SAP Plans to Train 12 Million People in AI Skills by 2030

SAP is betting big that it can help more people learn about artificial intelligence. The enterprise software company has set a goal of equipping 12 million more people worldwide with AI-ready digital skills over the next five years. The idea is to better prepare the global workforce for AI’s disruptive impact.

This isn’t the first time SAP has made such a commitment. It claims it has helped upskill over four million people since 2022.

“We think it’s important to transform the workforce, given that everybody is worried about what’s happening with business applications or business workers, more generally, with AI,” Dr. Walter Sun, SAP’s global head of AI, tells me in an interview. “We want to help enable knowledge upskilling so that people can continue to do work. The 12 million people goal worldwide with AI skills by 2030 is our target.”

To succeed in its mission, SAP is re-engaging the help of the online learning platform Coursera. In addition to its existing educational catalog that serves more than 100,000 students, SAP is launching a new professional certificate for SAP business analysts. It’s the second such program the company has on Coursera, joining the one for SAP technology consultants. The hope is that these two will serve as gateway points into SAP’s ecosystem for various career paths.

Another result of the SAP-Coursera partnership is the addition of new AI-driven accessibility features, namely automated video dubbing and machine translation for more than 20 languages.

However, those are not the only steps being taken, as the company is modifying its approach to certifications. No longer will exams be in the traditional multiple-choice format. Instead, SAP is embracing hands-on practical assessment where students can use AI tools during the test. The goal is to analyze their ability to solve real-world problems in an authentic SAP environment, rather than rewarding them for memorizing lessons.

Lastly, SAP’s certification portfolio is expanding to support new courses for SAP Business Technology platform solutions architects and system administrators, generative AI developers, and SAP Build developers. There’s also a partner-targeted certification for professionals with hands-on implementation experience to validate their knowledge of the “RISE with SAP” methodology, the company’s approach for helping organizations transition to the cloud and modernize their business processes.

This is the latest move by a tech company to help anyone looking to get ahead in the AI world. More people are being laid off, and companies are citing AI as the reason. According to LinkedIn, 85 percent of U.S. professionals could see at least a quarter of their skills affected by AI. Tech companies pushing AI as an enterprise solution must do more to help those displaced by the technology find ways to reinvent themselves.

SAP is not the first to provide upskilling assistance, nor will it likely be the last. It joins the likes of Salesforce, ServiceNow, Microsoft, Google, AWS, and IBM to provide an accessible means of education.

Featured Image: SAP's logo appears on the side of an office building. Credit: SAP