BY JAMES COOKE, EDITOR AT LARGE
techwatch
third parties offer low-cost option
for WMS support
WHEN IT COMES TO REPAIRS, SAVVY AUTOMOBILE OWNERS
have long known they can get a price break and more personal service by bringing their car to an independent garage rather than the
local dealer. Now, owners of some warehouse management systems
(WMS) have that “outside garage” option as well. In the past few
years, several third-party software maintenance firms have appeared
on the scene to provide support for specific brands of warehouse
management systems.
The trend first took root about a decade ago, with the emergence of
third-party software maintenance firms for enterprise resource plan-
ning (ERP) systems. Among the better-known providers of this type
of service are Rimini Street and the now-defunct
Just as with independent auto repair shops, these
third-party software maintenance shops generally
charge a lot less than the vendor would. “You ask for
modifications from the vendor and it’s going to cost
$175 to $200 an hour for their staff to do what you
ask them to do,” says Phil Obal, president of
Industrial Data and Information Inc., an independ-
ent software research company based in Tulsa, Okla.
“The third party can do it for less.”
In addition to offering lower prices, third parties
also go the extra mile in providing personalized
service. In fact, it was user requests that sparked systems integrator
eKin Systems Inc. to enter the WMS support business, says Imran
Manzoor, a managing partner at the Milwaukee, Wis.-based firm.
Manzoor’s company provides full support to users of Catalyst
International’s WMS, including 24-hour on-call service. After
Catalyst was acquired by CDC Software in 2007, eKin discovered that
a lot of users were unable to find the kind of support they wanted,
Manzoor explains, so eKin stepped in to fill the gap. The firm has
since branched out into support for users of RedPrairie’s and
Manhattan Associates’ warehouse management systems.
Another third-party software firm that provides support to WMS
users is the Raleigh, N.C.-based Open Sky Group. Open Sky offers
maintenance, training, and support for users of RedPrairie’s WMS.
The company’s CEO, Curt Sardeson, and many of its staff members
are former RedPrairie employees.
Sardeson says that although in one sense, his company competes
with RedPrairie, it also serves as a kind of complementary service provider. He explains that a
lot of his firm’s work comes from smaller companies that want help modifying their software
so they can, say, generate custom shipping
labels or reports. Although RedPrairie provides
its clients with tools they can use to customize
their applications, many lack the necessary in-house expertise or simply don’t have time to
learn to use the tools. These
companies often end up turning to Open Sky Group for
help, says Sardeson. “We’re
the after-market alternative if
RedPrairie is unavailable,” he
says.
Despite the apparent
advantages offered by third-party software firms, some
users remain leery. P.J.
Jakovljevic, an analyst for the
Boston-based software consulting firm Technology
Evaluation Centers, says users are often reluctant to switch to outside support firms out of
fear of burning bridges with the vendor.
They’re afraid that if something happens to
the third-party firm, the vendor won’t take
them back as a customer or will charge a hefty
penalty to do so, he explains.
Those concerns notwithstanding, smart distribution managers will start quietly checking
around to find out if third-party support services are available for their particular WMS. At
the moment, this option is available for a limited number of WMS packages, so their search
may come up empty. But that could change in
the very near future. This market is projected
to grow over the next year.
