Industry Articles

The goal of this section is to highlight articles that may be of interest to you. These articles are available from various industry sources.

Articles on Software Maintenance Trends

  • Best of Breed — Coming Full Circle

    2007 PRISM User Group Meeting — keynote presentation by Craig Piekarz; Chief Product Strategist, Boston Logix

    Two distinct groups of software vendors developed Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) products, the Platform Players, and the Best-Of-Breed Players. These groups had different go-to-market strategies. Platform Players targeted the executive levels of prospective clients selling global enterprise accounting systems. Best-Of-Breed Players targeted industry niche business requirements which were often at the operational level of the organization. Their philosophy was “go deep and specialized.”

  • Evidence Grows That App Modernization Tops App Replacement

    SystemiNetwork— blog post by John Ghrist, November 27, 2007

    “The assertion that modernizing your applications is a better investment than replacing them outright recently gained a little more credibility… …A recent study by Forrester Consulting conducted for Software AG, maker of Adabas (a data-management solution) and Natural (an application and deployment environment), both mainframe tools, found that legacy modernization would produce a five-year return on investment (ROI) of 331 percent, with payback achieved in less than four months in a composite case study of several representative enterprises…”

  • Is Your ERP System Safe from Industry Consolidation?

    WAM Systems Newsletter — article by Dave Kravitt

    As the enterprise business software industry continues to consolidate, many companies employing these applications are faced with a dilemma — continue to invest in their existing mission critical systems or migrate to newer, “state-of-the-art” systems. Often legacy applications are working well, addressing current business requirements and providing value, but have been orphaned by their vendor. Frequently the financial justification to replace is uncertain and the risk assessment immeasurable. This article explores the continuum of choices: keep, replace, or augment…

  • Managing Business Intelligence Complexity

    Vanguard Business Analytics

    Overcoming the complexities assciated with traditional BI approaches

  • ERP Users Bristle at Upgrade Pressure, Maintenance Costs

    Computerworld

    IT execs cite growing dissatisfaction, take steps to rein in vendors

  • Paying More for less

    Computerworld

  • Take Back Enterprise Technology

    CIO.Com

    Many of the large enterprise vendors are practicing customer abuse, say Susan H. Cramm and Whole Foods CIO Mike Clifford. It's time to right the ship. Read their joint column, send your questions and they'll respond online.

  • Old ERP Dilemma: How Long Should You Pay Maintenance?

    TechnologyEvaluation.Com — article by Olin Thompson

    ABSTRACT: After a company has decided to keep an existing ERP system, the next decision is how long should they continue to pay the vendor for maintenance.

  • The Old ERP Dilemma: Should We Install The New Release?

    TechnologyEvaluation.Com — article by Olin Thompson

    TechnologyEvaluation.Com — author Olin Thompson ABSTRACT: If you have an older ERP system and you have decided to continue to pay maintenance you should be getting periodic releases from the vendor. The frequency of these releases varies, but for each new release, you have a decision to make. Should you install the new release or not?

  • The Old ERP Dilemma: The Refresh Option

    TechnologyEvaluation.Com — article by Olin Thompson

    TechnologyEvaluation.Com - author Olin Thompson ABSTRACT: If your ERP system is “old”, if it is highly modified, if it is far behind in releases, if it is not really serving your current needs, you may be thinking of replacing it. Many companies ignore the option of “refreshing” the existing system up to the current release and implementing modules and functions added since your original purchase. It works for some people, but will it work for you?