ERP Supplier Comparison, 2009

 

Infor

Microsoft

Oracle

SAP

Other
ERP Functionality Over 20 “brands” with widely diverse functionality Four basic brands; all but AX with basic functionality Four primary brands, two with deep functionality Two brands, one with the deepest functionality available
  • Lawson—Two
  • Sage—Multiple
  • Intuit—One
Market penetration/ activity, ERP

 With its many brands, probably third largest but heavily maintenance- revenue- and AS/400-based Would rank somewhere between Infor and Lawson Gaining on SAP, especially in North America, but still significantly behind SAP in ERP market share Holds wide lead in ERP market share (SAP is also gaining in middleware behind IBM, Microsoft and Oracle) Sage and Intuit in particular have many more installations than Infor, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP but are aimed totally at small- and medium-size enterprises
Market penetration/ activity, standalone

 Also has a widely diverse mix of standalone application brands Leads based on Office; also actively pushing  CRM capability as a service; will use the experience to market ERP as a service Large lead over SAP in standalone applications market share, primarily through acquisition SAP does not really compete in standalone applications market but has a few offerings Thousands of examples
ERP Partnership strategy

 Partners heavily with IBM and IBM distributors Partners heavily with Microsoft developer community; looking for 100,000 About 4500 middleware partnerships that should be transferable to applications Has been trying unsuccessfully for 10 years to build a program; looking for over 1,000 Tend to partner with IBM and Microsoft (but rarely both); many newer ERP suppliers partner within open source community
ERP Industry applications strategy Wide span but primarily product supply chain Covers breadth of the industry classification codes A lot of standalone, unintegrated industry-centric point products Integrated industry centricity of its ERP offering in 25 major codes is key to SAP success in ERP Thousands of examples from companies such as Agresso, Compiere, HotWax, IFS, OpenBravo and XTuple mentioned in accompanying articles
ERP Platform

 Heavily AS/400-based .NET Different platform under each brand Solid modern middleware base for both brands Primarily use IBM or Microsoft middleware or LAMP/WAMP stack
ERP/SaaS Strategy

 Through partners Trying to build into major delivery method Not a major market goal of Oracle’s according to public statements; may be counting on NetSuite “off the books” Will take another run at NetWeaver-based SaaS, probably under the BusinessOne brand (given the failure of the Business By Demand service). Others have shied away from direct SaaS, most notably Lawson (whose CEO was not shy about it)