Investing.com -- SAP SE's shares were indicated 0.5% higher at $159.15 in pre-market trading Thursday as Bloomberg reported the German software giant is restricting new hiring and cutting non-AI business travel, redirecting those savings toward what the company describes as a "significant push into AI," part of a deepening strategic bet that has already reshaped the company's executive ranks twice this year.

SAP SE (ETR: SAPG) stock has shed roughly 47% over the past year on the NYSE, leaving the ADR barely above its $148.06 52-week floor ahead of a critical Q2 earnings report on July 23.

The spending reorientation is paired with a sweeping leadership reorganization. CEO Christian Klein has personally assumed control of AI product development under a program called "Project Fuji," absorbing the responsibilities of departing board member Muhammad Alam rather than immediately naming a replacement. Chief Operating Officer Sebastian Steinhäuser has taken over Industrial AI. SAP confirmed the logic in a statement to CIO.com: "SAP is evolving its organization to accelerate its transformation toward an AI-driven Autonomous Enterprise. The new structure brings AI, data, and core applications closer together, enabling more integrated, end-to-end solutions built on SAP's unique process expertise."

This is the second major reorganization in 2026. A March restructuring created the "Customer Value Group," and a May update established dedicated "Business AI Platform" and "Autonomous Suite" units reporting directly to Klein. The pace of internal change reflects how seriously the company is treating the pivot, and how much investor patience has frayed as the stock has slid more than 26% below its 200-day moving average of €182.43.

Klein has been blunt about what the transformation means for the workforce. "I'm not sure if here someone in two or three years will still code software," he told The New York Times on Thursday. "I don't expect to operate with a smaller work force, but with a very, very different work force." SAP shed roughly 3,000 jobs in a 2023 restructuring and then launched a €2 billion cost program in early 2024 affecting 8,000 positions, yet has since added more than 3,500 net new roles, many of them customer-facing "forward-deployed engineers" working on AI solutions.

At SAP Sapphire in May 2026, Klein unveiled the "Autonomous Suite," rebranding the full cloud ERP stack around agentic AI, and confirmed a shift to consumption-based pricing measured in "AI Units", a significant structural departure from traditional per-user SaaS billing that could alter revenue predictability. How enterprise customers and analysts model that transition is one of the most consequential open questions heading into results.

Despite the share-price punishment, analysts have largely held their bullish stance. UBS targets €205 on the stock, Berenberg €215, Jefferies €210 with a buy rating, and Bernstein Research as high as €276. UBS analyst Michael Briest expects further margin improvement in Q2, following a 30% operating margin in Q1, the highest in 13 quarters, even as Q1 cloud revenue surged 27% at constant currencies. A €10 billion share buyback program running through end-2027 provides some downside support, though the current tranche's first leg repurchased roughly 16.3 million shares at an average price of €161.16, well above where the stock trades today on Xetra at €138.92.

The July 23 earnings release will serve as the first real scorecard for Klein's capital-discipline strategy. Consensus points to earnings per share of $2.06 on revenue of $11.47 billion. Investors will be watching closely for any update on the AI investment program's scale, the progress of the Autonomous Suite's commercial rollout, and how management frames the "AI Units" pricing model's impact on forward revenue visibility, questions that the hiring freeze has raised but the company, currently in its pre-earnings quiet period, has not yet answered.