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For the past 14 years, John Woodburn, owner of St. Louis Park-based The Woodburn Group, has been a reseller of Great Plains business software. These days when he goes out to talk to potential clients about the products, he gets to tack a big "M" on the front of his discussions. That is making his life a whole lot easier.
In April 2001, Microsoft Corp. acquired Great Plains Software Inc. of Fargo, N.D., for approximately $1.1 billion in stock. Under terms of the deal, Great Plains became the Microsoft Business Solutions division, operating within Microsofts Productivity and Business Services Group.
Microsoft Business Solutions offers accounting software such as Great Plains, as well as inventory management applications, supply-chain management products and so on.
The Microsoft-Great Plains deal has helped soften the recessions blow for The Woodburn Group, its owner said. Revenue is down from 1999, but up about 7 percent from 2001 to 2002 - a change Woodburn credits to the changing economy, and to Microsoft. "Our revenues have maintained because of the strength of Microsoft," he said.
For some local resellers, Microsofts acquisition of Great Plains has opened up markets that were heretofore unavailable.
Take for instance Altara, a Sacramento, Calif.-based firm with five people in its Bloomington office. With the strength of the Microsoft name behind its products, "we are able to compete for projects we could not have approached before," said general manager Scott Bodigheimer. Recently, for example, Altara won some major work from VerizonWireless, "and we were able to get that in part as a result of the...