Market conditions are changing. There's a shortage of talent, regulation is increasing, and competitive forces are on the rise. How should firms position for the future when many have just experienced their most profitable year? What is the motivation to change?Advancements in technology and retiring Baby Boomers must also be considered. How do firms transform, and what are the steps that great leaders go through to ensure success? Paralysis often comes from having too many senior partners and not enough great leaders.

On the heels of its $1 billion-plus acquisition of online banking services provider Digital Insight, Intuit Inc. continued bolstering its niche offerings by inking a $142 million deal to acquire payments processor Electronic Clearing House Inc., or Echo.Under the terms of the agreement, the financial and accounting software concern will pay $18.75 per share in cash in exchange for each share of Echo common stock, including shares that are issuable upon exercise of options.

The best firms get better by improving their leadership and management skills. Many people and firms refer to leadership and management synonymously, but these represent distinct differences and skillsets. Both are very important.However, productivity is typically the measurement of highest value in an accounting firm. Individuals are regularly rewarded for their productivity, rather than the ability to leverage time and get results through others. The support and cooperation of others is necessary in order to accomplish significant goals.

NEXVUE SPINS OFF SOFTWARE UNITNexVue Information Systems, a provider of financial and business intelligence software for the mid-market, has spun off its software development unit and named John French as its chief software architect. French will lead development operations at the unit, which has been christened Bio Analytics Corp.

In 1990, the editors of a computer magazine planned for a tenth anniversary issue. One of the tasks: find out the prices of technology ten years before for some startling comparisons. The research provided the information that about 1980, a laser printer cost a half-million dollars. Or course, even in 1990, those devices were much cheaper. That kind of pricing collapse is not the exception in the technology market. It’s as close to a rule as technology products become more powerful; they also become much less expensive. A similar thing happened with the change from mainframe-based service bureau processing of tax returns. A colleague once related that an executive of such an operation confided that his company had expected prices to drop sharply with the adoption of desktop tax software. But the company couldn’t cut its own prices quickly enough to compete. Something similar is happening in midmarket accounting software, at the low end. A CPA who does reselling and consulting said he had just replaced a $400,000 system with $3,500 of software from Intuit, its QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions package. It’s not just Intuit chipping away at the bottom of that market. It’s also Sage Software pushing Peachtree Quantum, designed to keep Peachtree users from migrating upward in the same way QES was designed to hang onto QuickBooks users. From grumbling in the channel, it’s clear that Quantum is cutting into the number of users upgrading from Peachtree and MAS 90 while QES is cutting into the number of users moving up to about everything else. Intuit has been taking 12,000 units of a year away from the market and that is a sizable amount. Sol, it’s no surprise that resellers are moving upstream. The Sage channel is pushing MAS 500 and the Microsoft channel is moving towards Dynamics AX (formerly Axapta). Sage says sales of MAS 500 went up 17 percent for its year ended September 30, way above the level for the rest of the mid-market products. And what happens to the mid-market—it disrupts the Tier 1 players in exactly the same way.

What’s the most important skill that a technical support person can have? Technical knowledge? Knowing a product, whether software, hardware, or networking is important. But no one can know everything, anymore than any of us know all of the words in our language. What we do know is how to find the definitions in a dictionary. This is problem-solving, and beyond the essential technical knowledge, it is the one thing I have come to look for when I have spent time trying to solve a problem with computer technology. And I have spent a lot of time trying to solve problems with hardware and software over the last few months. In multiple attempts to establish a home wireless network, I have run into reps good and bad. It got to the point, that if the rep was not following the same process I had been through before, there was a good chance the advice I received was wrong. There were the people from LinkSys, which makes modem routers needed to broadcast a wireless signal, who finally admitted that the company was having problems synchronizing the model I had with the DSL signal. There was the DLink rep who confidently assured me that the steps she had recommended would work. They didn’t. The biggest problem came with Verizon, whose reps seemed very conversant with getting DSL up and running when it went offline, but had widely ranging skills in addressing the Wi-Fi System. The ones who most often went wrong were the ones who started making recommendations before they asked enough questions. The most difficult were those who simply refused to admit that the course they had recommended didn’t work, no matter how many times they insisted I try it. That went beyond Verizon. There was the lady on the Symantec help line, who refused to back up her recommendation that I enter a code to get my Norton Anti-Virus up and running—even though that clearly wasn’t working. She must have trained at the same school as one Verizon rep, who was helping with the problem that the Wi-Fi system could be detected by the receiving computer in our house, but the unit still couldn’t access the Web. After we went through a series of diagnostic steps, the following conversation ensued: “You need a PC card.” “Why?” “To receive the signal.” “No, I don’t. I have an adapter.’

Sage Software has unveiled its annual tax update release for its Sage FAS Fixed Assets product line.

Corporate performance management is garnering a lot of attention, as firms look to leverage technology to gain competitive advantage by focusing on critical financial and operational metrics.The standard guidance for success, such as top management sponsorship, end-user buy-in and careful scope definition, need no embellishment. This article offers some practical advice that can spell the difference between success and failure in a CPM implementation.

In today's market, innovation and security are the primary filters for investing in technology. It's not an easy job to simultaneously manage costs, risks, security and regulatory requirements while driving innovation and growth. Firms that simply spend their budgets on maintaining technology will fall behind, while those that invest in innovation and integration of systems will prosper.To whom technology leaders report will often predict a firm's long-term success, including its return on tech investments. Proper governance is critical, and firms that view technology as a strategic asset get much higher rates of return than those that view it as overhead.

Sage Software has announced the launch of Sage Pro ERP 7.4, the latest version of the company's business management solution for small and midsized businesses.The version includes several new features, such as an executive dashboard, a new desktop interface and two new modules - Return Merchandise Authorization and Request for Quote - as well as several improvements on the software's manufacturing-specific modules.

It's always interesting to see when software trends are failing. Four years ago, software vendors couldn't get over their love affair with the big "enterprise" customers, ditching their small business and mid-market customers in favor of wealthier global concerns. The accounting software industry was no exception.Now the trend is reversing itself, due in part to the fact that there are only a relative handful of enterprise customers to be had - and most of them do not want to go through the pain and cost of switching accounting systems unless it is absolutely necessary. Today, the mantra is to move into the mid-market, where companies are forced by growth to upgrade their systems. Little software vendors are moving up to the mid-market; big vendors are moving down.

JOURNYX LAUNCHES P5 PROTOCOLJournyx, a publisher of Web-based time-tracking software, has rolled out Journyx P5 Protocol, a process enabling users to track per-person, per-project profitability. P5 Protocol assists companies in identifying profit opportunities, as well as gathering and analyzing time and project management data that can be used to increase productivity, and aid hiring and retention. For more, visit www.journyx.com.

Sage Software recently launched Sage Accpac HRMS, a new human resources management system for Sage Accpac ERP and Sage Pro ERP users.

Payroll, human resources and timekeeping solutions provider TimePlus Payroll has launched a proprietary feature, that allows employers and employees to access payroll information online.

Microsoft Office is accounting; accounting is Microsoft Office. This is all ye know and all ye need to know. Maybe that line won’t rank with some other literary gems. But it describes something of what is happening with accounting applications, indeed all applications. As a press release from Epicor noted in October, the phenomenon is a convergence of separate applications. Epicor made that analysis in the announcement of its Epicor Information Worker, which is a bit of a new category of software, perhaps we should call it Office ride-along application, as vendors increasingly try to make their applications look and work like the Microsoft y packages.. This trend has been quite apparent in the Microsoft financial line as its four accounting applications have taken on more of the look of Microsoft Outlook and implemented portal functionality. Microsoft has talked of the emergence of composite applications, and Epicor seems to be taking a step in that direction, although the company did not use the term. As described by Epicor, IW is delivered as an Office application. Epicor users can synchronize with Outlook, and drag and drop Epicor ERP data from the Epicor Task Pane to Word 2007 or Excel 2007. In other words, the applications no longer work in isolation from each other. To quote the press release: “The continued blurring of the lines between enterprise applications like Epicor and desktop productivity tools like Microsoft Office enables users to seamlessly interact with relevant and timely information wherever they need it and ensures continuity of information sharing and collaboration across the enterprise.” Of course, two can play at that game, especially when one of the companies owns the game. It’s hard to see how any vendor can out-Microsoft Microsoft. Some resellers have commented that Microsoft’s approach to selling the Dynamics line appears to be moving to “Oh, it’s just like Outlook. You know how to use that.” Ease of learning tends to be a very powerful selling tool. And maybe that’s all you need to know.

MICROSOFT OFFERS OFFICE ACCOUNTING EXPRESS FOR FREE: In its latest attempt to become a player in the accounting software space, Microsoft had released a free, stripped-down version of its software, targeting small businesses that are late adopters and rely on pencil and paper or Excel for their bookkeeping needs.Microsoft Office Accounting Express 2007 integrates with other Microsoft Office software and will be included in the Small Business, Professional and Office Ultimate versions of Microsoft Office 2007. While using the free version of Express, users are periodically offered an upgrade to other products in Microsoft's recently retooled accounting suite, including Office Accounting Professional 2007, which is set for release early next year with a price tag of $149.

The auditor can no longer assume that no fraud exists unless it smacks them between the eyes.Statement on Auditing Standards 99, issued in 2002, requires auditors to exercise professional skepticism about the possibility of a material misstatement in the financial representations of management due to fraud. Now that SAS 99 is four years old, it is time to investigate this standard that shifted auditors from no fraud detection responsibility to the higher degree of professional care.

The processes, technologies and people that helped you get to the level you're at may not be able to ensure that your firm is competitive and able to retain and attract quality people in the future.

With previous editions of Accounting Today's annual Top 100 Products feature, our editorial staff traditionally thought long and hard in an effort to pull together a theme that would, in essence, provide a cohesive blanket for the myriad products and product categories.But with this, our 14th edition of the Top 100 Products, we felt that the cover image was sufficient - an austere spotlight highlighting the true product "stars" of technology in the accounting profession.

In addition to those products that made it onto Accounting Today's Top 100 Products list, our editors have chosen a strong crop of contenders that bear consideration.Here are some of the products to watch in 2007.