Enterprise software provider Infor is set to add weight to its service-oriented architecture (SOA) strategy next month, with the launch of Infor Open SOA.

Infor Open SOA, which will be free to Infor customers, will become part of every release the company sells and supports across multiple platforms, according to the firm’s chief executive, Jim Schaper. Firms will be able to integrate products such as CRM, asset management and ERP applications and get a common view of data, he added.

The system will be based entirely on open standards, which differentiates it from SOA offerings from rivals SAP and Oracle, Schaper said. “SAP NetWeaver is a totally proprietary infrastructure, customers have to run their [SAP] apps to take advantage of SOA, and the vast proportion of Oracle Fusion is proprietary,” he argued. “But another proprietary architecture is not what customers want.”

The January release will include support for Infor applications such as SupplyWeb, with further products added through future releases. The vendor also plans to build in support for third-party applications with future SOA offerings. “If customers want to integrate an I2 application or Salesforce.com, there’ll be a very small fee,” Schaper added.

While Infor is keen to push forwards with its SOA strategy, the firm does not have immediate plans to expand its on-demand product lines, which are currently quite a small part of its overall business. “Asset management and CRM are the two on-demand applications that have seen significant uptake. We won’t go through the expense and development for other products until we see customer demand,” Schaper argued.

“Implementation can be a nightmare and we haven’t seen too many firms want to let go of their financial data.”

Four-year old Infor is currently owned by private equity firms and has grown through 10 acquisitions, including ERP specialist SSA Global and asset management firm Datastream. Schaper said that Infor is the tenth largest software company worldwide and the largest privately-owned one. But an IPO is on the cards.

“For the size we are today, it’s increasingly difficult to remain private,” Schaper conceded. “We expect to file with the SEC within a year or less, and it could take three to six months to get through that.”

Infor fits a hole in the software market, according to Schaper. “Previously there were niche providers, focusing on specialist applications or industry sectors, who offered great domain expertise but there were questions over their financial stability and global distribution abilities,” he said. “And there were SAP and Oracle, who had the financial stability and global distribution, but firms needed to do a lot of customisation of their products. We wanted to take the best of both, so we acquired the niche providers while building a global organisation.”

The majority of Infor’s customers are in the mid-market, however. “We don’t compete with Oracle and SAP for a global financial implementation at Volkswagen or Porsche,” Schaper said. “But we’re competing for their suppliers and plants and satellite offices.”