ERP Solutions

Open Source or Proprietary ERP Solutions?

Open source Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP solutions are becoming popular.  These solutions will most likely compete with the likes of SAP, Oracle, Microsoft, Infor, Epicor and more in the near future.   The most likely open source ERP candidate to sweep the nation with all its free abilities is an open source ERP solution called OpenBravo.  OpenBravo hails from Spain and is popular in Europe and the United States.  OpenBravo is a great product for the small and medium size market.  They currently have more than two million customer downloads but, ninety percent of those customers don’t end up with the product.  Of  the ten percent of customers that do implement OpenBravo .1 percent end up converting to become paying customers.  OpenBravo has about two hundred customers they are earning profits from.  This open source ERP solution is currently in use in twenty-seven different countries and is being used by a couple thousand customers.  OpenBravo has over twelve thousand registered members and more than five hundred projects in the mix.

So, what’s better, free ERP software or commercial Enterprise Resource Planning software?  Well, there are benefits and disadvantages to both.  The big disadvantage of a proprietary Enterprise Resource Planning solution is the investment.  Organizations may invest millions of dollars only to implement the commercial ERP product and find out that it isn’t right for their business.  We know this happens because about fifteen percent of commercial Enterprise Resource Planning customers do not renew their licenses.  This disadvantage is open source’s advantage.  An advantage of proprietary Enterprise Resource Planning solution is that you have the vendor there with you to hold your hand every step of the way.  Of course, if you opt for an open source ERP solution, you can always hire support services.

OpenBravo is a web-based solution consisting of several modules or groupings of functionality.  OpenBravo can be integrated with Twitter and GoogleDocs.  The interface is user-friendly and intuitive.  Many analyst predict that this year, 2011, will be the year for OpenBravo to really succeed.  Companies are overcoming the fright of what used to be considered “unpredictable” software.  And, in an economy where everyone is trying to save a buck, open source may very well be the answer.  OpenBravo remains headquartered in Spain but the company very much has a presence in the United States.

Written by :

kristine H