Dublin-based banking data analysis group, Bankhawk Analytics, has won the SAP Startup Focus Award in Florida. It won in the category "Most Transformative" startup at the SAPPHIRE NOW conference. The competition provided participants in the SAP Startup Focus program an opportunity to showcase their solutions for the SAP HANA platform during SAPPHIRE NOW held in Orlando, the first week of June. Almost 100 companies participated in the challenge, with the field narrowed to 20 finalists in four categories. Bankhawk Analytics and the other three winners were announced by Hasso Plattner, co-founder and chair of SAP AG, during his keynote address. The Irish firm showcased Bankhawk365, its analytics software, which companies can use to unlock cash trapped in banking systems, uncover hidden banking costs and generate large ongoing savings. "We are very proud to be a part of the SAP Startup Focus program," said Brian Weakliam, CEO of Bankhawk Analytics. "Winning the award in the category Most Transformative was a pleasant surprise. The journey with SAP has been very rewarding so far and the future looks extremely bright." The SAP Startup Focus program supports startups in developing new applications on SAP HANA, SAP's real-time database platform that streamlines analytics, planning and predictive assessments to allow business to operate in real time. The program is an accelerator for big data, predictive and real-time analytics startups and now has more than 1,500 startups with very distinct SAP HANA-based use-cases, from gaming to retail to finance to manufacturing and more.