Oracle Small Business looks upmarket

PALO ALTO: Oracle Small Business on Monday said it is targeting bigger

companies with newly upgraded online services that help automate accounting,

inventory, Web activities, selling and customer service.

Software from San Mateo, California-based NetLedger powers the small business

product sold by Oracle Corp., which is the No. 1 vendor of database software.

Oracle also sells software to manage business processes at large corporations.

In 1998, NetLedger -- which has received substantial funding from Oracle

chief executive Larry Ellison -- started selling online accounting software to

companies with up to 25 employees. Oracle has offered NetLedger's integrated

software as its own brand since June and now is using its updated product to

target companies with 25 to 250 employees and sales of up to $50 million. The

new version of NetLedger's software includes sales force automation, customer

support management and advanced shipping and receiving. It is also more

expensive.

While the base price for the service remains the same at $99 a month, the

company is trimming the number of free users included in that price from five to

two users with unfettered access and one accounting-only user. The cost for

additional user access is going up from $20 to $50 per month.

"We still feel that we are a very efficient tool for the smallest

businesses ... Realistically, it's the companies between 25 and 250 that see the

maximum benefit of this," Evan Goldberg, president of Oracle Small Business

and chief executive of NetLedger, said of the beefed-up small business offering.

Goldberg said Oracle Small Business is aiming its selling efforts at

companies such as auto dealerships and franchise operators, which work closely

with the large businesses that Oracle is courting with its own 11i e-business

software.

NetLedger -- which has 5,000 companies paying to use its service and expects

to be profitable in early to mid-2003 -- competes with small business software

maker Intuit Inc., Microsoft bCentral, the small business online service from

software titan Microsoft Corp. and others. Intuit recently said it had embarked

on a plan to sell its popular QuickBooks accounting software to bigger companies

in specific industries.