Open Source ERP + CRM in the Cloud: opentaps and Amazon EC2

Cloud computing and open source applications is a great combination.  You get all the benefits of the cloud: easy to deploy, easy to maintain, low upfront and long-term infrastructure costs.  But you also get all the benefits of open source: flexibility, low cost applications, and control — control of your software and most importantly, your data.

When you bring the two together, you also get a third benefit: Getting up and running with open source in the cloud is amazingly easy.  For example, take a look at how easy it is to start up opentaps Open Source ERP + CRM in the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) cloud:

(This is a video about opentaps and Amazon EC2 I made last year.)

After having worked with Amazon EC2 for almost two years now, we’ve decided to take the next step.  We’ve created a production-ready opentaps Amazon EC2 Image.  Unlike the one you see in the video, this image has been configured to be used as a production ERP or CRM system.  We’ve taken opentaps configured it to run on the default web ports, pre-configured it with the MySQL open source database for production environments, and pre-loaded opentaps with a base template so you can start setting up your company in it.  We’ve also created a standard Professional Configuration Services package so that an opentaps Partner can help you finish the installation.

Once you start this instance, you should be able to login, set up your company information, load your products and customers, and start doing all the things an ERP and CRM system lets you do: manage your customers, take orders, fulfill orders, manage your inventory, finances, and manufacturing, etc. etc.

The amazing part, though, is how easy it all is.