A new offering this week from NetSuite called SuiteCloud Connect forSAP lets users connect NetSuite data to their existing SAP systems.This way, NetSuite is essentially targeting those SAP users.
It’s an offering that is being sold to customers as a palatablesoftware-as-a-service approach in this cost-cutting climate. Oneanalyst suggested that SAP could have done the same thing with its ownfoundering on-demand ERP tool Business ByDesign, except it was marketedquite differently: for first-time customers looking for a new SaaSoffering.
It sounds like, while an offering can render an array ofcapabilities and benefits, its success can be largely due to how it’smarketed, and to which of those capabilities is chosen as the“flagship” capability to get the spotlight.
With the economic downturn, vendors are increasingly marketing theirproducts as scalable, and offering them in a modular fashion that canaugmented when funds or the need becomes available, or reduced whenutilization is low. It’s fitting considering the necessity to move awayfrom the long-term and resource-demanding deployment that can onlyrender a delayed return on investment.
The massive ERP implementation is not so hot nowadays, and SAP ERPimplementations have earned negative sentiments, having been describedas monolithic, over-budget, over-schedule. I read somewhere (I forgetwhere exactly) where an industry observer noted that customers alwayshad the option to buy SAP piecemeal, except it was never marketed thatway. But, I guess, perhaps now, that modular option will be one of thefeatures deemed more appropriate to this climate, and will get pushedto the fore.
