Lawson wins two county business software deals

Lawson Software Inc. has won contracts from counties in two states to provide enterprise resource planning software and implementation services, the company announced this month.

Under the first contract, Lawson of St. Paul, Minn., will provide Montgomery County, Pa., with financial, procurement and enterprise performance management software. The company did not disclose the value of the contract.

Lawson's integrated software replaces a 10-year-old homegrown financial system. The new applications will help alleviate redundancies and opportunities for data entry errors, and add new functionality, the company said.

The county also expects the Lawson system will provide easy access to accurate financial data and improved reporting capabilities for the county's 3,600 employees.

The integrated Lawson system will improve financial analysis and reporting capabilities, streamline purchasing processes and allow for easy data retrieval and exchange across Montgomery County's operations, the company said. Lawson expects to complete the implementation by Nov. 1.

The county, which has a population of about 750,000, is part of the Philadelphia metropolitan area.

Under the second contract, Lawson will help Knox County, Tenn., to consolidate its processes and applications into a fully integrated, Web-based system.

The goal is to provide a standard interface across all operational areas, while eliminating redundant processes and manual data entry. The contract is worth $4.5 million, Lawson said.

Knox County licensed Lawson financials, human resources and procurement suites in the third quarter of fiscal 2004. The county expects to complete implementation of the human resource module in January 2005 and go live with the financial and procurement modules in July 2005.

Knox County has a population of about 400,000 and includes Knoxville.

Lawson, a provider of enterprise resource planning software and services for commercial and government clients, has about 1,675 employees and annual sales of $344 million.