The Double Bind of ERP Systems for Midsize Companies

How the middle market gets caught between a rock and a hard place… and what you can do about it.

Midsize companies have a unique and troublesome set of needs.

On one hand, they still need the rapid time-to-value that kept them running as a small business. On the other, their operations are now complicated enough that ad hoc solutions aren’t cutting it any more. That’s the double bind.

So, a midsize company looking for an ERP system needs their solution to be both broad and deep, but they also need it to have minimal implementation time. That’s a tall order, but there are options.

The Middle Market “Bloc” Is Too Big to Be Ignored

The middle market is a resilient and growing sector of the economy. That’s a good thing for many reasons, some less obvious than others.

Chiefly, as more midsize companies appear, they’re becoming too large a group for ERP vendors to ignore. Recently, most of the big ERP vendors have poured tons of work into their mid-market products, from Oracle’s Netsuite to Sage’s Intacct.

If you want an affordable, rapidly deployed ERP solution from a brand name you recognize, you’ve got options. They have their drawbacks, of course, like limited access to the vendor, system inflexibility, and high cost, but some companies decide to make that tradeoff.

The Changing Landscape of Middle Market ERP

It’s not just the big names who are changing the landscape of mid-market ERP. The rapid expansion of cloud-based work processes has gotten vendors big and small to launch cloud hosted (or even SAAS) ERP solutions.

In this new generation of cloud-based ERP products, there’s no lack of variety.

Some of them look and work exactly like a traditional ERP system, except it’s on the cloud. With all the benefits and risks that come with that. Tip: Make sure you trust your vendor’s cybersecurity before you sign up.

Others are innovative in the extreme, up to and including Odoo’s self-serve, à la carte model. Way outside the box, for sure.

Whatever option you go with, just keep in mind that midsize companies looking for ERP aren’t playing an unwinnable game anymore. If anything, they have the advantage.

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