Ambitious manufacturing software house Baan Co NV has signed a memorandum of understanding with Siemens Nixdorf Informationssysteme AG to acquire the Paderborner’s aging but venerable ALX Comet unit, on undisclosed terms. Comet, from the Nixdorf side of the house, is a series of modular business, financial and manufacturing software which had its greatest moment of glory during the 1980s, but even now there are still 15,000 installations, down from its heyday of 60,000, mainly in Europe. It now runs on Windows NT and Unix platforms. Siemens Nixdorf will transfer the unit to a newly founded company to be wholly owned by Baan. The software will be upgraded for Year 2000 compliance, but Baan clearly hopes it can persuade many of the users to shift over to its own software. As part of the deal, Siemens Nixdorf will expand its existing five year sales relationship with Baan to a global channel agreement, selling Baan’s software to a wider range of customers worldwide.
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