Infor, a leading provider of business application software serving more than 70,000 customers, announces expanded cloud capabilities for the equipment industry. The new capabilities include technology from IBM, NTT DATA, a global IT services and consulting provider, and Velocity Technology Solutions, a long-standing managed service provider to Infor M3 customers. This announcement follows Infor’s earlier announcements about its significant investment in equipment industry software, and the cloud-enablement of the Infor Equipment suite.
Infor M3 is a leader in the equipment industry. Hundreds of equipment-centric customers worldwide utilize M3 to manage their manufacturing, distribution, financials, equipment sales, replacement parts inventory, shop and field service, warranty, core management and rental operations.
“As we continue with Infor and the M3 Equipment solution, we are encouraged to hear of Infor’s continued and growing interest in cloud-based offerings that may boost performance, reduce cost or ease required IT resources. We will be monitoring these cloud developments closely,” says Gilles Kegle, IT Director at Weir Canada, an Infor equipment industry client.
Building on this momentum, NTT DATA and Velocity have developed expanded cloud offerings for M3. Both NTT DATA and Velocity support IBM PureSystems and Power Systems technology and provide hosted private cloud solutions and services for the Infor M3 product suite.
“The IBM hybrid cloud platform, which is built on PureSystems with Power Systems technology demonstrates the unique ability of IBM and its partners to offer a solid cloud foundation to enterprises seeking a platform for mission critical systems,” says Ali Shadman, SVP Business Cloud, Infor. “With M3 and IBM’s broad cloud products we are able to optimize workloads on IBM I, AIX, Windows and Linux platforms to provide the transactional performance and reliability of M3 coupled with open integration and collaboration of Infor ION and related products and technologies.”
“NTT DATA’s deep manufacturing industry expertise and global cloud ecosystem allow us to leverage Infor’s SaaS capabilities with NTT DATA’s Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Disaster Recovery as a service (DRaaS) offerings,” says Mike Sarantopoulos, Senior Vice President of Cloud Advisory Services at NTT DATA. “In addition, NTT DATA Cloud Lifecycle Services supports the full service continuum for Infor customers, including consulting, migration and management services.”
“Velocity has been serving Infor M3 equipment customers for years with managed application services and related project services. Infor M3 is a feature-rich solution, and delivering this software within the Velocity virtual private cloud extends the benefits of M3’s capabilities even further,” says Paul Cioni, Senior Vice President of Service Delivery, Velocity Technology Solutions. “This will save customers money, provide greater flexibility and make software upgrades and support much easier now and in the future.”
A specific focus of Infor is Caterpillar dealers throughout the world, which has led to the creation of the Infor CAT Dealer Advisory Council. A number of CAT dealers have chosen M3 as their go-forward software solution, including Finning, PON, Bangla Cat and Zahid Tractor and Heavy Machinery Company.
Representatives from Velocity and NTT DATA will be on hand at Inforum in Orlando and at NADITA in Las Vegas in the coming weeks. Interested equipment professionals are encouraged to find out more about how the Infor Equipment Cloud offering can benefit their business.
