ECi, which acquired ERP vendor Macola last year, has made another acquisition relevant to their Manufacturing Division, purchasing Vineyardsoft, whose KnowledgeSync product was already being used by Macola and every other member of the Division. Vineyardsoft sold entirely through channels, and the plan is to expand those channels further.
The opening keynote at the annual Macola customer and partner event featured a drone demo intended to show mastery over adjacent technology that backfired spectacularly, although harmlessly. The event itself also featured an air of unpredictability – over the role of the channel in the Macola go-to-market going forward.
ECi has instructed Macola to make development of a cloud strategy a major priority. Macola’s execs discuss the specifics of what they are doing, when customers are likely to see the fruits of this labour, and what they are likely to be.
The latest version of the Macola ERP software continues to open up the product, and features changes that they say will end ‘version lock’ including the addition of screen plug-ins and back-end plug ins. There has also been a major extension of open APIs and new capabilities to make it easy to turn off unwanted fields.
ECi, to which Macola reports after their acquisition by ECI’s Apax Partners, told Macola customers and partners at their EVOLVE event what the new ownership will mean for them, and how Macola fits into ECI’s strategy for its manufacturing division.
Compared to the spring’s 10.5 release, and the upcoming 10.7 next year, this version of the Macola ERP software is less dramatic, but it still has some nice enhancements, including adding more APIs and making them easier to use.
The new combined company becomes one of the larger SMB-focused makers of software for manufacturers and wholesales distributors.
Macola also made the first public announcement of its new Macola Labs, tasked with coming up with innovative new techy twists that can be applied to the software.
