PeopleSoft ERP: The Way Of The Oracle
Most organizations today employ Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP in their systems to increase productivity and better file management. ERP will integrate, or attempt to integrate, various software programs into a single database for easier access and efficiency. This means that programs that run only on one department will be able to run on other departments. Data stored will be easily accessible by any authorized person or employee. Companies like PeopleSoft were established specifically for this purpose. PeopleSoft is an ERP which will integrate and customize a companies needs into a single software. In the olden days, a company with a big number of employees had different department for sales, finance, human resource, and marketing. These separate departments also had separate software programs to suit their needs. For example, HR will have personal information of employees which is not needed by the finance department because it is primarily concerned with the financial transactions of the employees. These financial transactions are not needed by the marketing department and so on. Companies which chose to employ their own IT staff to speed up work in every department usually forget to integrate each program so that it would function in cooperation with each other. PeopleSoft was founded in 1987 by David Duffield and Ken Morris to provide management solutions for Human Resources and Customer Relationships. Its most ideal benefit was that companies could customize the PeopleTools Technology to suit their business needs. PeopleSofts technology was also able to run in multiple operating systems and software programs because it had developed its own development platform. It could co-exist with, and run on, Microsoft, Oracle, SQL Server, Informix, IBM-DB2, HP AllBase/SQL and many more. PeopleSoft was successfully implemented in many companies, and most of them were satisfied with the customized solutions offered by PeopleSoft. However, PeopleSoft also had its share of litigations. Several Student Administration and Higher Education systems solutions which were developed by PeopleSoft were sued by Universities which availed of the program. Seven of the Big Ten Midwestern universities also complained of product deficiencies and performance problems which resulted in an open letter to the CEO of PeopleSoft. In 2003, it was able to acquire JD Edwardsa software company with similar product lines and solutions. Their merger resulted in PeopleSoft ERP gaining access to smaller, mid-sized companies instead of only big corporations. JD Edwards product lines were also repackaged and renamed PeopleSoft.
That same year, PeopleSoft was already battling a hostile takeover by Oracle which resulted in several suits and legal battles. PeopleSofts board of directors initially disagreed with the merger but after long battle, and after a decision by a US Federal Judge and the European Commission to continue with the merger, PeopleSoft finally signed a merger agreement with Oracle in December 2004. The merger will result in a new ERP product called Fusion which, according to Oracle, will combine the best features of PeopleSoft, JD Edwards and Oracle. They will, however, continue to support existing companies which have PeopleSoft and Oracle solutions in their system so as to prepare them for an upgrade to Fusion when the companies are ready. Oracle also determined that JD Edwards had more loyal customer base than PeopleSoft and they eventually renamed PeopleSoft products like PeopleSoft Enterprise One to JD Edwards Enterprise One and PeopleSoft World to JD Edwards World. |
