It was a Company in Portland Oregon, here where I live. The "Shane Company", a jeweler. Used to run a lot of local radio ads, then the ads suddenly stopped. Turns out they went bankrupt. In bankruptcy proceedings they mainly blamed the costs incurred by the SAP system brought in to replace their in-house customized Universe-based system. The SAP implementation was supposed to cost $8 million, but costs were near $19 million when the company went out of business. I the bankruptcy proceedings the company mainly blamed the SAP implementation. After bankruptcy they resurfaced, which we know as the radio ads came back on a few months ago after being off about a year. However - the ads have stopped again. Perhaps they are just saving advertising dollars for now? Or is it worse?
But what really burns me up: I did a google search on this very thing 2 days ago and came across a blogger who was defending SAP, his deal was that the install failure was Shane Company's upper management's fault. Grrrr!!! If any company agrees to pay $8 MILLION dollars for a system, the vendor had better provide all the help needed to get the system up and running successfully or that vendor has failed. How about you MV providers, do you ever help the customers do an installation? Or do you take the money and let 'em do the best they can? And if they fail, it's their fault?? I'm just rehashing what I've read. I'd really like to hear from one of the programmers or analysts that worked for the Shane Company when all this happened. Are you out there? An even more damaging a story, if possible, is the implementation of SAP to serve the City of Portland (once again, my home city, but this time it involves my tax dollars). I don't know too many details except that it was supposed to unify 19 separate systems into one, and implementation was to cost about $20 million (already outrageous), but one attempt under an outside SAP implementation specialist failed, a second implementer hired from way out of town also failed, finally SAP themselves came in (where were they all this time?) and it seems finally got the job done. Cost at this point: almost FIFTY MILLION DOLLARS (actually about 48.6 million, but what's an extra 1.4 million dollars?) I recently asked a high-up analyst in the police department how the SAP implementation was doing, and they said, "Oh - OK I guess - there are still some problems." Thanks for listening- Harold Oaks Sr. PA Clark County, WA -----Original Message----- From: u2-users-boun...@listserver.u2ug.org [mailto:u2-users-boun...@listserver.u2ug.org] On Behalf Of Horacio Pellegrino Sent: Wednesday, May 23, 2012 12:16 PM To: U2 Users List Subject: Re: [U2] File Sizing using concurrent option AND FAREWELL I remember a company that went bankrupt because they spent so much in SAP ( or was it Oracle? ) It was in the news. Anybody? HP On Wed, May 23, 2012 at 3:07 PM, Dawn Wolthuis <dw...@tincat-group.com>wrote: > I have only seen SAP implementations from a bit of a distance and > through reading stories, but in every case, my understanding was that > those in charge of the project were gone before SAP went live. I have > seen systems analysts and programmers survive the project, with plenty > of stories once they do. It sounds like a really brutal ERP > installation. I have not kept current on this front enough to know > that people were still selecting it, although a whole lot of people > are still maintaining it. > > Best wishes, Scott, and thanks for taking the time to write up your > notes regarding some of those in the industry who have helped you. > Cheers! --dawn > > On Wed, May 23, 2012 at 1:58 PM, Holt, Jake <jh...@samsill.com> wrote: > > I thought no one actually ever finished implementing SAP? > > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: u2-users-boun...@listserver.u2ug.org [mailto: > u2-users-boun...@listserver.u2ug.org] On Behalf Of iggch...@comcast.net > > Sent: Wednesday, May 23, 2012 1:31 PM > > To: U2 Users List > > Subject: Re: [U2] File Sizing using concurrent option AND FAREWELL > > > > > > > > Don't worry, we're not going to implement anything that's going to do > damage. Well, unless you call the outrageous cost a damage :) > > > > > > > > Any thoughts on the CONCURRENT option? > > > > > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > > > > > > From: "Wjhonson" <wjhon...@aol.com> > > To: u2-users@listserver.u2ug.org > > Sent: Wednesday, May 23, 2012 2:14:19 PM > > Subject: Re: [U2] File Sizing using concurrent option AND FAREWELL > > > > > > Well you used to be. After SAP sucks ten years out of the life of your > company, we'll see > > > > > > > > << I am being moved to our corporate office to join a eam of 10 who will > be learning, configuring, and customizing SAP to meet the eeds of the best > wine and spirits distribution company in the world. Ok, I'm > > little partial... >> > > > > > > > > > > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: iggchamp <iggch...@comcast.net> > > To: U2 Users List <u2-users@listserver.u2ug.org> > > Sent: Wed, May 23, 2012 11:11 am > > Subject: [U2] File Sizing using concurrent option AND FAREWELL > > > > > > > > Hi All, > > > > uv 10.2.7 / hpux 11.11 > > > > First things first (skip this section if you don't care for goodbyes)... > > > > > > I wanted to say thanks to all of the contributors to this list. I have > learned > > tremendous amount from all of you. The passion that many of you have > for your ork is really inspiring. I am being moved to our corporate office > to join a eam of 10 who will be learning, configuring, and customizing SAP > to meet the eeds of the best wine and spirits distribution company in the > world. Ok, I'm > > little partial... All of you deserve a great deal of credit for my > pportunity as you have all contributed to the things that I've been able to > ccomplish with my current system. Without the great system that we here in > llinois have developed, I'm sure that noone would trust in my abilities to > eliver in a different environment. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > blockquote> > > > > special thanks to a couple of people I have been blessed to work > directly ith. I cannot recommend their services enough! > > /blockquote> > > > > > > blockquote> > > > > > > ony Gravagno ( http://www.nebula-rnd.com/ ): When each division of SWS > was > > sked to provide a web service that would interface our sales force > automation > > nits to our business systems, I was terrified. I had never had the > opportunity > > o work with web technology and, based on a heavy workload, did not have > the > > ime to dive in at that time. I did take the web developer that Universe > > ffered for a spin. Pretty cool tool. While I was able to develop a web > > ervice that could work had I set the requirements myself, I could not > get it to > > eet the requirements that corporate was developed. I even worked with > one of > > he IBM engineers and he could not get it done. Keep in mind that I have > always > > elieved in my abilities to provide solid solutions using the tools that > we have > > n the multivalue world. It killed me to have to bring in a resource > from the > > utside. I swallowed my pride and turned to Tony. I was amazed at the > > ncredible service that he provided. He developed a service for me that > has > > een rock solid. I am still amazed that I have never had to revisit it > after > > ears of pounding by our sales force. This is plug, play, and forget > about it > > t its best! Not only that but our web service which provides incredibly > > owerful and complicated pricing blows the web service developed on our > > orporate as400 system out of the water from a performance standpoint. > Thanks > > ony, you've made me look a lot better than I really am :) > > /blockquote> > > > > > > > > eff Fitzerald ( http://www.fitzlong.com/ ): Your write-ups on file > performance > > ave really helped me to ensure that our system is always operating at a > high > > evel. I wish I could get everyone around here to read it. I was also > > ortunate enough to have been allowed to use your file maintenance > product - > > AST. I can't tell you how much time that this saved me. When I first > arrived > > t this company, all the files were dynamic. I made the mistake of > converting > > hem all to static because I believed the performance was much better. I > was > > ight and the system was screaming. The reason I use "mistake" is that it > > brought me into a whole new world of ensuring the thousands of files > used by > > he application continued to perform by spending all my weekends sizing. > Yuck! > > y allowing me to break away from managing the monster that I had created > by > > sing your product, I had my weekends free again. Yay! Not only that, > your > > roduct was doing a much better job than I ever did. Unfortunately, > budgets > > ere cut and I could no longer continue to use it. Thanks Jeff, you > helped me > > o spend my time moving the company forward by developing great tools > rather > > han maintaining files. > > /blockquote> > > > > > > ILE SIZING question: > > > > As mentioned, I'm moving on. Before leaving I'm trying my best to ease > the > > urden on my friends here in Illinois by automating many of the things > that I > > ever got around to doing for myself . That being said, I put together a > > outine that will analyze our files and resize as necessary. It's pretty > slick > > ut not near the software offered by fitzlong.com - refer to previous > section. > > > > I would like to set it up to execute from cron so that noone has to > babysit. > > eing the scaredy cat that I am, I've always phantomed off the process and > > onitored over the weekend to ensure that noone is accessing the files in > > uestion. I put the CONCURRENT option in there as a safeguard but never > really > > rusted it enough to turn the program loose without policing. > > > > My questions regarding CONCURRENT are these: > > 1. Is the option trustworthy enough to use on a live system while > users > > re possibly accessing the files? > > 2. Are there any sort of performance issues? In other words, would a > file > > hat takes 2 hours to size take 8 hours to size while users are > accessing? The > > outine keeps a history of various statistics including how much time it > took to > > o its business. > > 3. Does it slow the application that is accessing the file? > > 4. Any other considerations? > > > > > > hanks in advance for your response and for all of the tremendous help > that > > ou've all been over the years. > > > > Scott Thompson > > ______________________________________________ > > 2-Users mailing list > > 2-us...@listserver.u2ug.org > > ttp://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users > > > > _______________________________________________ > > U2-Users mailing list > > U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org > > http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users > > _______________________________________________ > > U2-Users mailing list > > U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org > > http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users > > _______________________________________________ > > U2-Users mailing list > > U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org > > http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users > > > > -- > Dawn M. Wolthuis > > Take and give some delight today > _______________________________________________ > U2-Users mailing list > U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org > http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users > -- *hp* _______________________________________________ U2-Users mailing list U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users This e-mail and related attachments and any response may be subject to public disclosure under state law. _______________________________________________ U2-Users mailing list U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users
