I'm gathering additional material for an upcoming talk I'm giving in 2 weeks time.
I'm interested in the factors which underpin developments in accounting software products (for businesses) at all levels, from simple cashbooks to vast ERP systems.
This won't be a 'technical' talk, and it won't be about practice or tax software, just business/commercial matters.
Some starters:
Microsoft's role, including its imminent introduction of cut-down and cut-price systems
The role of the Internet as a connection medium, enabling remote computing, e-business in all its forms, etc.
Any unfulfilled demands for functions?
Any/all external factors could be relevant. I'm not looking for essays, but I'd value those out there with opinions based on experience and reflection to contribute their thoughts!
Regards
Mike James
Mike James
Replies (11)
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RE: The future of accounting software
As far as SME's are concerened, the future of accounting software, in a word, is speed.
The speed at which you process, operate, report on, act upon, share and manage your business processes.
This will be due to not one single event or technology, more a continuation of the trend that began around 10 years ago when the first second generation systems began to appear.
The Web will certainly play a big part in this by connecting businesses together with each other and with their employees.
Gary Turner
Sales Director
Pegasus Software
Microsoft
The whole XML movement is growing and evolving but needs to consolodate. The next version of MS Office, which is due shortly, will feature XML heavily. But probably a MS flavour, I've heard that they've made certain compromises in the deployment of XML in Office that the XML purists dislike.
On the accounting s/w side, MS will have an evolved .net financial system in a couple of years that they'll use to consolodate the current roster of four suites currently in MSBS. They intend to open up the .net Business Framework to other developers in order to establish .net as a (or the) main player 5-10 years out from now.
It is therefore probably reasonable to presume that five years from now accounting applications will be much more mobile and untied to desktops as they are now, whether their architecture is based upon .net, Java/J2EE or some other web based applications environment.
What this will mean for users is much more pervasive systems, smart devices like PocketPC, Smartphones etc. all linked together with the back-office suites and, in turn, with trading partners systems too. Massive automation and time savings, all adding up to, hopefully, more speed.
If you'd like to discuss in more detail please drop me an email.
View from the ERP end of the market...
A big subject, Mike, but from a player at the high end (CODA - www.coda.com) the issues are increasingly around getting information out of transactional (accounting and other) systems and using that to drive and measure strategy. So, focus on datamarts for more efficient reporting, opening up access to information across the enterprise, product costing and profitability measurement (ABC is coming back!), scorecarding, planning and budgeting, integrating Excel with accounting systems.
At the transactional level, previous comments on thin client (driving efficiency savings through centralisation and shared services) and XML (efficiency savings through automation and ease of integration) are the key areas.
Internationally, there are still alarmingly few accounting systems which can handle global requirements within one system - you'd be amazed how poor the 'big names' in ERP are at doing that. But enough of that....
Cheers
Dave Turner
([email protected])
Think thin
Hi Mike (and Gary),
The openess and flexibility to manipulate and analyse data quickly and easily is becoming a bigger factor. Pegasus, Access, and Great Plains (as was) have all made good progress in this matter over the last couple of years. Interestingly Sage, the market leader of the 90's seem to be a little way behind on this.
Systems are generally now more open and some (including those listed above but again not Sage) have some good two way linking to Excel. Systems will become more open to integration.
I would hope to see more use of email / internet and XML in the next few years so that not only can I email an invoice from my accounts system but my customer on receipt can click a button to import this directly in to their accounts system. This would hopefully be regardless of accounting systems used.
XML (Microsoft standard) was supposed to achieve this but I havent really heard anything about this for a few months now.
Entering an invoice in to a system is undoubtedly slower than it was 10 years ago when everyone used Dos based applications but hopefully with XML or equivalent you can speed up operations.
Finally, as for internet, I suspect most products will have a "thin client" solution in the next 5 years so that you can access your software from anywhere in the world using a standard web browser. Many products do this already.
Hope this helps.
John Clough
Numerica Business Services Ltd
Tel: 023 8070 2345
[email protected]
Addendum - Microsoft
Just as a quick addendum, I did hear that Microsoft may be bundling an accounting solution in to Back Office Small Business Server when they have written their replacement to Navision/Great Plains. The software I assume would be designed for 5-50 users as SBS is.
I'd be interested to know if anyone knows anything about this? Especially anyone from the mid tier players (Sage/Access/Pegasus).
John Clough
Numerica Business Services Ltd
Tel: 023 8070 2345
[email protected]
Mike, could you share your findings on this with us
Hi Mike.
I wondered whether you might be able to share your findings on the future of accounting software with us. It is a fascinating area.
All the best
Justin