SAP and Microsoft have joined up in an alliance to let SAP's HANA database run on Microsoft Azure cloud, as well as integrating Office 365 and SAP cloud services.

Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) and SAP AG (NYSE/Frankfurt: SAP) are also teaming up on enhanced management and security for custom SAP Fiori apps.

Coats LLC, Rockwell Automation and Nortek are three enterprises already using SAP on Azure. Sujeet Chand, senior VP and CTO for Rockwell Automation, said in a joint statement from Microsoft and SAP that the service provides scalability, security and services to run SAP HANA and big data applications.

Microsoft has more details on the Azure blog.

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Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN) doesn't want to get left out of the fun. The company put out a statement Tuesday reminding everybody that it runs SAP apps too, has since 2011, and counts GE, Brooks Brothers, Lionsgate and Ferrara Candy Company among its customers.

SAP has been busy. The company and Apple announced this month that they're working together to provide development tools to build apps for the iPhone and iPad and HANA. (See Apple, SAP Partner on Mobile Cloud Apps.)

SAP's alliances follow one of the earliest cloud strategies: allowing enterprise customers to move on-premises apps to the cloud for greater flexibility, manageability, reach and cost savings.

— Mitch Wagner, , Editor, Enterprise Cloud, Light Reading.