It’s a typical day at Acme Worldwide Enterprises. An Application Engine job bombs out when posting items. The analyst finds a problem with the code and notifies Oracle support, who tells him that it’s fixed in Bundle #17. The analyst hangs up the phone and sighs. They’re only current through bundle #6.
The analyst approaches his manager and tells her what he found. The manager realizes that this will be a big impact to the shared service group that’s responsible for testing the application. Applying so many bundles at once will require compare reports, re-applying customizations, and full regression testing of every module. She asks the analyst to see what it’ll take to develop their own one-off fix to get their otherwise stable application working again.
The manager then turns back to the task at hand – the next year’s budget. She’s just been notified by Oracle that the license fees are increasing yet again – which means the annual support cost, calculated as a percentage of license fees, will be increasing as well. This will be a tough sell. The CFO already doesn’t understand why support is so expensive for an application that’s been live and stable for two years now. The CIO will question why they should pay more per year going forward since the emphasis is on ROI and they don’t plan to upgrade for several years -- if ever. After all, Software as a Service and Open Source solutions are all on the table. But getting the periodic regulatory updates requires support. What can she do?
According to Punita Pandey, CEO of netCustomer, Inc. , this is a scenario that happens all too often. And there is a solution.
We give customers an alternative path to paying high maintenance fees. If customers don’t want to upgrade and have a stable application, we provide 24X7 technical support and regulatory updates, both customized to customer-specific requirements.
Most customers can save at least 50%, and some up to 75% on maintenance fees with netCustomer.
netCustomer customers get customized support. When a customer needs a fix, they don’t get a huge bundle of fixes to apply; they just get a custom fix for the single issue. They only get what they need. It’s the same thing for regulatory updates. And we assist customers through testing process.
We help with customization troubleshooting as well. Many issues have little to do with the core product, but with customizations.
Until recently there’s been only one 3rd party support provider with enough muscle to compete with Oracle themselves at supporting PeopleSoft applications. That provider is TomorrowNow. TomorrowNow was started by Seth Ravin and Andrew Nelson back in 2001. A few years later they sold to SAP who was looking to go head-to-head with Oracle in an effort to capitalize on the uncertain post-acquisition PeopleSoft market.
Lately though TomorrowNow’s fortunes have turned around. Oracle accused them of “corporate theft on a grand scale” – i.e. unauthorized access of the support website, Customer Connection -- and a lawsuit was filed. Shortly thereafter, SAP announced its intention to sell TomorrowNow, but so far there have been no takers. And Oracle has recently added charges to its original complaint.
So with pending litigation and an uncertain future, TomorrowNow’s customers are increasingly uncomfortable and looking for some stability, though not necessarily from Oracle. According to this article , president and CEO of Rimini Street, Seth Ravin says
The lawsuit actually opened up business -- because some people didn't even know there was a choice. A lot of people read the lawsuit and said, 'My God, Merck and Honeywell, and all these large companies using third-party support.' And instead of saying, 'Wow, look what happened here!' The issue really is, 'Holy gee, am I the only guy paying full price?'
So netCustomer and Rimini Street are two companies vying to fill the vacuum left by the flailing TomorrowNow. Both are credible players in this market. netCustomer partnered with PeopleSoft before the PeopleSoft buyout and provided technical support for PeopleSoft customers through GSC. Rimini Street was started by one of the original founders of TomorrowNow.
But with the lawsuit there is certainly a lot of scrutiny around 3rd party support. Can customers count on the 3rd-party support marketplace be there in a few years? According to Punita Pandey:
The need for 3rd party support is real. TomorrowNow became a growth leader, partly because they were funded by SAP. They seem to have done a good service for the customers. Even if they go away the market isn’t going away. The need is real. Is it a small portion? That’s probably true. Will it increase in size? That’s probably true too. It’s a growing market but it will evolve over the next few years. If companies have mature and customized ERP applications environment, the cost-benefit of vendor support is questionable at best. netCustomer support not only saves on costs but also provides a better value.
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Last Updated on Tuesday, 06 May 2008 13:03.