I think most of us have been reading about the recent successes of IBM in closing large deals for Baan consulting and services. I hear consultants talking about an aggressive recruitment campaign all over the world. Yet I also see the posts that IBM is holding back on actually signing the contracts with their new recruitees.

Does anybody have some good - insider - information on this? What is exactly the scale of this so called Invensys contract? Is it going to be the windfall alot of consultants have been waiting for or?

I was hoping that you were going to get loads of replies on this topic, as I for one am keen to know what the latest is.

Many months ago, when this deal was first rumoured, it was suggested that this implementation was to be one of the largest and any slack in the consultancy market would be used up and some to staff this project.

It has now been dragging on for some months, without news and there appears to be more available resource than ever before. I think we are getting to the position that a big client is required pretty soon especially here in the UK or there will be many of us looking at a very quiet christmas.

I have also heard some rumours regarding "Honda" - has anybody else heard anything ?

Honda? That's a new one. I've got a contact in Honda. I think I'll give him a call. Let you all know ...

Checked with contact in Honda (UK). There is nothing going at Honda UK, in fact Baan don't seem to have made a very good impression there. There may be something in the USA ...

Baan TEXAS (http://communities.msn.com/BaanTX)


I interviewed in March with IBM for their expected Invensys win. Had been receiving phone calls that they were still interested up until about 6 weeks ago. Public press releases says IBM got a big iBaan deal with Invensys; but they seem to still be working on project structure for implementing ibaan at rest of Invensys. Could be they are still working out details...so, I don't think it is settled yet.
Clark

Well I too have heard a few rumours about IBM (and strangely been involved in one or two) but so far nothing is happening as far as I know, the only information I have is that it will be next years big Baan story (watch out for IBaanWorld I suppose)

It would seem to make sense that Invensys will move slower with Baan5 implementations. Depending upon how many they are ultimately going to do...[If it ain't broke, don't fix it] look for their Baan division to do most of the consulting on it....or so I think.
Clark

Having seen IBM both from the inside and outside, I can describe IBM as having only two modes of operation: "Full Speed Ahead" and "Full Speed Reverse".

On the first ruimour of a deal, IBM's internal recruitors (PDM's) will begin to scour the world had have 100's of people lined up to start tomorrow morning... Until the deal doesn't hapen. Then they will shed everyone. Think of an automobile production line when companing to IBM's mode of hiring/firing.

What y ou are seeing is the internal reacion tol a comment or memo internally within IBM, but not a true authorization to actually hire. Expect lots more ups and downs before anything actually happens.

Stephen's reality is right.

I have a friend from Probe (then QCS?) who was doing Baan process and is now with IBM consulting. The projects seem to be in the nego stage (hopefully for all of us waiting for this big deal to happen).

Does anyone else think that IBM has gotten worse over the years? Perhaps all the acquisitions were more than they could take.
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Marius from NTT DATA Romania (https://nttdata.ro/)