Third-Party Support Special: About the Third person - 1

INDIA: Once upon a time there was a CIO burdened down with a white elephant called ERP Maintenance. To eke out the worth of a big suite’s price tag was his mandate. But he always lost pace against the big wall of huge AMCs (Annual Maintenance Contracts) year after year. It was a Sisyphean phenomenon, where the stone always used to roll down the hill after a huge effort to carry it up. Only to watch it grow heavier each time.

The reason the writer here has usurped the privilege of using past tense is a simple three-letter word. Or may be a two-letter one.

Third-party maintenance. If you have happened to read the exploits of companies like Rimini Street, there’s no need to put in that word for the uninitiated.

Even if you haven’t, you might already be well aware of the puzzle called AMCs.

The market is open to a number of low-cost providers.

All a customer needs is an assurance of stability and few concomitant disruptions on turfs like tax, regulatory or technical upgrade areas.

Rimini Street, have been making some headlines in the recent past. And for more stuff than being sued by Oracle last year wherein it was alleged of infringing on Oracle's IP. There are more names to join this league - like Spinnaker Support, netCustomer and Virtual Tech.

Panaya is another name to reckon with. It has positioned itself as an option for those looking at minimal risk of upgrade and associated testing headaches. While Rimini Street supports SAP and Oracle product lines, Panaya offers its service for SAP customers.

As a media report highlighted, a Panaya customer still pays SAP its annual maintenance fee; however, the update process is completely re-engineered after this point.

The trend is clear. Third-party support is now available. And for a variety of applications.

It can be due to the decades-old malaise of costly AMCs or could be because of original’s vendor support lifecycle going in for an obit.

It not only gives CIOs a chance to achieve the long-coveted savings on hefty software budgets, but the very option allows them a negotiating advantage with the big cheese.

ERP Suites have always been laden with criticisms of being a huge, complicated black hole that doesn’t justify the huge expenses, at least not of the support side. A CIO can either rip and replace an old suite, that has already turned into a heavily-punctured coffin or look at the last nail — support from elsewhere available.

But do these support guys have what it takes? We find that out in the next segment.