Microsoft's ERP strategy is morphing.

Axapta, one of Microsoft's four ERP products, has fallen victim to Microsoft's slip-date curse. Meanwhile, it sounds as if Microsoft has started to take measures to streamline its stable of four different ERP lines.

Last summer, Microsoft Business Solutions (MBS) officials said Axapta 4.0 would ship some time in 2005. But a couple of weeks ago, Microsoft quietly decided to redraw the Axapta roadmap. Now the 4.0 release is due to go to beta testers in October 2005. The final release will hit some time in the first half of 2006.

Microsoft officials decided to delay Axapta in order to open up the application programming interfaces (APIs) and add a software development kit (SDK) to the product, according to an MBS spokesperson.

The Axapta team also is planning to add more electronic-collaboration capabilities for linking trading partners; support new business processes and new document types (like purchase orders); and step up integration with BizTalk Server, SQL Server, SharePoint Portal Server and Microsoft Message Queue technologies, according to sources claiming familiarity with Microsoft's product plans.

Microsoft also is working to add a variety of supply-chain-management, CRM, human-resources management and financial management features to the 4.0 release, the sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said.

Microsoft is still planning to add RFID support to Axapta 4.0, as it said it would last year, the product sources said.

Axapta is one of four different ERP products currently offered by MBS. Microsoft has maintained that it doesn't consider having four different ERP products a problem. Each one is targeted at a different segment of the market, company officials have said, and all four will continue to be enhanced for the foreseeable future.

On Thursday, however, Microsoft chief financial officer John Connors said during the company's quarterly earnings call that Microsoft has decided to move some of its MBS wares into maintenance mode. He did not offer specifics as to which, if any, of the ERP products would be sidelined.

Directions on Microsoft analyst Matt Rosoff said if Microsoft were to move any of its ERP products into maintenance, he'd expect Solomon to be the first. Microsoft closed its Solomon headquarters last July and outsourced the development and support of the product to Plumbline, a company created by some of Solomon's founders.

"At the time, Microsoft didn't say that Solomon was going into 'maintenance mode,' but outsourcing is a pretty clear indication that it's no longer a core strategic product," Rosoff said. "MBS said it had committed to releasing Solomon 7.0, but we don't yet see that release on our roadmap. MBS also has committed to continuing to support Solomon through at least 2013."

When asked about Connors comments, a Microsoft spokesperson said "Microsoft Business Solutions will continue to upgrade all four of its business management applications including Great Plains, Solomon, Navision and Axapta. We can not elaborate on comments regarding products moving into the maintenance model at this time."

Connors made the remark in response to a financial analyst's question about the MBS division's failure to yet achieve profitability.

MBS lost $29 million in Microsoft's second fiscal quarter, which ended on December 31, compared to $139 million in the comparable quarter a year ago. Connors admitted that the MBS unit has had problems with its channel, marketing and R&D strategies, but that he felt it was now "well-positioned for better execution."

(This is an updated version of an article which appeared in the January 20, 2005, issue of the Microsoft Watch newsletter. Want to see what other Microsoft news nuggets you might have missed? Sign up today for a free two-week trial subscription to Microsoft Watch.)