Hi everybody,

recently SSA terminated all partner contracts and only renewed contracts for 8 Baan service providers. Not even a month later, all companies, which were active in this field (former partners and independend service providers) got mail from a law firm, requesting them to stop using Baan logos, to destroy documentation and other material, to notify their customers and to stop being active in the field.

This happened in Germany, where I am mostly active. This obviously unsettled both the customers and also the service providers.

My question is: Are similar things done by SSA in your country or is this a German phenomenom?

Thanks

Markus

Hi Markus,

That is a worrying evolution. Especially the rather 'aggressive' way it is being done.

And it sure is a funny approach! What I heard from an ex-collegue in NL is that SSA moved all their consultants to one of the partners, since their own focus would be development and sales only. Consultancy and services were all pushed out...

So, if they start terminating the partners' contracts now, who is going to provide the consultancy and services? :confused:

To avoid misinformation here:

Baan made new contrcats with some partners and especially Watermark seems to have an international one. Also, my information is only from Germany.

But I would like to know, wether this is happening in other countries. From Pat's reply I deduct, that he was confronted with the same, so from the sound of it, it is also happening in UK or Belgium.

My initial assumption was, Baan/SSA wants to do the consulting operations themselves, but this does not fit to, what is happening in NL then.

I am also pretty confused about the topic. To get rid of your partners does not make sense, if you have such a selling problem like Baan and you have to satisfy your installed base.

Also we all know, that the baanboard (which I regard as something like an "institution" in the Baan area) is run and made successfull mostly by individuals, which are now not allowed to act under the Baan umbrella then anymore. So what will happen in the long run here?

regards

Markus

But I would like to know, wether this is happening in other countries. From Pat's reply I deduct, that he was confronted with the same, so from the sound of it, it is also happening in UK or Belgium.

My comments may have been misleading but to clarify: I do not know of any such events in Belgium or the UK. I just wanted to comment in a general sense.


Also we all know, that the baanboard (which I regard as something like an "institution" in the Baan area) is run and made successfull mostly by individuals, which are now not allowed to act under the Baan umbrella then anymore. So what will happen in the long run here?


This is somewhat of a hot topic. Frankly, I have never been impressed by the way Baan Company and now SSA deal with 'outsiders'. Apart from some small scale initiatives (like the BaanERP Programmer's Manual (http://www.baanboard.com/twiki/bin/view/Progmanerp/WebHome)) driven by individual Baanboard.com fans inside Baan, Baan Company neither SSA has ever shown any interest whatsoever in the site. Neither in a positive nor in a negative way. It is like 'we do not exist'. Instead Baan/SSA seem to concentrate more on groups and organizations they can exercise a much greater control of (BWU etc). When we started the site 3 years ago we were hoping to come to some form of co-operation between Baan and/or one of their official 'satellites' (e.g BWU). But the response has always been negative or just totally indifferent. And frankly, we are not interested anymore neither. We rather focus our attention who think Baanboard.com is a worthwhile operation (e.g. our sponsors).

We remain open for interesting proposals that benefit our members regardless from which corner they may come but they got to be serious and with the necessary commitment involved. Baanboard.com will stay in operation for as long as we are physically, financialy and legally able to do so! :)