Ramesys and Oracle to offer 60% cheaper ERP

Major contractors can look forward to investing in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software "without having to worry about cost overruns" after Ramesys' and Oracle's decision to form a strategic alliance.
"We will offer predictability in cost," said Mark Chambers, managing director of Ramesys, the construction software provider.
Oracle is one of the four major global (ERP) software
companies.
Chambers said: "Ramesys heads up the package in the UK construction sector. We will offer Summit, the construction-specific software that we developed, over the Oracle database."
Linkage between these two elements can be by various routes: Mentor, the Ramesys financial system; the equivalent package from Oracle; or any competitor's alternative. "That could be from SAP, a rival ERP provider, or Coins," he said.
"The package will cost 40% of a true ERP alternative. Construction groups can sign to a package that will cost £1m to £2m and with no cost overruns. That problem has been removed. We will offer fixed-price contracts or we could do a shared-risk option. The product will be out in the summer."
Chambers said the dilemma for construction groups has been that they wanted to implement the corporate global ledgers that an ERP provider offers, but they didn't want to lose the construction expertise of their existing provider.
"The issue faced both by Ramesys and Coins [its competitor] was that we were seen as being too small, even though we offer all the construction solutions. We have a £60m turnover in Ramesys, but even so we're seen by some as being not big enough.
"The UK construction top 100 is a bit like the football Premiership with the top three running away from the rest. The alliance allows us to stay on top of things," said Chambers.
Balfour Beatty recently decided to push out the boat by signing up to a deal with Oracle, but other players had been chewing over their future after seeing Jarvis and Amey catch a cold when ERP installation costs ballooned to around £20m, and Atkins landed itself with a total cost of £120m after ERP implementation went badly wrong.
Bad press is said to have driven one ERP provider out of the UK construction market.
Those sitting on the fence over ERP include Carillion and Skanska.