Datamation: Who's afraid of Linux?

Datamation looks at how Linux is being deployed in the lucrative ERP field -- one of mainstays of enterprise computing. Despite some impressive case studies, it appears that the leading ERP vendors -- like SAP and PeopleSoft -- offer lukewarm support for Linux.

"BJ Havlik is not afraid of being on the bleeding edge. Two months ago, Havlik, the IT manager of Menasha Corp., a $1 billion packaging and forest products company in Neenah, Wisc., swapped his company's SAP applications from Hewlett-Packard servers using a Unix operating system and onto Dell servers running Linux."

"Havlik's motivation was simple: he figures moving to Linux has saved his company about $700,000. It has also propelled Menasha into the brave new world of enterprise resource planning on Linux, a world that, so far, only a handful of companies have ventured to explore...."

"Siemens, which hosts SAP applications for clients, has recently suggested to a couple of clients that they consider shifting to Linux, says David Paish, a team leader at the Toronto data center. While Paish isn't convinced that Linux is ready yet for a high-volume application such as SAP Retail, he believes Linux is well suited to hosting R/3 systems for small to mid-sized businesses. For a company with under 500 users, 'running SAP on an Intel platform is cheaper,' he says."

Complete Story

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