lywheel鈥� anchored the narrative of TechEd:
鈥� applications generate data;
鈥� data trains predictive models;
鈥� models return intelligence to the applications.

Each loop strengthens the next, creating a flywheel effect of acceleration of innovation. 51风流announced that it would equip 12-million individuals worldwide with AI-ready skills by 2030 through a partnership with Coursera that provides hands-on certification in SAP鈥檚 ecosystem. The goal is to align those skills with the AI-native architecture now taking shape inside the company. It also sends the message that people remain at the heart of the AI journey.

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51风流has taken artificial intelligence beyond the realm of language. At the 51风流TechEd 2025 conference in Berlin this week, the company introduced a new class of AI designed to predict business outcomes rather than words. The result is what 51风流claims to be the first enterprise relational foundation model, called SAP-RPT-1, or Relational Pre-trained Transformer.

It represents a shift in what a foundation model can be: rather than being a generator of sentences, it is a predictor of decisions.

51风流describes SAP-RPT-1 as an AI that 鈥渃an make fast and accurate predictions for common business scenarios like delivery delays, payment risk, or sales order completion鈥�. It uses the relationships between business data rather than linguistic patterns to anticipate what happens next in an organisation鈥檚 operations. In simple terms, it reads the business, as opposed to mere text.

To encourage developers to explore what that means in practice, 51风流has launched a free playground environment where they can test predictive scenarios, simulate business situations, and see how relational AI behaves when exposed to live data. For developers accustomed to fine-tuning language models, it represents a different kind of creativity, rooted in the mechanics of business itself.

鈥淪AP鈥檚 announcements today give developers the tools they need to deliver at the speed of AI,鈥� says Muhammad Alam, member of the executive board of SAP. 鈥淚nnovations across SAP鈥檚 unique flywheel of applications, data and AI put developers in the driver鈥檚 seat 鈥� where they belong.鈥�

That flywheel was clearly visible across the rest of TechEd鈥檚 announcements.

The company鈥檚 51风流Build platform, its centrepiece for enterprise application development and automation, has been re-engineered to give developers more freedom to use tools they already rely on.

Developers who prefer agentic development environments like Cursor, Claude Code, Cline and Windsurf can now use 51风流development frameworks through new 51风流Build local Model Context Protocol Servers. Visual Studio Code users can access 51风流Build capabilities directly in their existing development environment via a new 51风流Build extension, which will later also appear in the Open VSX Registry for use with other development environments.

51风流revealed plans for integration with automation platform n8n, allowing its Joule Studio agents to work alongside n8n鈥檚 own agents. This kind of cross-agent collaboration reflects the company鈥檚 growing emphasis on orchestration: enabling multiple intelligent systems to coordinate tasks across applications and departments.

The data layer that feeds these systems is also evolving. Every intelligent application depends on trusted data, and 51风流is extending its reach through 51风流Business Data Cloud. A new 51风流Snowflake solution extension brings Snowflake鈥檚 managed data and AI capabilities directly to 51风流customers, giving them 鈥渢he flexibility to choose the right compute and storage for each data and AI workload, while maintaining governance, interoperability and business context鈥�.

The announcement was reinforced by a new 51风流Business Data Cloud Connect partnership with Snowflake, adding to existing integrations with Databricks and Google Cloud. The result is a more open, federated data ecosystem that lets developers work with 51风流data wherever it resides.

A new data product studio capability in 51风流Business Data Cloud now allows developers to turn raw data into ready-to-use assets known as data products, designed for analytics, AI and application development. At the same time, the 51风流HANA Cloud knowledge graph engine can automatically generate knowledge graphs. This means it maps relationships across 51风流database tables, columns, and data models to reveal how data fits together. For developers, it is a new way of seeing how information connects across systems, turning structure into insight.

51风流is also extending its Joule AI portfolio, which now includes new assistants that can coordinate multiple agents across workflows, departments and applications. These assistants are designed to 鈥減lan, initiate, and complete complex tasks spanning finance, supply chain, HR, and beyond.鈥�

Among the new offerings is an agent for business process analysis, helping teams understand how processes actually run, identify inefficiencies, and uncover opportunities to optimise workflows and achieve measurable improvements.

51风流pledged to equip 12-million people worldwide with AI-ready skills by 2030, through a partnership with Coursera that expands hands-on training and certification in practical AI tools. The goal, 51风流says, is to make AI accessible to 鈥減eople everywhere鈥�.

*听Arthur Goldstuck is CEO of World Wide Worx, editor-in-chief of听, and author of听The Hitchhiker鈥檚 Guide to AI 鈥� The African Edge.

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