On Thursday, 26 June 2014, Expertech ERP and Acc-Consult Botswana in conjunction with Lorge Solutions hosted "One Channel Botswana", an all-day Sage ERP focussed convention at The Grand Palm Resort and Convention Centre, Gaborone, Botswana.

The event had a massive turnout of over ninety key decision makers from some of Botswana's biggest corporations, government departments and NGO's.

The convention focused on current and emerging ERP software trends and the latest out-of-the-box solutions for businesses.
 
A number of leading local and international ERP and industry experts spoke on a wide range of topics, including the accelerating migration to SaaS and Cloud deployed systems, mobile solutions for ERP, specialised solutions for equipment and equipment maintenance, warehousing and logistics, Business Intelligence as well as automated document delivery.

Greg Palmer, strategic sales manager Sage MMD Africa gave the audience an insight into of the massive R&D spend being ploughed by Sage into Sage 300 ERP as well as the exciting roadmap for the flagship Sage ERP X3 product suite.

A common thread that ran through all the presentations was the sudden arrival of Mobility in the ERP space, the increasing demand for hosted solutions and the growth in on-demand interaction with systems such as e-commerce.

It appeared that not only will mobile devices overtake the traditional desktop, they will become all pervasive due to the large number of users who have already migrated to smartphone and or tablets with a new trend to wearable devices gaining momentum. Corporates will start to leverage the smart phones and tablets carried around by staff with wireless connection to whatever is required be it in the cloud or on the private network. Advertisers and e-Commerce sites will increasingly be designed and aimed squarely at mobile users.

Cloud computing essentially consists of three components, the abbreviations being SaaS, PaaS and IaaS which stand for Platform, Software and Infrastructure as a services respectively and users are preferring a small monthly off-balance sheet bill rather than a large upfront and ongoing investment in Software, Servers and Platforms.

E-Commerce or e-Tailing as it is becoming more commonly referred to, is seeing massive impetus and is expected to grow exponentially in the next five years. Customers now 'shop' in multiple ways, checking a store's website, maybe visiting one or more stores, looking at on-line product reviews, viewing the prices of competitors on a smartphone whilst standing outside a store, and choosing whether to buy the goods in-store or online and collect it in-store or have it delivered.

One Channel partners Lorge and Acc-Consult were pleased to say that the event was a wonderful success and helped business leaders who attended the convention to better understand and grasp emerging industry trends that may otherwise have remained an elusive an abstract concept.
 
One Channel and its partners will be hosting their final event of the year in Johannesburg on the 17 September at the Killarney Country Club with Lorge as co-host.