By Dan Jones
System Software Associates (SSA) Inc claims that its new alliance with Cognos Inc will see it looking beyond ERP. SSA is integrating Cognos’ PowerPlay and Impromtu tools with its flagship ERP product and Rob Bailey, director of business development, says that the alliance will be the first of several planned deals with ‘best of breed’ vendors. Bailey claims that the Chicago, Illinois-based enterprise resource planning software company, which saw license revenues drop by 40% last year against 1997 figures, was now ahead of the game with its new best of breed strategy. Bailey contrasts the SSA approach with that of dominant ERP vendors such as SAP, which also work with Cognos but are developing their own business intelligence tools. He claims that working with best of breed vendors represents a speedy and inexpensive solution to the problem of adding functionality which was traditionally outside the sphere of ERP packages. SSA is integrating Cognos’ PowerPlay and Impromtu tools with its BPCS ERP suite and will also sell the tools separately for SSA license holders. Bailey says that the tools will allow users to extract and analyze data from held on its BPCS system and report findings and trends based upon that data. The tools are integrated with the BPCS now but Bailey promises that links to other enterprise systems are on the way.
