We’re thrilled that SAP has been named a Leader in the inaugural IDC MarketScape: Worldwide Talent Intelligence 2025 Vendor Assessment (doc #US52995425, November 2025). As organizations accelerate their shift to skills-based talent strategies, talent intelligence platforms are becoming mission critical to everything from workforce planning and hiring to mobility, development, and retention. We believe this recognition reflects SAP’s commitment to helping organizations build a dynamic, skills-driven workforce.
The IDC MarketScape for Worldwide Talent Intelligence evaluates vendors using the IDC MarketScape model, which incorporates quantitative and qualitative factors to assess vendors’ current capabilities and future road maps for delivering value to customers seeking talent intelligence. According to the report, SAP was recognized for strengths in “unified and integrated skills framework, embedded AI and analytics, and an open data ecosystem.”
Chasing innovation: powering the skills-based enterprise
At SAP, we have made consistent and strategic investments in skills, talent intelligence, and AI-driven workforce planning.
The talent intelligence hub is a unified skills framework embedded across the entire SAP SuccessFactors HCM suite. It empowers HR with an AI-driven, consistent skills foundation to help optimize talent processes, enrich personalized employee learning experiences, and accelerate skills development—enabling organizations to build an agile, future-ready workforce.
Building on this foundation, skills and intelligence capabilities can be leveraged across multiple product areas. SAP SuccessFactors Career and Talent Development helps transform career growth, internal mobility, and success into a single, AI-powered, skills-based solution, helping to give leaders clear visibility into workforce capabilities while guiding employees to personalized opportunities, so you can build, retain, and deploy the talent your strategy needs to win. SAP SuccessFactors Workforce Scheduling (generally available in 1H 2026) can enable optimized shift planning in manufacturing and production by helping to ensure the right people with the right skills are in the right place at the right time to help prevent the costly impacts of understaffing or overstaffing. And the People Intelligence package in SAP Business Data Cloud can bring together people, skills, and business data, from SAP SuccessFactors solutions and beyond, into actionable insights that help leaders make more informed people and business decisions.
We are also accelerating innovation with new Joule Agents to help automate repetitive tasks, guide employees with real-time, context-aware support, and enable accuracy across core HR processes, so that HR can focus on strategic people initiatives. The Performance and Goals Agent, now generally available, and the upcoming Career and Talent Development and People Intelligence Agents (both planned for 1H 2026) will deliver AI capabilities to help manage performance reviews, compensation planning, skills distribution, retention, personalized development, and succession. And with SAP’s acquisition of SmartRecruiters, we are strengthening our talent acquisition capabilities to deliver an even more unified, intelligence-driven hiring experience.
These innovations help organizations close skills gaps and empower employees with meaningful, data-driven growth opportunities, helping them thrive in an ever-changing workplace.
Customer insights: real outcomes from skills transformation
Our customers say it best when it comes to the impact of our skills-based innovations.
- Capgemini, a global business and technology partner, is building a skills engine to support the employee lifecycle. “Skills are at the core of our company, as they support both clients and employees. Our promise to ‘get the future you want’ means thinking about future client needs and employee skills and career development. SAP SuccessFactors HCM is key in our skills-first approach to our people experience transformation,” Jihane Baciocchini, vice president and head of Talent Acquisition, Capgemini, said.
- Grundfos, one of the world’s leading pump and water solutions companies, is utilizing the talent intelligence hub functionality of SAP SuccessFactors solutions to create a single source of skills information, enabling it to connect people and business needs in new ways. “There’s a consensus that what got us here won’t get us there: we need new skills and capabilities. And that’s where the talent intelligence hub in SAP SuccessFactors solutions comes in. It’s helping us build one skills foundation that feeds into critical decisions on talent—and transform skills into something we live and breathe every day,” Mads Kidmose, head of HR Technology and Data Foundation, Grundfos Holding A/S, said.
What’s next
This is a critical moment for HR leaders, as talent intelligence platforms are transforming how organizations hire, develop, and retain their workforce. Looking ahead to 2026, our focus remains on expanding skills-based capabilities and delivering AI solutions that can empower every organization to grow with confidence and thrive.
Read an excerpt of the 2025 IDC MarketScape for Worldwide Talent Intelligence report.
Lara Albert is chief marketing officer for SAP SuccessFactors.
