With Software AGs tender for IDS Scheer being announced yesterday (July 13th), chances are that the major competitors will have had a sleepless night. With ARIS still the cream of the crop in process modelling after all these years and WebMethods’ BPM suite and CentraSite providing significant and comprehensive BPAutomation and SOA support, this surly has the potential to upset market structures.
One may of course question the wisdom of SAPs unwillingness to grab hold of IDS Scheer, when they must have had a first refusal option. But as the example of Tibco buying Staffware has shown us some years ago, the ability to integrate not only the acquired technology but also the mindset and skills of people is a major factor to be considered. And this is where SAP may rightly have seen some problems. And knowing how Prof. Scheer has cared for the company he created, he must also have felt that SAP would have been to big to be able to buy IDS and keep its spirit alive. Software AG on the other hand have demonstrated in how they integrated WebMethods that they clearly have the ability and the sensitivity of handling this in a better fashion.
This might just turn out to be one of the few really successful deals in the broader BPx market with Software AG gaining access to a lot of relevant IDS customers and positioning themselves against SAP and IBM. The potential is certainly there, let’s see if they can make it work.
[...] if anything, at the moment I’d regard these market movements (together with the Software AG/IDS Scheer deal) as a sign of trust in the market. Will they improve things for the customers? Let’s leave that [...]