(Note: This article was posted to CRN.com Aug. 22.)

SAP partners that work with the vendor's cloud software products now have access to the first phase of a partner program that a company official says will provide them with recurring revenue without the hassle or risk with the contracting and billing processes.

The initiative, SAP PartnerEdge Cloud Choice – Profit Option, is the first component of what is expected to be a multifacted cloud partner program. SAP is making good on a promise it made during the company's Sapphire Now conference in May.

Yet, while some SAP partners said that while they may tap into the services offered by the program, they see it as geared more toward recruiting new partners who haven't really made the move to selling cloud services.

[Related: SAP Partners See Opportunities, Challenges In New HANA Releases]

"It has some positives," said Tomas Fertig, CEO of Seidor, a Spring, Texas-based solution provider and SAP Platinum partner. He said that by handling the contracting and billing for cloud software subscriptions, for example, SAP is assuming more of the risk. "We'll probably adopt it in some parts of the world," Fertig said, noting that he's still reviewing the program details.

SAP, once largely known for its ERP and CRM software for big corporations, has been aggressively expanding into cloud software in recent years with software developed in-house and through such acquisitions as SuccessFactors, Concur Technologies and Ariba.

In the first half of 2016 SAP, based in Walldorf, Germany, recorded 32 percent growth in cloud subscription and support revenue to 1.40 billion Euros ($1.58 billion), But it's still relatively small compared to the company's software license and support revenue, which reached 6.81 billion Euros ($7.71 billion) in the same six months.

At SAP's Global Partner Summit in Orlando, Fla., in May, company executives unveiled plans to recruit both born-in-the-cloud strategic service providers and current solution provider partners to add SAP's cloud applications to their service portfolios. But few details were disclosed at the time.

SAP PartnerEdge Cloud Choice - Profit Option is part of SAP's overall PartnerEdge partner program, rather than a completely separate effort. It's the first of what's expected to be several Cloud Choice programs accommodating different partner models for working with cloud software.

"We're going to attract a new set of partners to us [with the new program]", said John Scola, SAP vice president of cloud channels and transformation, in an interview. But he also expects current SAP partners to leverage it to get into cloud computing.

The program will provide partners with a recurring revenue stream without having the hassle or the risk that go with the contracting and billing processes, Scola said.

The program applies to SAP's stable of cloud software including SuccessFactors human capital management, Ariba commerce network, Hybris omni-channel CRM, the Business ByDesign cloud application suite, and the cloud version of the S/4HANA application suite.