SAP announces strong Q3 results amid antitrust & anticompetitive claims

SAP SE announced strong financial results for the third quarter of 2025 amid ongoing antitrust and anticompetitive claims. SAP’s total revenue is up 7 percent while its IFRS operating and non-IFRS operating profits are up 12 percent and 14 percent, respectively.

Meanwhile, SAP’s current cloud backlog is up 23 percent at €18.8 billion (US$21.8 billion) with its cloud revenue up 22 percent and cloud ERP suite revenue up 26 percent.

The results come as SAP’s antitrust dispute with Celonis continues to play out. Elsewhere, the European Union (EU) is investigating SAP over potential anticompetitive practices.

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SAP’s performance underscores strength and agility

“SAP delivered a great Q3 with strong cloud revenue growth of 27 percent [at constant currencies],” said Christian Klein, CEO of SAP. “We are gaining market share as our customers are adopting solutions across the entire business suite, including business data cloud and AI [artificial intelligence] at accelerated pace. For Q4 we are executing against a strong pipeline – which gives us confidence in our accelerating total revenue growth ambition for 2026.”

SAP’s strong Q3 performance underscores the strength and agility of its model, added Dominik Asam, CFO at SAP. “Through disciplined execution and a sharp focus on profitability and cash flow, we’ve maintained forward momentum despite an uncertain macroeconomic backdrop. We enter the fourth quarter confident in our ability to deliver on our commitments, as reflected by an improved outlook for operating profit and free cash flow.”

SAP’s ongoing antitrust and anticompetitive issues

Despite its Q3 performance, SAP faces some uncertainty regarding the outcome of the Celonis case and EU probe.

In March, process intelligence vendor Celonis accused SAP of violating US antitrust law and other provisions by making it harder and more expensive for Celonis to access client data stored in SAP’s applications. Celonis also accused SAP of engaging in increasingly egregious conduct targeting its customers to coerce them into using Signavio, SAP’s own process mining offering.

The case has had several twists and turns. In June, a US court partially dismissed the claims before Celonis filed an updated complaint in July. Celonis then apposed SAP’s move to dismiss before defending its lawsuit before a skeptical US judge in October. In the same month, Celonis filed three patent claims against SAP, one in Texas and two in Munich.

Separate to the Celonis case, the EU launched an investigation into potential anticompetitive practices by SAP in September. The European Commission probe focuses on SAP’s aftermarket practices related to its ERP software, which helps companies manage finances, HR, supply chains, sales, and procurement.

SAP confirmed that the European Commission has started formal proceedings involving the company. “These proceedings address some areas of our on-premise maintenance and support policies, which are based on long-standing standards that are common across the global software sector.”

SAP stated its belief that its policies and actions are fully in line with competition rules. “However, we take the issues raised seriously and we are working closely with the EU Commission to resolve them,” the firm added.

SAP does not anticipate the engagement with the European Commission to result in material impacts on its financial performance.

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