QuickBooks Online subscriptions were up 29 percent over a year ago with only a little help from the new version introduced in October. And that contributed to what Intuit CEO Brad Smith said, during the company’s earnings call for the first quarter ended October 31, was a strong start to fiscal 2014. And the number of active users of QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions rose 19.7 percent over last year’s corresponding period.

Xero is investing to gain market share, the message from its financial results that were released this week. For the six months ended September 30. Revenue for the most recently ended period was about $25 million, up 84 percent from a year earlier with a loss around $14.1 million, an increase of 144 percent from the red ink ago.  Xero invested in building its company, including strengthening operations in the United States and with the $150 million in capital raised half month, it's got some cushion in the bank account to continue doing that.

Just what we need – another low-cost web-based accounting package? Paychex became the surprising entry is this crowded field this week with the introduction of Paychex Online Accounting. And yes, it targets companies with 10 or fewer employees and which don't have a large reservoir of accounting knowledge. Isn't this where most of the competitors are playing?

Stuart Blumenthal, former VP at Sage reseller ISM, has taken a job with RKL eSolutions. The move stemmed from the decision of Phoenix, Ariz.-ISM to sell its Sage 500 practice to Lancaster, Pa.-based RKL. BJ O'Reilly, CEO of ISM, noted "We wanted to focus on Sage 100 practice and X3 and we are selling NetSuite as well." He added Sage has not been committed to Sage 500 for some time while RKL had the resources to work with the application because it has done a lot of development work with that product.