By Najat Kantouar and Mauro Orru


SAP said Chief Technology Officer Juergen Mueller would leave the German business-software company at the end of the month after what he said was inappropriate behavior at a past company event.

The group said it came to a mutual agreement with Mueller over his departure just months after extending his contract as head of tech for another three years until the end of 2027.

"I want to address an incident at a past company event where my behavior was inappropriate. I regret being inconsiderate and sincerely apologize to everyone affected. I recognize my behavior at that moment did not reflect our values at SAP," Mueller said.

An SAP representative declined to elaborate on the incident.

Mueller joined the company behind the Concur travel and expense management platform in 2013 and has been on SAP's executive board since 2019. During his mandate as chief technology officer, SAP has been moving away from software-licenses sales to subscription-based cloud services, banking on a more profitable and predictable model based on recurring revenue.

Mueller's departure also comes as SAP doubles down on efforts to cash in on artificial intelligence as it jockeys for position to compete with other tech companies. SAP last year made investments in three generative AI companies--Aleph Alpha, Anthropic and Cohere--and poached Walter Sun from Microsoft as its global head of artificial intelligence.

The company said Chief Executive Christian Klein would cover for Mueller on an interim basis.


Write to Najat Kantouar at najat.kantouar@wsj.com and Mauro Orru at mauro.orru@wsj.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

09-03-24 0541ET