In a recent blog post, I talked about the differences you are offered by so-called pure-play business process management (BPM) software suppliers vs. so-called stack providers. (I hope I explained why I say "so-called" in both cases but if not, let me know and I'll post about that subject.)
Harald Nehring, SAP NetWeaver BPM product marketing director, weighed in on the discussion about that post, defending the stack providers of course. So I caught up with Harald on February 24 (in both the sense of meeting with him, and in the sense of catching up on what has been happening since the last time we talked). He wanted to explore the subject a little more completely and he brings some opinions to the table worth considering.
First of all, it's just semantics but he calls what SAP (and Oracle, Microsoft, IBM. etc.) offer a platform, not a stack. Harald, I understand your point. It's just that I'm not much of a PowerPoint user. Someone drew this diagram for me years ago and now I just plug in the appropriate words no matter what the subject.
Seriously, in Harald's opinion, it is really about the semantics; that is, the semantic model associated with the entire stack: the processes, the rules, the governance facilities, the data, and so forth. The beauty of the stack--I mean platform--approach is that the suppliers of such complete BPM-enabling offerings have figured out all the integrations for you already.
And I believe their relative market success with this approach is based on the fact that that it is what most users want. The big suppliers' successes and the continuing consolidation in the software market is not because of all the nefarious marketing tricks the blogobatherers ascribe to IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, SAP, etc. (not that they don't pull a few marketing tricks).
On the other hand, when you choose a stack supplier, you have to buy into some factor or another that limits your choices down the line. To take full advantage of NetWeaver BPM, you should also use SAP ERP. You don't have to but that's where the big payoff comes. Ditto for various aspects of the IBM, Oracle and Microsoft stacks.
Of course, many of the pureplays have similar restrictions. But because they are designing and developing from a clean sheet of paper, the pureplays have been able to add some features the stack suppliers haven't provided yet.
It's your choice (and in fact many of you choose both).
-- Dennis Byron
I would point out that some of the pureplays would describe their software as a platform as well...
So Dennis, I think you've got your conceptual "stack" right :) fill in the boxes as appropriate to whatever the market or vendor is.
Pureplay is just another name for companies waiting to be purchased by a bigger company with a more complete end-to-end solution. I have seen it over and over. In the mobile computing world there was Extended Systems, Good Technology, Intellisync, Appforge and others with good pieces to the puzzle, but users don't want pieces. They need a consolidated and simplifed environment with a lower TCO (total cost of ownership).