(IDG) -- Continuing to warm up its relationship with Microsoft, enterprise resource planning (ERP) vendor Baan this week at Comdex will announce plans to bundle its applications with the new SQL Server 7.0 database. Furthermore, the company gave indications that its applications may not support future versions of other databases.

The package, temporarily labeled BaanSeries '99, will be an "easy-to-install kit," said Lorenzo Martinelli, vice president for strategic marketing at Baan.

Several Baan selections will be available in this format immediately, including Baan's core manufacturing suite, as well as its financial, product-configurator, and analytic applications. The whole range of Baan applications will be packaged with SQL Server 7.0 by the end of 1999's first quarter.

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The package will cost a few hundred dollars more than separate software licenses, and will be ready to use "out of the box," according to Martinelli.

The agreement helps Baan to compete against similar bundling agreements by rival SAP and Oracle's in-house integration of applications with databases, Martinelli said.

Although current versions of Baan's ERP products also support Oracle databases, future versions may not, as Baan comes to rely more on Microsoft, Martinelli said. With Version 7.0, for the first time his company feels that SQL Server outperforms Oracle's databases and is scalable enough even for Baan's largest customers, which serve 1,000 or more concurrent users, he added.

Although its roots are firmly planted in cross-platform technology, Baan has been steadily tying its technology direction to Microsoft.

Stannie Holt is an InfoWorld reporter.

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