Lawson Software - technical definition

(Lawson Software, St. Paul, MN, www.lawson.com) A software company that specializes in ERP for vertical markets including health care, retail, public sector, professional and financial services. The company was founded in 1975 by Bill Lawson, Richard Lawson and John Cerullo to do consulting on Burroughs computers. Its custom software efforts turned into packaged products that eventually led to client/server applications in the 1980s and Internet-enabled applications in the 1990s.

In 2006, after acquiring Intentia International, a developer of manufacturing and distribution software, Lawson aligned the combined products into M3 and S3 categories. Movex, Intentia's flagship product, became the mainstay of the M3 line; M3 meaning "make, move and maintain" goods and equipment. Software for service industries was grouped under S3 ("staff, source and serve"). See Lawson Insight and Intentia.