Executive Summary

• This is the Brightwork Research & Analysis software rating series.
• We rate both the software and estimate the risk of implementing each application.

MUFI Rating & Risk for Infor Lawson

MUFI: Maintainability, Usability, Functionality, Implement ability

Vendor: Infor (Select For Vendor Profile)

Introduction

Info is another ERP software vendor, which has grown through mergers and acquisitions. Infor is the 3^rd largest ERP software vendor in the world. Infor acquired the ERP software vendor Lawson in 2011. Infor actually has the following ERP products.

Application Detail

Infor10 ERP Enterprise, Lawson M3 ERP Enterprise, Infor10 ERP Business, Infor10 ERP Express, Infor10 ERP Process Business. And these are just the major ERP systems. Infor lists the following ERP systems on their website.

• Info LN
• Infor LX
• Infor M3
• Infor SyteLine
• Infor System21
• Infor VISUAL
• Infor XA
• Infor Adage
• Infor SunSystems
• Infor Lawson
• Infor Distribution A+
• Infor Distribution FACTS
• Infor Distribution SX.e

However, we have decided to focus on the Lawson ERP system as this is the flagship ERP for Infor.

Infor Lawson has the best user interface of any of the older generation ERP systems. Infor Lawson uses a very inventive interface design where icons along the top provide navigation between the major areas of the application.

Infor Lawson also has a decent dashboard that shows the user basic activity.

The application also has a very useful search bar along the top, along with a search modifier. Infor Lawson has the first application we have reviewed that has updates and alerts that really work well. They are listed per category along with the right side of the user interface.

This is another view on the alerts – this allows the user to hover over the appropriate icon and see the list of vendors that are on hold.

Infor Lawson has copied the Chatter functionality in Salesforce, which allows comment threads to be saved and accessed. Infor Lawson has done a very nice job with this functionality.

Infor Lawson is an interesting alternative for large ERP buyers. Infor Lawson has the highest ERP worker productivity of any of the ERP applications, which are sold to large buyers. While most of the other large company ERP applications are increasingly dated, Infor Lawson is a borderline ERP system, which is simply a combined financial system with a strong human resources module. That is not necessarily a bad thing, as it is better to go into ERP procurement understanding that buying a single system, which would do everything, was never a feasible strategy. Infor sales will attempt to counter this argument by pointing to its multiple offerings which can be connected to Infor Lawson – however these are all acquired applications, and each one of these applications would need to be evaluated on their own merits. Attempting to allow Infor to perform your solution architecture by pitching all Infor products is a bad strategy.

However, that fact that Infor Lawson combined a finance system with a strong HR system is why Lawson was traditionally strong in service industries such as finance and healthcare. Buyers that fall into this category may want to give Infor Lawson a look, however, if no real supply chain management requirements exist, FinancialForce along with either its consulting service application an HR application would be another possible alternative.

It is certainly true that service industries do not require ERP suites, and in fact even for manufacturers ERP systems are not actually necessary as the rise of excellent stand-alone financial applications provides the flexibility to create flexible solution architectures. For more on this topic see our Solution Architecture Packages.

MUFI Scores

All scores out of a possible 10.

Vendor and Application Risk

Brightwork Research & Analysis Risk Defined: (See This Link for Our Categorization of Risk)

Infor Lawson is one of the better ERP systems in this category, and it is in many ways a well-designed system that just happens to be short on some functionality. However, Infor’s consulting is not strong, and few consulting companies specialize in Infor Lawson, although they can certainly be found.

Likelihood of Implementation Success

This accounts for both the application and vendor-specific risk. In our formula, the total implementation risk is application + vendor + buyer risk. The buyer specific risk could increase or decrease this overall likelihood and adjust the values that you see below.

Risk Definition

See this link for more on our categorizations of risk. We also offer a Buyer Specific Risk Estimation as a service for those that want a comprehensive analysis.

Risk Management Approach

Managing an Infor Lawson implementation means managing the risks related to getting consultants assigned to the project, and secondly to deal with rather limited functionality. This can quickly become a problem if the buyer takes statements made by Infor sales to heart and hold’s the implementation team’s feet to the fire to make all of them come true. And this, by the way, can easily happen, because as we explain in our Honest Vendor Rating of Info, Infor generally has a low accuracy level to the information it provides during the sales process.

Finished With Your Analysis?

To go back to the Software Selection Package page for the Big ERP software category. Or go to this link to see other analytical products for Infor Lawson.

References