|
By Mel Duvall
The major players in the enterprise software market managed to eke out minor gains in revenue increases last year, according to a report issued this week by AMR Research, but the Boston, Mass.-based firm is predicting the global economic slowdown will bite into revenues this year, in the range of 2 to 6%.
According to the report, vendors of enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, supply chain management (SCM), human capital management (HCM), and customer relationship management (CRM) experienced year-over-year growth of between 4% and 9% between 2007 and 2008. The one exception to the growth story was the product lifecycle management (PLM) segment, which saw a decline of 2%. AMR Research analyst Marianne D'Aquila said in a statement that the decline in PLM software, which is used by customers to design and engineer new products, was heavily impacted by cutbacks in the automotive and manufacturing sectors, and provides a glimpse into what lies ahead for 2009.
"There is no doubt, now more than ever, the global economy will have its greatest impact on the enterprise application software market in 2009," she said.
In its ranking of the top 50 enterprise software vendors, AMR noted that SAP and Oracle continue to dominate the markets, and they continue to play an influential role across most segments of the market. In fact, the PLM segment is the only one not dominated by SAP or Oracle.
According to the rankings, SAP was No. 1 in 2007-2008, with $15.8 billion in revenue. Oracle was No. 2 with $8.6 billion. Sage Group was No. 3 with $2.4 billion, Infor fourth with $2.2 billion, and Dassault Systems rounded out the top five, with $2 billion in revenue.
Sage Group, which is not as well known as Oracle or SAP, is headquartered in Newcastle Upon Tyne, Great Britain, and specializes in enterprise software for small-to-mid-sized businesses. In its most recent financial update, provided in early May, the company noted that sales were being hit by the economy and it had taken steps to mitigate the impact.
"After a robust performance last year, we are now experiencing the effects of the weakening global economy in most of our markets, with customers delaying software purchasing decisions," Chief Executive Paul Walker said in the update. "We are proactively managing our business for these demanding market conditions and, in the current financial year to date, we have successfully eliminated annualized costs of £49.3m, representing 4% of the full year 2008 cost base."
The following are the rankings of the Top 50 Enterprise Software in 2008 vendors by revenue:
Only registered users can write comments.
Please login or register. |
