CCH is signaling the possibility that the company's products will become a platform for commercial development, not just applications that are now open to add-in product development. The company moved in that direction as it formally announced this week its Open Integration Platform for sharing data and workflows within its cloud products.
"It enables integration at a much deeper level than we have been able to do before," CCH president
Mike Sabbatis said during a launch event. He also described the move as giving CCH the ability to bring a new business model to the market.
The move raises the specter of developers being able to take CCH code and produce new applications for sale. While the company has not yet approved that method, the subject is under discussion. For the moment, integration means developers can hook their code into the CCH platform and its common database. For example, one CPA firm that has an electronic filing status application utilized the tools so that it could pull electronic filing data from CCH applications.
Among the companies already working with CCH are AccountantsWorld, XCM Solutions and Templeton Solutions. Templeton, West Palm Beach, Fla.-based CPA firm, raises some interesting issues as it has utilized Microsoft Dynamics CRM to build TC Practice Management which is competing against CCH in the practice management software market.
"There will be some overlap in functionality and we are open to working where there is the most sense," noted Jerry Connor, CCH's senior manager of shared technology services.
CCH lists a wide range of applications and organizations that it sees as candidates for the program including payroll, accounting software, CRM, performance management, resource scheduling, expense management, custom reporting/specialty; implementation/consulting firms; and system integrators.
Bob Scott has provided information to the tax and accounting community since 1991, first as technology editor of Accounting Today, and from 1997 through 2009 as editor of its sister publication, Accounting Technology. He is known throughout the industry for his depth of knowledge and for his high journalistic standards. Scott has made frequent appearances as a speaker, moderator and panelist and events serving tax and accounting professionals. He has a strong background in computer journalism as an editor with two former trade publications, Computer+Software News and MIS Week and spent several years with weekly and daily newspapers in Morris County New Jersey prior to that. A graduate of Indiana University with a degree in journalism, Bob is a native of Madison, Ind
