An ERP Vendor Soap Opera: A Close Look at SAP's Purchase (and Attempt to Sell Off) TomorrowNow
When SAP acquired cut-rate ERP service provider TomorrowNow, observers scratched their heads. How would the two work together? Then Oracle sued, alleging stolen information. SAP isn't waiting for its court date. It's ready to entertain buyers for TomorrowNow.
Will the Sun Come Out for TomorrowNow?
While TomorrowNow’s fate is unclear, the Oracle lawsuit marches on toward the Feb. 9, 2009, trial in Northern District Court in San Francisco. Questions abound, including two big ones: If SAP does sell TomorrowNow between now and then, what will that mean for the case? And will the parties settle the case before then?
Rimini Street’s Ravin says neither the lawsuit nor the SAP press release has dampened his business. “Our business grew and went through the roof after the lawsuit was filed,” he says. That’s because in the lawsuit Oracle included dozens of companies from TomorrowNow’s customer list, which, he says, made other companies wonder, “Am I the only guy paying full price?”
In a his report on the SAP announcement, AMR’s Richardson provided an intriguing scenario for how all of this could all play out. “Rimini Street succeeds in buying TomorrowNow from SAP and then later sells the whole business to Oracle. Oracle could continue the discounted maintenance program as a way of ensuring that companies remain as customers or switch them back to standard maintenance.
“As we have said many times before,” Richardson writes, “all things are possible.”
