According to recent reports issued by Gartner and AMR Research Inc., IT spending is set to improve.

The forecasts follow solid growth across the enterprise resource planning (ERP) market in 2005 and after a new survey of over 500 technology decision-makers across Europe revealed that medium-sized businesses are set to increase their ERP spending in 2006.

If the analyst reports are to be believed then organisations can look forward to investing in and using technology as an enabler to grow profits, retain customers and increase competitive edge.

However, as anyone who has ever been involved in the search and selection of new business management software will defend, this is easier said than done. Whilst not intending to demean the challenge of documenting company requirements, preparing for organisational change, agreeing budgets and forming steering committees — with so many software solutions and vendors in the marketplace, one of the biggest challenges now facing such organisations has to be where to start in the selection process. It appears that in today’s market, there really is a case of information technology overload.

Following a number of high profile acquisitions in the ERP industry over the last twelve months and further consolidation forecast over the coming years, analysts predict that just a handful of key vendors will retain market share and competitive edge going forward — one of these vendors is Microsoft.

When asked in the recent AMR Research Inc. study to name the top ERP applications vendor they would most likely consider deploying this year, 58 percent of survey participants selected Microsoft Dynamics (formerly Microsoft Business Solutions).

This whitepaper is not intended to advise readers on best practice in the search and selection of a business management solution. Its aim is simple — to outline why any and all organisations should consider Microsoft Dynamics and the Microsoft “stack” as part of this process.