Agresso's Public Sector Customers Spend up to 3.5 Times Less on Annual ERP Running Costs

VICTORIA, British Columbia and IRVING, Texas, July 28, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

• 54 councils report annual cost of running ERP from the three leading suppliers to UK public sector;
• Almost half the number of full time employees needed to maintain Agresso ERP.

UNIT4 Business Software's parent company UNIT4, the world's leading provider of business software for Businesses Living IN Change (BLINC™), today published research findings from 54 councils in the UK, that confirm Agresso Business World customers in local government are spending considerably less to run their ERP systems than their counterparts working with the two brand leaders. In many cases, councils using Agresso are spending up to 3.5 times less in annual running costs, with almost half the number of Full Time Equivalent (FTE) staff supporting the software.

Late last year UNIT4 - whose Agresso Business World ERP solution is used by more UK councils than any other -announced the findings of research among 20 UK councils that found they spend on average $1,966,680 USD (£1.2 million) per year maintaining other 'big ERP' systems. A further independent survey conducted from April to June this year compares the annual ERP running costs reported by 54 UK councils and the number of full time IT support staff needed for Agresso Business World versus the two 'big ERP' brands.

Users of the two brand leading ERP solutions reported that they employ on average 1.1 FTEs and 0.72 FTEs respectively to support their ERP system for every 1000 employees, but for Agresso this figure was just 0.62.

The average cost to maintain ERP systems for every 1,000 residents was reported to be $4,956 USD (£3,024) and $2,753 USD (£1,680) for the same big ERP brands. Agresso local government users have a considerably lower cost of ownership, on average spending just $1,425 USD (£870) using the same measurements.

"The flexibility of Agresso has been incredibly important to us," said Steve Vasey, Finance Manager (Business Services) at Xentrall, the shared services venture between Stockton-on-Tees and Darlington Borough Councils. "The sector has been particularly volatile recently but because we use Agresso we can adapt our systems internally without spending precious budget on external IT consultants."

Agresso Business World is uniformly acknowledged and documented both by industry technology analysts and customers to offer unrivalled post-implementation agility.

"It came as no surprise to us that some local government organizations are spending 248 percent more to run other ERP systems and we expect the same to be the case in North America, but it doesn't have to be, as the days of ERP vendors holding users hostage are over," said Ton Dobbe, VP Product Management, UNIT4. "This proves that not all technology can adapt to more austere times and clearly highlights the need to consider the total cost of owning ERP as the ongoing financial burden of maintaining systems can be very high."

UNIT4 is already the number one provider of ERP systems to local government in several European markets. The company is continuing to expand its market share with a series of recent wins where rapid, low cost change management has been the influencing factor.

A high resolution infographic illustrating these findings is available to download here.

A PDF of the infographic illustrating these findings is available to download here.

About UNIT4

UNIT4 is a global business software and services company aimed at helping dynamic public sector, and commercial services organizations to embrace change simply, quickly and cost effectively in a market sector it calls 'Businesses Living IN Change' (BLINC)™. The Group incorporates a number of the world's leading change embracing software brands including Agresso Business World, our flagship ERP suite for mid-sized services intensive organizations and Coda, our best-of-class financial management software.

With operations in 17 European countries, as well as 7 countries across North America, Asia Pacific and Africa and sales activities in several other countries, its revenue was €421.7 million in 2010. UNIT4 is headquartered in Sliedrecht, the Netherlands and has over 4,000 employees. It is listed on Euronext Amsterdam and is included in the Amsterdam Midcap Index (AMX). For more information on UNIT4 or any of its operating companies, please visit the website at http://www.unit4.com, follow us on Twitter @UNIT4_Group.

The names of actual companies or products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners. Agresso, Agresso Business World, BLINC and VITA are registered trademarks of UNIT4 Business Software.

Media contact:

David Turner
Group Marketing Director, UNIT4
+44(0)1423-537739
[email protected]

SOURCE UNIT4