Sage touts Sage ACCPAC ERP in new product order
Posted by Glen Mund on Thu, Aug 16, 2007 @ 04:48 PM
By Richard Morochove
The Bottom Line - August 2007
A corporate re-organization announced a few days prior to the gathering set the stage. The keynote announced the fallout of the reorganization, a stratification of the company's business management and accounting applications into two categories: value and strategic products. Sage Business Vision and Sage Pro, for example, are now classified as value products. On the other hand, Sage ACCPAC and Simply Accounting by Sage are strategic products.
In my opinion, the value products resemble what Sage once called "sunset products." In a 2002 briefing in Boston, Sage's North American CEO Ron Verni described accounting software Dac-Easy as a sunset product. It would continue to be supported, but not actively promoted. Five years later, Dac-Easy is still sold and a new version was recently released. However, you don't see the product stocked by major retailers, nor is it promoted by major advertising campaigns. While Business Vision will continue to be sold and supported by Sage, I believe it will not be improved in any substantial way. Tellingly, the original developer of Business Vision and its longtime guiding light, Murray Aston, is no longer employed by Sage. Schoutsen takes an upbeat view: "Business Vision will not be put out to a pasture. That's not the case." Businesses using the Business Vision can continue to enjoy the product. However, I would not recommend new users purchase it at this time.
I believe the differentiation between value and strategic products is due to an embarrassment of accounting riches at Sage. The U.K.-based company is the great consolidator in the accounting software business. It acquired dozens of accounting software solutions in the past decade. Some of Sage's business accounting solutions compete with each other by appealing to similar markets. So it's only natural that the company sort out a pecking order.
The future looks rosier for strategic products Sage ACCPAC, aimed at mid-sized businesses and its entry-level sibling, Simply Accounting. Laurie Schultz, former general manager of Simply Accounting solutions has been promoted and now gains responsibility for the ACCPAC line. The move makes business sense since upgrading Simply users accounts for one-third of ACCPAC's new customers, according to Schultz. Shultz joined Sage nearly three years ago, moving from accounting software rival Intuit Canada, where she managed the QuickBooks operations. Scott Zandbergen, the long-time product marketing manager for Simply, assumes Schultz's former role, heading up Simply Accounting management.
The market leadership in Canadian small business accounting systems is hotly disputed. Both Sage and Intuit Canada claim to be the market leaders. While QuickBooks has a strong presence on retail shelves, Simply Accounting also relies upon other channels, such as 7100 accounting professionals. Schultz calls accountant recommendations "the secret sauce for small business." In third spot, surprisingly enough, is an accounting software product which is no longer officially sold or supported in Canada - MYOB. MYOB Canada was sold by its Australian parent company to Intuit Canada in November 2001. Intuit decided to stop supporting MYOB customers in 2003 and encouraged them to switch to QuickBooks. Despite the lack of official support in Canada for four years, there are still a significant number of loyal MYOB users. They amount to roughly eight per cent of the Canadian market, according to Schultz. Non-official updates are available for MYOB Canadian Payroll and many consultants still support the application.
Development efforts are now in full swing at Simply Accounting. The venerable application will gain a new user interface and home screen in its 2008 release, due this fall. However, users will be able to continue to use the current, classic look, if they wish.
Beneath the surface, the next version of Simply will move to the MySQL database to manage accounting data. MySQL is a popular database, particularly for growing websites. MySQL should make it more efficient for companies to use Simply Accounting to manage larger accounting databases, such as those with many thousands of products in inventory.
After the keynote, I still had difficulty understanding the distinguishing characteristics of the two product groups. So I asked John Schoutsen, Sage's vice- president of corporate communications, to clarify. According to Schoutsen, "Value products will have the benefit of an aggressive R&D plan aimed at enhancing the existing products from a feature/function perspective focused on the needs of existing users, while strategic products will be focused more on the needs of existing users as well as new users and also on adopting new technology innovation." That sounds like marketing bafflegab to me. What does that really mean to users of the products?
Software developers often time important announcements for maximum impact, such as releasing the news at annual conferences attended by resellers and major customers. Sage Software's Insights 2007 conference in May came through in spades.