FRAMINGHAM, Mass. -- According to IDC, the worldwide enterprise resource planning (ERP) applications market is expected to reach $26.7 billion in 2004, compared to the near $25 billion in revenues achieved in 2003. Growth in the ERP applications market is attributed to the general IT spending increase as well as the pent-up demand for more integrated solutions to boost an organization's productivity, profitability, and competitiveness.

Preliminary estimates suggest that the top 10 ERP vendors secured 46% ($11 billion) of the market in 2003, compared to 44.5% in 2002 and 42% in 2001. Among the top 5 ERP applications vendors for 2003 are SAP, PeopleSoft, Oracle, Microsoft, and Sage.

"ERP market consolidation will continue at a gradual pace, taking it to a different level and providing vendors with new growth opportunities," said Albert Pang, research director for IDC's Enterprise Applications service. "The remaining cluster of vendors will have the wherewithal to compete successfully in the long term with their aggregated installations, recurring revenues, and R&D and marketing resources."

IDC expects the ERP applications market to reach $36 billion by the end of 2008. This space will grow as horizontal and vertical vendors increasingly compete against one another to expand their share. Emerging disruptive forces such as open source ERP and new players such as China Dot Com and United Health Group will also make an impact on how ERP software will be delivered in the future.

IDC's recently released study, Worldwide ERP Application Market 2004-2008 Forecast: First Look At Top 10 Vendors (IDC #31269), provides a top-down sizing of the ERP applications market in 2003 and a 2004-2008 market forecast. Historical and forecast revenue data is shown for the total worldwide market and by geographic region and operating environment. This study contains 2001-2003 revenues and estimated market shares of top 10 ERP applications vendors in 2003.

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