Today's Technology for Tomorrow's Firm.
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SAGE PEACHTREE PERSPECTIVE The Peachtree Perspective becomes The Sage Perspective T T is is the last column that will be called "T e Peachtree Perspective." Although Sage Peachtree is one of the fi rst names in accounting soſt ware (from the perspective of its stature in the industry, as well as its long history), the world has changed since Peachtree was an independent soſt ware company that created soſt ware to run on the Osborne personal computer. During the last 13 years, however, Sage Peachtree has been part of the Sage family of solutions, a large organization which has strong products in many markets — Sage ACT! and Sage Simply Accounting on the low end, Sage ERP MAS 90/200, Sage ERP Accpac, Sage Abra, and Sage CRM in the mid-range space, and Sage ERP X3 and Sage SalesLogix to serve enterprise cus- tomers. T e world has changed, however. Businesses now demand that business applications work bet er together, and we demand that large organizations function like one small, nimble business instead of as a series of loosely connected silos. We demand this because the world expects more from businesses today. Sure, every startup doesn't need offi ce space and a $10,000 phone system, but we are also expected to be accessible 16 hours a day (or more), and we are required to do much more with fewer resources. Accordingly, the name Peachtree, as well as other names like Simply Accounting, MAS 90 and ACCPAC must take a back seat to the lead business and the overall brand behind these applications — Sage. Sage North America handles its brands diff erently than the other Sage divisions. T e business management applications it sells in Europe, Asia and Africa do not retain the pre- T e changes taking place, however, are not just related to the names of the products. T ere are some things going on behind the scenes that will make the applications more interoperable. More than a year ago, Sage announced a new initiative called SDATA. SDATA is a set of common data exchange protocols and data layouts that will make it possible for Sage products to interface with outside applications and websites using standard web protocols such as HT P and ATOM. Some of the Sage applications now offer web-enabled access to data streams, as witnessed by the tools available at ht p://sdata.sage.com, including an add-in for Excel, a web-based data access tool, and widgets for extracting data from on- premises or hosted solutions into web-based dashboards. In addition to the SDATA initiative, all of the entry-level accounting and mid-market ERP applications have THE NAME PEACHTREE, AS WELL AS OTHER NAMES LIKE SIMPLY ACCOUNTING, MAS 90 AND ACCPAC MUST TAKE A BACK SEAT TO THE LEAD BUSINESS AND THE OVERALL BRAND BEHIND THESE APPLICATIONS — SAGE. Brian Tankersley, CPA.CITP, Technology Editor Brian Tankersley is a Knoxville, Tennessee CPA and consultant whose practice is focused on technology consulting and training for accountants. Brian is a nationally recognized speaker with K2 Enterprises (k2e. com), and blogs on accounting technology at CPATechBlog.com. Comments, suggestions, and errata are always welcome, and should be e-mailed to brian.tankersley@ CPAPracticeAdvisor.com. acquisition naming structure (e.g. Sage ERP X3 was previously called Adonix). In the United Kingdom, where Sage is a leading public company, its products are branded as Sage products (e.g. Sage One, Sage 50 Accounts, Sage 100, etc.). While all the details are not fi nalized just yet, the next major release of the product we now call Sage Peachtree will carry a name that puts the Sage name first, and will most likely minimize or eliminate the legacy name of the product. 26 26 September 2011 • www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com APra implemented the Sage Business Intelligence Excel-based reporting tool. T is tool makes it possible to combine data from these applications with data from other ODBC data sources into fi nancial, operational and management information reports, which will allow users to drill down into the underlying detail from the accounting software. This same Business Intelligence tool is imple- mented in most of Sage's other accounting and ERP solutions, so consultants should be able to work on multiple applications by learning how to work with this tool. While Sage doesn't change its history of 30 great years of supporting American and Canadian small busi- nesses, nor do they want to erode the goodwill associated with the Peachtree name, this is a very diff erent applica- tion than the one that ran on that $5,000 Osborne computer over three decades ago. With tools like the web-based e-marketing services, integration with contact management tools like Sage ACT!, and advanced business intelligence tools, this product is not the same application that was typically paired with an Epson MX-80 dot matrix printer … so perhaps it should have a different name. The applications also work bet er together than they ever have in the past, and they are starting to off er more integra- tion and collaboration than ever before. So it's more reasonable to think of this as one organization instead of a series of independent companies, and I think it's necessary for the product we now call Sage Peachtree to be able to change to meet the needs of the next genera- tion of workers. The Peachtree Perspective has graduated, and has become T e Sage Perspective. See you next month.