At SAP Concur Fusion 2025, SAP showcased AI-driven innovations and a strategic partnership, enhancing travel and expense management with improved visibility, automation, compliance, and spend insights while driving efficiencies and enriching employee experiences.
As our world demands organizational adaptability at warp speed, business travel also is transforming in a fast-paced and complex environment. At our annual flagship event for SAP Concur users and experts, we delved into the power of AI, sharing insights and experiences. Whether customers and partners attended in person in Seattle, Washington, or virtually, they all gained new perspectives on how to navigate the complexities of tomorrow’s business landscape with confidence.
Global participation and experts on-site
Customers and partners joined SAP Concur Fusion from all over the world, representing 75 countries. At the Seattle Convention Center, attendees could explore the new Fusion Pavilion in the exhibition hall and talk to SAP Concur experts and 43 exhibiting partners. We offered over 180 unique learning opportunities including Ask the Expert and breakout sessions, micro forums, and product trainings to explore how SAP Concur solutions can deliver innovation in travel and expense while unlocking efficiencies.
Debut: Integrating Joule with SAP Concur to enhance user experience
During the event’s day one keynote, we announced new generative AI innovations and an expanded partnership with American Express.
SAP is embedding its generative AI copilot Joule into SAP Concur solutions, bringing the portfolio one step closer toward a fully automated travel and expense management process.
In the Concur Expense solution, Joule will help answer employees’ questions and work to ensure that expense reports are ready for submission with minimal effort. For example, Joule can assemble a timeline view of expenses, review for mistakes or missing expenses, and make recommendations for how best to complete the expense report. General availability is expected in the second quarter of 2025.
In the Concur Travel solution, Joule will be embedded to help plan locations for off-site meetings, providing meeting location recommendations and high-level flight and hotel cost estimates based on meeting attendees’ origination points. Once the meeting site and hotel options are selected, Joule will create an e-mail template to send to team members with a link to book directly in Concur Travel. Joule with Concur Travel is now in the SAP Early Adopter Care program with general availability expected later this year.
Automating expense management in Concur Expense
On stage, we also announced an expanded partnership with American Express to help simplify expense management for shared customers. SAP Concur and American Express are launching a real-time authorization data capability whereby American Express Corporate Card purchases automatically generate and categorize expenses in Concur Expense at the time of spend. This feature will first be available for meal expenses. It also will include mobile notifications that send the employee expense policy reminders in the moment.
We also are working to expand access to our integration with Mastercard, which automates expense entry at the time of purchase, so more Mastercard customers can benefit from a simpler and more efficient experience.
Additionally, American Express Global Business Travel has integrated its hotel marketplace, featuring over 2 million properties across 180 countries with competitive rates, into the new Concur Travel solution, providing customers with access to comprehensive hotel content, including negotiated programs and preferred partner rates.
Announcing SAP Concur Innovation Award winners
On day two of the event, we celebrated the remarkable achievements of our SAP Concur Innovation Award winners. These companies have leveraged SAP Concur solutions to revolutionize their travel and expense processes, enhancing efficiency and visibility. The 2025 winners include L’Oréal Groupe, which streamlined user provisioning between HR and expense systems, and Weatherford, which automated its global travel and expense program, significantly improving data integrity and compliance.
UST, Coca-Cola, E.ON, and Mayekawa also have demonstrated exceptional innovation. UST consolidated its T&E processes; Coca-Cola unified its travel booking and expense systems; E.ON automated data collection for GDPR compliance; and Mayekawa reduced its finance team’s workload by more than 12,000 hours. These successes highlight the transformative power of SAP Concur solutions in driving business efficiency and growth. We are very proud to recognize these exceptional organizations as 2025 SAP Concur Innovation Award winners.
Move to future T&E: Spotlight on generative AI
SAP Concur is creating a world where travel and expenses practically manage themselves. At SAP Concur Fusion, we shared with customers and partners how we continue to deliver on that journey—with touchless, intuitive experiences enabled by industry-leading SAP Business AI and close partnerships with top payment providers. The Concur Travel and Concur Expense solutions are part of SAP Business Suite, SAP’s comprehensive portfolio of integrated solutions that combines our core cloud ERP and line-of-business applications, fueled by unmatched business data and actionable AI.
Chris Juneau is SVP and head of SAP Concur Product Marketing.
