Infor CEO sees 'minimal overlap' from SSA deal

Computerworld - The number of contenders in the ERP market shrank this week with the buyout of software vendor SSA Global by rival Infor Global Systems.

The acquisition will create a $1.6 billion company that will be the de facto third-largest business applications vendor after SAP AG and Oracle. Corp., according to Jim Schaper, chairman and CEO of Alpharetta, Ga.-based Infor. While he was unable to offer a detailed, long-term product road map, Schaper did emphasize in an interview that there are no plans to kill off any products or do forced migrations.

He acknowledged, however, that both sets of products served similar markets. Infor has been selling to manufacturing and distribution customers and offers cross-industry software that enables asset management. SSA's various product lines, which themselves were cobbled together through a number of acquisitions, also serve manufacturers, said Schaper.

However, each company serves different niches in those markets, and there is "minimal overlap" among those niches. In addition, both companies have been working to develop a service-oriented architecture (SOA) for their products that will offer an inexpensive way to do applications integration, he said.

A couple of Infor customers were upbeat about the merger. "I have no end-of-product life concerns," said Bruce Knoll, director of IT at Meridian Automotive Systems Inc. in Dearborn, Mich. The car parts maker runs Mapics ERP applications from Infor. He said Infor isn't likely to buy up SSA just to sell it again for a profit or force the installed base to do migrations. Additionally, he is curious to see what SSA might bring to Infor's product portfolio.

Knoll said both companies serve midsize manufacturers that rely on the AS/400 platform, making the deal announced Monday a "good match."

"This is an opportunity," said Jeff Vogstad, client solutions team manager at Coast Mountain Bus Co. in Vancouver, British Columbia. The transportation company uses Infor's Datastream asset management applications to help maintain its 1,200 buses and its facilities. The buyout of SSA will allow Infor to offer a broader set of applications and give it a bigger installed base that will increase the opportunities for customers to share intellectual property.

Vogstad said he's also interested in SSA's warehouse management and transport management applications, and he hopes Infor will work to integrate them with its own software.

The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter.

Read more about erp/supply chain in Computerworld's ERP/Supply Chain Knowledge Center.