Infor, a US-based enterprise software vendor, says it expects its financial management system revenue in China to surge at least 50 percent on year in the fiscal year ending May 31, 2008, on the back of rapidly growing new hotel clients ahead of the Beijing Olympic Games.

"We have got deals from hotels in Beijing and Tianjin, especially the big chains such as Accor and Starwood," said MC Chu, Infor's region director of North China, yesterday.

Infor also aims to expand FMS services to domestic firms and organizations but it mainly focuses on multinationals' Chinese operations, said Chu, who declined to reveal detailed revenue figures.

At present, Infor has about 600 FMS clients in the Chinese mainland and more in Hong Kong, including Holiday Inn, KPMG, Starbucks and AIA.

Infor mainly provide FMS services to firms with annual revenue of more than US$50 million, according to Andy Birch, Infor's senior director on CFM (corporate finance management) industry & product marketing.

Infor provides clients open SOA (service-oriented architecture) platform which allows them to easily integrate with other vendors' products such as ERP (enterprise resource planning), according to Birch.

In 2006, revenue of China's enterprise management market totaled 7.14 billion yuan (US$952 million), a jump of 19.5 percent from a year ago, according to Beijing-based research firm CCID Consulting.

Infor also aims to widen revenue in China from trading, oil, banking and insurance sectors.

Meanwhile, the company expects FMS income in the casino industry in Macau, which has attracted giants from Las Vegas to set up sites, to soar, Birch said, without elaborating.

(Shanghai Daily November 8, 2007)