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Pentalog, Russia, an SAP proposition

Alex and I took the road to Russia recently. We were very far away from what we know as the geographical borders of Europe, at the foot of the Urals, to assess the possibilities of a relationship with one of the leading Russian specialists in SAP.

I would first like to thank them for their incredible hospitality. We did some ice fishing in a frozen river, visited an ice cave… drank lots of vodka, and ate very well wherever we went. In this regard, I would like to emphasize the quality of Russian cuisine, with salmon and other fish, pickled or smoked, caviar, and delicious meats. In short, even the most demanding gourmets among you would not have been disappointed in Russia.

Professionally, we really appreciated, again, the quality of the people we encountered. I would first like to thank Evgenia, Denis, Maxim, Evgeniy and Victor for having accompanied us every hour of our journey. Their professional availability was incredible and I would like to note this amongst these young developers, project managers and managers.

Yes, there were a few difficulties and if I did not mention them, you would not believe me Both Alex and I noticed the same difficulty with foreign languages, as I have previously mentioned concerning Morocco and Ukraine. English is not yet the universal language and we definitely need to encourage the use of the French language if we are to go further… you see were I am going? Anyway, I can assert that nothing in the world, reaches the level of Romania and Moldova when it comes to finding people who can converse both in English and French.

I cannot in fact, help thinking of our 100 Moldovan employees, of whom 80% are francophone, almost 100% English-speaking… and 100% speak Russian.

Before starting the SAP adventure, I promised myself to prepare a �killer proposition� for this market. We will only propose the best-in-class services, whatever their nature. Otherwise, we should not get involved. Have we found this offer for SAP? I do not know yet. Alex and our market intelligence team are still going through the pre-qualification stage looking for at least one other operator in another geographical area, before making a final decision, whether to go or not to go for SAP, and / or, whether to go alone or accompanied?