The company's release includes Sugar Open Source, a free basic version, plus two commercial editions, Sugar Professional and Sugar Enterprise, which come in three delivery models -- hosted, as an appliance, and on-premise.

Changes in Version 4.0 are focused on business process automation, adding a new rules-based workflow engine, said SugarCRM co-founder John Roberts.

"An administrator can define the rules without the need to do any programming," said Roberts.

Also included is an enhanced campaign management system for automating outbound e-mail campaigns and inbound e-mail lead requests, with an extended reporting capability to create charts and dashboards on the fly.

"You can build your own query and create your own report criteria or organize a dashboard that is most appropriate for your business users," said Roberts.