Founded by five former IBM employees in the early 1970s, SAP, or Systems, Applications, and Products in Data Processing, is a software application company that is well-known for its Enterprise Resource Planning system, or ERP software. The system combines a number of functions and modules focused on every business process needed across different industries. Some of the modules offered by the ERP system include treasury, human resources, and sales and distribution.
As a company, SAP is also known for its R/3 product which was combined with its flagship product ERP to provide real-time services. The R/3 system is a basic processing architecture made up of three layers: presentation, database, and application. It assists users specifically with the management of financial and asset accounting, production operations, and personnel, and offers the advantage of seeing changes in real time.