My question is "Why weren't they able to close the deals?" Two weeks ago, everything was rosy. Mgmt believed they had enough deals in the pipeline to make the quarter. Now they can't close them. I don't believe the market growth is slowing, so there must be another reason for customers to hold off their purchases. It sounds to me like a couple big accounts are holding off until SAP's product comes out. SAP is strong in CPG and will try to sell SCM to it's installed base first. It seems likely that MANU ran into SAP on a deal or two. The thing is, SAP isn't going to make their Beta date and they won't get anywhere near their target deliverable date IMO. I wouldn't be surprised to see the customers who were going to wait decide not to wait afterall if and when it becomes obvious that SAP's offering will fall short of the mark. I think this is dead money at least until MANU's earnings announcement, but by then some of these deals could look a lot more closable.
As for PSFT buying MANU, I don't think so. PSFT had the right idea a couple years ago when they bought Red P, but what ever happened to that? By now, they should be firing on all cylinders. I haven't heard of a single PSFT/RedP win since the purchase. In fact they're losing accounts to ITWO. Last week PSFT announced partnership agreements with 9 different small niche SCM players, so it looks like they have given up trying to integrate Red P and now they're trying something else. I don't know what they have in mind, but it doesn't look like more aquisitions are on the horizon, e3ven at firesale prices.
If anyone might be a better fit to buy MANU it would be JDEC. MANU is partnering with them already and if SCM is so vital an area for ERP co.'s, JDEC might just make an offer. ITWO is partnering with ORCL, SAP has decided, unwisely IMO, to build it themselves, PSFT seems to be floundering. If JDEC wan't to gain marketshare, an integrated SCM offering of the caliber of MANU would make pretty good sense to me.
I would guess that buying MANU in the high 20's would be a pretty good lottery ticket. <g>
RA |
