One of the first questions for multinational company/corporation to move to new market is ERP implementation, customization, report tuning, integration for newly established subsidiary.  The specific of South American and in particularly Brazilian market is manufacturing or production outsourcing to Brazil.  We will try to provide the first level comparison or readiness of the major worldwide ERP brands: Microsoft Business Solutions, Oracle (we will not touch PeopleSoft & JDEdwards, just Oracle E-Business Suite) and SAP (where we will give you update on reasonable solution for mid-size companies – SAP Business One).  Also we will be concentrating on manufacturing-type of subsidiary, the franchisees network deserves special publication.

Localization Challenge.  Each large country: Brazil, India, Russia has unique taxation system and special rules in the accounting practice itself.  This is why we see locally developed ERP/MRP applications flourishing on the corporate ERP market.  At the same time – these specifics create some barriers and challenges for worldwide ERP brands to penetrate on the market.  In the case of Brazil, we would like to mention such regional ERP as Microsiga.  Please note that Multilanguage is usually easily resolvable issue, comparing to tax code.

SAP Business One.  This ERP solution, coming from SAP deserves very high scores, it is pretty much ready with tax code, Multilanguage feature (Brazilian Portuguese).  SAP Business One has MRP as well as Production modules plus integration to high end SAP is also available for transaction consolidation to the headquarters in Europe or in the USA.  SAP Business One has about 8 thousand installations Worldwide and it is very advanced and popular in Latin America, where tax code is rather standard one: Venezuela, Argentina, Mexico, Chili, etc.  SAP Business One launch in Brazil is the fall of 2005.

Microsoft Business Solutions.  MBS has two ERP applications for Brazilian market – Microsoft Navision and Microsoft Axapta.  Navision has several dozens of implementations, while Axapta will be available soon (in 2006).  We see several blends of Navision localizations for Brazil.  Axapta localization is currently on the way to be released.  Talking about Navision – MBS promotes Navision on the emerging markets, such as Russia, East Europe, plus it is traditionally strong in the Europe.  Also take into consideration very good Navision positioning in manufacturing industry.  We do not want at the same time to deemphasize Axapta – it has very high potential.  In East Europe and especially Russia – Microsoft indicates that number of Axapta installations is close to Navision implementations and Axapta was designed relatively recently, so please compare these two: Navision & Axapta before making final decision.  Just to mention, that Great Plains is not popular in Brazil, however it was partially localized and if you have corporate standard to use Microsoft Dynamics GP worldwide – it should be available for you.  Microsoft Project Green will lead to “merge” of its ERPs: Microsoft Dynamics will be the final merged ERP product, it will harmonically integrate the pieces of Microsoft Dynamics NAV (Navision), Microsoft Dynamics AX (Axapta), etc.

Oracle E-Business Suite.  Also known as Oracle Financials and Oracle Applications – Oracle has traditionally strong positions in Latin America and Brazil.  Oracle has conception of standard functionality (which could be used worldwide) and local or regional (language, special forms, tax engine, etc.).  If your company has Oracle Financials/Applications implemented in the headquarters – you should check on the status of Oracle Financial localization for Brazilian or Latin American regional market.  Oracle E-Business Suite also usually has extensive customization and integration components to custom Oracle databases.

You can always appeal to our help and expertise – in our Sao Paulo office we have all these systems expertise, plus Microsoft CRM, MS Great Plains, Lotus Notes Domino.  Please give as a call São Paulo 55-11-3826-3449, USA 1-866-528-0577, 1-630-961-5918! help@albaspectrum.com