UNC-Chapel Hill and NC State University will partner on the human resources and finance components of their enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, says Larry Conrad, vice chancellor for information technology and chief information officer at UNC, who will be working with Marc Hoit, his counterpart at NC State.

When the two universities cut their budgets, Conrad and Hoit decided to join forces on an information technology plan.

Both campuses will continue to use Oracle’s PeopleSoft software but now with a new focus. They will share hardware, software, resources, business operations and vendor contracts in order to maximize efficiency and minimize costs.

Conrad says they may not complete the project until 2013, but the operation is underway.

UNC officials expect successful results from this project and may use it as a jumping off point for future collaboration with NC State.