The ERP Market 2001 And Beyond – Part 2: Vendor Reactions

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) integrated software solutions have become synonymous with competitiveness, particularly throughout the 1990's. ERP systems replace "islands of information" with a single, packaged software solution that integrates all traditional enterprise management functions (transactions) like financials, human resources/payroll, and manufacturing & logistics (See Essential ERP - Its Functional Scope for more details). We also believe that having an ERP system is a prerequisite in most business environments to fully take advantage of the latest business information processing trends, such as collaborative e-Business and customer relationship management (CRM).

For a list of the major ERP vendors and their market share, see Figure 1.

Figure 1.

This is Part Two of a five-part article. This part discusses the vendors' reaction to market changes. Part One contains an overview of the ERP market and how ERP is expanding to included SCM, CRM, and e-procurement. Part Three will briefly analyze some of the major ERP vendors. Part Four will contain market predictions. Part Five will contain recommendations for the vendors and users. Part Five will contain links to the preceding parts.

How Are Vendors Reacting?

On the other hand, in the ERP market, the major vendors focused on the high-end of the market have virtually evolved into providers of comprehensive e-Business suites (see Where Is ERP Headed (Or Better, Where Should It Be Headed)? Part 3: E-Business and Mid-Market Shakeout). They also compete with a slew of smaller extended ERP vendors for the market for small to medium enterprises (SMEs). While the heyday of the ERP market in the mid 90s may have postponed the consolidation in the lower tiers of the market, it is, however, not the case today. The acquisitions mentioned in Part One reflect the morphing enterprise applications landscape as vendors scramble to outrival competition or, more often, survive during the next phase of e-Business.

While at the high end of the market, vendors of enterprise applications suites face fierce competition from CRM, SCM, B2B exchange providers and other niche players, in the mid-market, a more conventional consolidation has been taking place, mainly with an aim of combining the resources to deliver extended enterprise software suites that meet the 'one-stop shop' requirements of smaller companies.

ERP Pricing Options

ERP systems have earned the general perception of being exorbitantly expensive to license and implement (see ERP Trivia - Every Why Should Have Its Wherefore), and vendors have recently been trying to change that infamous image with new pricing options in order to keep users' costs down. Users typically pay an up-front per-user (either concurrent, role-based, or named) license fee and an annual maintenance charge to use ERP systems (typically 12%-20% of the license fee). The per-seat price for ERP varies greatly depending on the number of users, the number of modules to be deployed and what "bells and whistles" are added, and whether the company belongs to the high-end Tier 1 (Fortune 500) or the small-to-medium enterprises - SMEs (Tier 2 and 3) market segment.

The per-user price range has been from $1,000 to $6,000 (typically higher values for larger companies), with the continual price decline trend owing to fierce competition and the reduced or postponed demand for software. Many vendors offer per-month per-user rental or outsourcing deals as an alternative to traditional up-front licenses (for more information, see Where Is ERP Headed (Or Better, Where Should It Be Headed)? Part 4: ASP's and New Pricing Models). Fixed price, preinstalled, pre-configured ERP is also available and is particularly attractive for the lower-end of market (see Fast-path Implementations - Are They Good or Bad?).

Competitive Changes

Sales cycles vary from months to years depending on the company size, its organizational structure (single or multi-site, international or not), and the functional scope of the project. While the selection phase of software acquisitions will increasingly gain critical importance (due to customers' increased awareness of possibly fatal consequences from selecting the wrong software), the pressure for faster decision-making will mount both from vendors (who want shorter and less fluctuating sales cycles) and users (in order to stay ahead of their competitors). As a rule, every $1 of ERP software sales drives on average another $3-$6 of additional hardware, third party integration and consulting, and resellers revenue, although in some cases additional costs can reach $10-15 for each dollar spent on software.

Early ERP adopters discovered to their dismay that implementing these systems was only the first step toward creating a competitive information technology infrastructure. They and new users alike are now looking for significantly more comprehensive functionality - from advanced planning and scheduling (APS) and manufacturing execution systems (MES), to sales force automation (SFA) and collaborative business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce tools - and demanding that they be integrated into their ERP backbone. Consequently, during the last few years, the functional perimeter of ERP systems began an expansion into its adjacent markets, such as supply chain management (SCM), customer relationship management (CRM), professional services automation (PSA), product data management (PDM), manufacturing executions systems (MES), business intelligence (BI)/data warehousing (DW), and e-Business (see Where Is ERP Headed (Or Better, Where Should It Be Headed)? Part 1: Functional Scope and Vertical Focus).

Faced with competitive inadequacies, the major ERP vendors have been vigorously busy developing, acquiring, or bundling new functionality so that their packages go beyond the traditional realms of finance, materials planning & management, and human resources. While most traditional ERP software enables the integration and management of critical data within enterprises, companies have increasingly recognized the need to deploy more advanced software systems that manage the global supply chain by enhancing the flow of information to and from customers, suppliers and other business partners outside the enterprise.

A typical ERP system now offers broad functional coverage nearing the best-of-breed capabilities; vertical industry extensions; a robust technical architecture; training, documentation, implementation and process design tools; product enhancements; global support and an extensive list of software, services and technology partners. While it is not a system-in-a-box yet, the gap between its desired and actual features is becoming smaller every day. Consequently, we believe that the above outlined trends in the ERP market are the direct consequence of vendors' attempts to:

1. Resolve current ERP functional and/or technological deficiencies,

2. Expand software sales both within their existing and potential customer bases, particularly in the lower-end of the market, by allaying the ERP complexity and costs perceptions, and/or

3. Harness the Internet, which has been reshaping the enterprise applications market by making possible unprecedented visibility and information sharing both within an enterprise and between business partners.




SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/the-erp-market-2001-and-beyond-part-2-vendor-reactions-16486/

Can You Add New Life To an Old ERP System?

Recently, TEC featured an article by Olin Thompson titled, "The 'Old ERP' Dilemma: Replace or Add-on" which discussed options available to companies who want to add business functionality to their "Old ERP" systems. Certainly, there are many options now available in new business functionality that run the gamut from Supply Chain Planning (SCP) to Customer Relationship Management (CRM). The pros and cons of replacing or adding on to your existing ERP system were set forward in Thompson's article. But before you look to new ERP functionality, you should see if you are getting the full benefit out of your existing system. If not, are there ways to add new life to your current ERP system without going into an extensive development project.

Whether you have an old or new ERP system you have probably learned that to maximize its value, you have to work hard at getting information from the ERP system to key users. According to Thompson, " the data checks in, but the information can't check out of many ERP systems". You also may be finding that as e-business strategies are emerging in your supply chains, you could need access to more externally generated information than your ERP system, in its current configuration, can handle. For an Information Technology manager, both situations are problematic. Many companies should take another look at data warehousing before deciding that what to do with the "old ERP" system.


*In Memoriam

Does Data Warehousing Really Work?

Bob Cramer, Director of IT for Appleton WI based Anchor Food Products has found that, " lots of the pain we have with our old ERP system is based on users not having access to information. We see data warehousing addressing most of the problems our users have with the old ERP system". Today, most reporting from older ERP systems is directly from the ERP transaction processing (OLTP) system. Typically, users take ERP transactional data and input it to an Access database or a spreadsheet to generate the reports they need to make business decisions. From a user perspective, the extraction and re-inputting of information is both time consuming and potentially error prone. From an IT perspective there are no opportunities to build in validation checks to ensure that the information is either reliable or the most current available.

Data warehousing provides another way of getting information from legacy systems. Many companies have found it necessary to "build around" their ERP system to some extent. For example, Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS) systems have often been added after the ERP installation. Companies find that they can report from either their ERP or their APS systems, but have difficulty combining data from both systems without having to create new databases or spreadsheets. Once the data is extracted from the systems, it is very difficult to ensure its integrity. James F. Dowling pointed out in the TEC article, "Business Basics: Unscrubbed Data is Poisonous Data" data should be managed as a corporate asset that appreciates in value over time. Historical data must be addressed with as much care as current database content".

The Data Warehousing alternative uses a better approach. It "packages" the information in data cubes that are customized for each group of users. Once the information is packaged in a data cube, users can extract the information using an On Line Analytical Processing (OLAP) tool. Today, OLAP tools are available as client-server applications or can be operated from a Web browser.

The data warehouse also can include information that is not in your ERP system. By adding information from outside the ERP system, IT can provide users access to ALL the transaction information that the company collects as well as whatever information they might want to collect from OUTSIDE the company. This is a significant difference and a potentially powerful advantage. Pat Clifford, Director of Business Consulting at the Boise ID agri-business giant the J. R. Simplot Company, found after installing a data warehouse comprised of company information from their ERP and several legacy systems, " it not only gave more information to our employees, but allowed them to move from just reading reports to performing managerial analysis."

What is the Best Way to Integrate Your Old ERP with Data Warehousing?

There are two basic strategies that can be used to start a data warehousing project. For certain ERP systems third party providers have developed 'off the shelf" data warehousing solutions that are pre-built to the fit the features of your ERP system. If you have an old ERP system that is supported by a data warehousing "solution", you should seriously consider this option. Data warehouse solution products are usually based on the ERP modules you have installed. You can roll out the data warehouse to one module at a time making it easier for IT to manage. One major advantage of using a data warehousing solution is that it can be done in a significantly shorter timeframe than if you have to buy an entire data warehousing tool set.

If your old ERP system is not supported by a data warehousing solution product, you will need to "build your own" using a tool set provided by a data warehousing vendor. At Simplot, Clifford found there were advantages in defining the project by functional areas instead of trying to create one big project: "Different functional areas look at information in different ways, so it's important to work with each group as you build the data warehouse". The advantage of a data warehousing tool set is that it gives you total control over what kind of information you want to present to your users. The disadvantage is that it will take more time and internal resources to implement.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/can-you-add-new-life-to-an-old-erp-system-16444/

Chemical Industry ERP Showdown: Infor vs. JD Edwards vs. Lawson vs. SAP vs. SSI

Five vendors were selected for the evaluation: Infor ERP LX, JD Edwards EnterpriseOne, Lawson M3 for Process Manufacturing, SAP's mySAP ERP, and SSI's TROPOS. All the results presented here were determined by TEC's eBestMatch decision support system, based on the latest request for information (RFI) supplied to us by the five vendors.

The priorities assigned to the various modules and submodules were selected by the client. (This is different from Showdowns we've run in the past, where all the priorities were set evenly.)

The chart below indicates how priorities were assigned across the main ERP modules:

Distribution of priorities by main ERP modules

As the chart above indicates, the client gave Process Manufacturing Management the highest priority, at 25%, followed by Inventory, Purchasing, and Sales Management, all at 15%. Financials, Quality Management, Human Resources, and Product Technology were given the lowest priorities.

In the chart below, you can see how the priorities were assigned within the client's key module of interest, Process Manufacturing Management.

Distribution of priorities within the Process Manufacturing Module

The two most important submodules within Process Manufacturing Management, as indicated above, were Formulas/Recipes, with a 28% priority, followed by Material Management at 17%.

Results

How, then, did the vendors rank? The overall results (factoring in all the modules) are shown in the chart below.

Overall Vendor Rankings

As this chart indicates, Lawson M3 for Process Manufacturing scored highest overall, followed by mySAP, Infor ERP LX, and JD Edwards EnterpriseONE—all closely grouped together—with TROPOS finishing last.

Below are the results within the Process Manufacturing Management module.

Vendor rankings — Process Manufacturing Management

Again, Lawson placed first. But Infor LX moved up to second place, displacing mySAP ERP. TROPOS came in third, moving up considerably from last place in the overall rankings. Slipping to fourth place was mySAP, with JD Edwards placing last.

Conclusion

Of the five vendors, Lawson was the most consistent performer. But as we've seen in this Showdown, rankings can change when different areas of functionality are looked at.

For example, although Lawson placed first overall and in the Process Manufacturing Management module, the vendor slips to third place in Human Resources, behind both Infor and mySAP (see chart below). And, as we saw in the chart above, with the exception of Lawson, all the vendors shifted rankings when the focus was changed from overall results to the Process Manufacturing Management module.

Vendor rankings — Human Resources

Given that the rankings can shift depending on what functional areas you look at and the priority you assign to them, how, then, can you determine which ERP solutions are best suited for your particular business needs?

The fastest, simplest way is to use TEC's ERP Evaluation Center.

TEC's ERP Evaluation Center allows you to set priorities that reflect your organization's business model and special needs, at every level of functionality. At the modular and submodular levels—even down to the individual criteria—you can tell the system which business processes are critical, important, or not important to your organization. The system then compares your priorities against the vendor responses to produce a shortlist of solutions. You get a custom comparison—one that ranks vendor solutions on how well each vendor's functionality matches the business requirements of your organization.

It's the best way we know of to evaluate ERP solutions, and we invite you to give it a run-through. Simply click on the link below to visit our ERP Evaluation Center, and conduct your fast, free custom ERP comparison. After all, there's no other organization quite like yours.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/chemical-industry-erp-showdown-infor-vs.-jd-edwards-vs.-lawson-vs.-sap-vs.-ssi-19265/

Business Software Firms Sued Over Implementation - Lawsuits Bring ERP Problems to Light

This grim list includes Hershey Foods, Whirlpool, Allied Waste Industries, and the maker of Gore-Tex, W.L. Gore & Associates. Other stories of troubled enterprise resource planning (ERP) software implementations are also leaking out from additional companies, colleges and universities across the country. Some companies are even turning to lawsuits, alleging the software doesn't work and pointing a finger at the ERP software makers and consultants who install the systems intended to automate their accounting, order entry, and manufacturing processes. However, many analysts say that when huge software projects go wrong, it is often the buyer's fault, particularly when companies fail to understand the scope of the project or spend the time and money necessary to move from an old computer system to a new one.

Market Impact

We believe that this is only the tip of the iceberg. It is an open secret that a large number of ERP implementations do not live up to their expectations. As a matter of fact, a number of consulting practices are not only surviving these bleak days of ERP market downturn, but also making a very lucrative business by utilizing their ERP consultants in projects aimed at resolving major post-implementation "blues". The idea is the same, although each renowned consulting firm will sell their "unique" methodology disguised under the names like "Enterprise Effectiveness", "Second Wave" and "Continuous Improvement".

We believe this bad news will have greater market consequences for both the ERP vendors and consulting firms then one would initially imagine. The news will make it much more difficult for big ERP vendors to make inroads into the much coveted mid-market territory, where the prospective clients are forced to be cost conscious. Moreover, some mid-market ERP players go so far in their sales campaigns as to offer 50% of the software license payment deferral until successful project signoff.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/business-software-firms-sued-over-implementation---lawsuits-bring-erp-problems-to-light-15551/

ERP Showdown—Round 2! Exact Macola ES vs. Infor SyteLine vs. QAD MFG/PRO

Results

As you can see above, straight "out of the box," Infor SyteLine ranked first overall, with Exact Macola ES coming in second, and QAD MFG/PRO placing third. Overall scores are based on the average level of support the vendors offer across the entire ERP spectrum.

As the chart below shows, Infor finished first in five of the eight modules, QAD finished first in two of the modules, and Exact Software finished first in one module.

However, as with most aspects of enterprise software, it's not that simple or clear-cut.

Rankings, either overall or by module, do not tell you everything you need to know. What they do provide is a basic, high-level view of vendors' general strengths and weaknesses right out of the box. However, the fact is, few businesses, if any, can use an ERP solution straight out of the box. Businesses have special needs and priorities that need to be supported by any ERP solution they use.

For example, your business may require an especially robust human resources (HR) functionality. Even though Infor finished first overall, Exact ranked first in HR by a significant margin, and may therefore be a better choice for your organization. You'll notice that QAD has a low score for the HR module, because the vendor does not offer HR functionality in its discrete ERP solution. In other words, it would be provided by a third party. Accordingly, if you want a separate best-of-breed HR solution that integrates into your ERP system, QAD may represent the best choice.

The same applies within individual modules, where the top-ranking vendor may not necessarily be the right one for your organization's needs. Although Infor was first overall in manufacturing management, QAD was strongest in field service and repairs, as shown in the chart below. If field service and repairs is a critical area in your organization's business model, QAD may be a better choice than Infor (the overall winner), or Exact (the overall second place finisher).


Conclusion

Given that out-of-the-box rankings rarely, if ever, reflect the real-world needs of an organization, and that rankings can shift depending on what area of functionality you look at, how do you determine which ERP solution is best suited for your business?

The fastest, simplest way is to do what we did to produce the results you see here: use TEC's ERP Evaluation Center. (We got our results in twenty minutes—as opposed to weeks or even months of struggling with huge Excel spreadsheets.)

TEC's ERP Evaluation Center allows you to set priorities that reflect your organization's business model and special needs at every level of functionality. At the modular and submodular levels, even down to the individual criteria, you can tell the system which business processes are critical, important, or not important to your organization. The system then compares your priorities against the vendor responses to produce a shortlist of solutions. You get a custom comparison—one that ranks vendor solutions not on out-of-the-box functionality, but rather on how well that functionality matches your business requirements.

It's the best way we know of to evaluate ERP solutions, and we invite you to give it a run-through. Simply click on the link below to visit our ERP Evaluation Center and conduct your fast, free custom ERP comparison. After all, there's no other organization quite like yours.

SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-showdown-round-2-exact-macola-es-vs.-infor-syteline-vs.-qad-mfg%2Fpro-18947/

Welcome to ERP Showdown: Infor ERP LN 6.1 vs. Epicor Vantage vs. Lawson M3 Discrete Manufacturing Solutions

Introduction

With enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems being the information backbone of the organization, we decided to take a closer look at three of the more popular discrete ERP solutions for the mid-market. Using TEC's ERP Evaluation Center, we compared Infor ERP LN 6.1, Epicor Vantage, and Lawson M3 Discrete Manufacturing Solutions head-to-head, based on the most recent data supplied to us by the three vendors.

We looked at eight standard ERP modules. To eliminate any chance of bias, and to ensure a level playing field, all 3,600 criteria that make up the modules and submodules in our ERP Evaluation Center were given equal weight and priority. In other words, no area of functionality was treated as being more important than any other.

The chart below shows the overall rankings.

Results

As you can see above, straight out of the box, Infor ERP LN 6.1 ranked first overall, with Lawson M3 Discrete Manufacturing Solutions coming in second, and Epicor Vantage placing third. (Overall scores were based on the average level of support the vendor offers across the entire ERP spectrum.)

As the chart below shows, Infor finished first in five of the eight modules (although by some fairly small margins in a few cases), with Lawson finishing first in three modules (two of which were extremely close), and Epicor failing to finish first in any of the eight modules.

As you can also see in the chart below, there’s an especially wide range of results in Human Resources. Infor ERP LN 6.1 is the only one of the three solutions that currently provides full HR functionality. Epicor Vantage requires third-party functionality, while Lawson M3 plans to offer full HR functionality in future releases. (It should be noted that clients do not always require an HR component in a new ERP system, as many prefer to retain their existing HR solution or add on a third-party solution.)

However, as with most aspects of enterprise software, it's not that simple or clear-cut.

Rankings, either overall or by module, do not tell you everything you need to know. What they do provide is a basic, high-level view of vendors' general strengths and weaknesses right out of the box. However, the fact is, few businesses, if any, can use an ERP solution right out of the box. Businesses have special needs and priorities that need to be supported by any ERP solution they use.

For example, if your business requires an especially robust quality management functionality, even though Infor finished first overall, Lawson scored higher in the Quality Management module, and may therefore be a better choice for your organization.

The same applies within individual modules, where the top-ranking vendor may not necessarily be the right one for your organization's needs. Although Infor placed first overall and in Product Technology, the chart below shows Lawson as stronger in both the Reporting and Workflow and Document Management submodules. If either of these functional areas is key to your organization's business model, Lawson may be a better choice than Infor.

Conclusion

Given that 'out of the box' rankings rarely, if ever, reflect the real-world needs of an organization, and that the rankings can shift depending on what area(s) of functionality you look at, how then do you determine which ERP solution is best suited for your business?

The fastest, simplest way is to do what we did to produce the results you see here: use TEC's ERP Evaluation Center. We got our results in less than 20 minutes, versus weeks—or even months—of struggling with huge Excel spreadsheets.

TEC's ERP Evaluation Center allows you to set priorities that reflect your organization's business model and special needs at every level of functionality. At the modular and submodular levels—even down to the individual criteria—you can tell the system which business processes are critical, important, or not important to your organization. The system then compares your priorities against the vendor responses to produce a shortlist of solutions. You get a custom comparison—one that ranks vendor solutions not on out-of-the-box functionality, but rather on how well that functionality matches the business requirements of your organization.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/welcome-to-erp-showdown-infor-erp-ln-6.1-vs.-epicor-vantage-vs.-lawson-m3-discrete-manufacturing-solutions-19338/

Will That Wretched ERP Finally Die? Possibly, But Only the Acronym

"The traditional ERP model is dead and collaborative commerce (c-commerce) is emerging to take its place." This was yet another ERP demise prediction, this time given by a speaker at a symposium in Europe at the beginning of April, which was hosted by a leading research house. He went on to predict that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Supply Chain Management (SCM) would become as important as ERP in the electronic economy by 2004. A prediction was given that ERP systems will only host 40 percent of business applications by 2004 due in part to the rise of collaborative commerce, or c-commerce.

With traditional ERP systems, attention is placed on internal productivity. What will happen to alter that model is the emergence of a more diverse enterprise framework. From now until 2004, a more dynamic online marketplace will emerge, where companies can collaborate with employees, customers, stockholders, sales channels and suppliers through a multi-enterprise framework. It was also predicted that due to a more dynamic marketplace, ERP vendors would have to focus on either 1) creating functionally stronger ERP components or 2) creating functional c-commerce frameworks.

Market Impact

There is nothing new in these statements that the market has not already been aware of. The currently infamous 'ERP' acronym may face extinction, but not its basic concept. All of the major ERP vendors realized the need to shift from an internal to an external focus a long time ago. Over the last few years, the main players have been actively partnering or finding other ways to provide solutions that allow businesses to collaborate more effectively. Also, the vast majority of vendors have recently stopped using the term ERP in their marketing campaigns, or have at least been downplaying it. Part of the reason for doing this lies in their attempts not to be branded as outdated by market requirements.

However, the real reason lies in the fact that the boundaries between ERP, CRM, e-commerce and SCM are blurred so much that this attempt to functionally separate them becomes pointless. If the ultimate objective is to win and retain customers, one must consider the entire chain, which includes traditional ERP and SCM functions as well as the more remarkable and supposedly more relevant CRM and e-commerce activity.

The cycle begins with the attraction of the customer through sales and marketing. This hopefully results in an order management and fulfillment process and ends with a customer service, which can involve anything from field installations through to enquiry and complaint management. All of these steps have to be executed well without exception. Otherwise, the customer will end up on a competitor's list of customers.

Therefore, the relative importance of CRM vs. ERP, ERP vs. SCM or of any other match-up is irrelevant. All of these functional areas are critical, except for some esoteric or autistic businesses. The 64,000-dollar question is how all business processes work together. In the electronic world, the degree of flexibility and efficiency of processes relating to the customer lifecycle, product development, and so on, to name but a few, will be a big determinant of losers and winners. Therefore, while the traditional introspective mind-set of ERP becomes history, its functionality remains critical. The 'new economy' will not cause the obsolescence of general ledger and accounts payable & receivable for example. Quite the contrary, it may only emphasize their importance.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/will-that-wretched-erp-finally-die-possibly-but-only-the-acronym-15710/

Can You Add New Life To an Old ERP System?

Recently, TEC featured an article by Olin Thompson titled, "The 'Old ERP' Dilemma: Replace or Add-on" which discussed options available to companies who want to add business functionality to their "Old ERP" systems. Certainly, there are many options now available in new business functionality that run the gamut from Supply Chain Planning (SCP) to Customer Relationship Management (CRM). The pros and cons of replacing or adding on to your existing ERP system were set forward in Thompson's article. But before you look to new ERP functionality, you should see if you are getting the full benefit out of your existing system. If not, are there ways to add new life to your current ERP system without going into an extensive development project.

Whether you have an old or new ERP system you have probably learned that to maximize its value, you have to work hard at getting information from the ERP system to key users. According to Thompson, " the data checks in, but the information can't check out of many ERP systems". You also may be finding that as e-business strategies are emerging in your supply chains, you could need access to more externally generated information than your ERP system, in its current configuration, can handle. For an Information Technology manager, both situations are problematic. Many companies should take another look at data warehousing before deciding that what to do with the "old ERP" system.


*In Memoriam

Does Data Warehousing Really Work?

Bob Cramer, Director of IT for Appleton WI based Anchor Food Products has found that, " lots of the pain we have with our old ERP system is based on users not having access to information. We see data warehousing addressing most of the problems our users have with the old ERP system". Today, most reporting from older ERP systems is directly from the ERP transaction processing (OLTP) system. Typically, users take ERP transactional data and input it to an Access database or a spreadsheet to generate the reports they need to make business decisions. From a user perspective, the extraction and re-inputting of information is both time consuming and potentially error prone. From an IT perspective there are no opportunities to build in validation checks to ensure that the information is either reliable or the most current available.

Data warehousing provides another way of getting information from legacy systems. Many companies have found it necessary to "build around" their ERP system to some extent. For example, Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS) systems have often been added after the ERP installation. Companies find that they can report from either their ERP or their APS systems, but have difficulty combining data from both systems without having to create new databases or spreadsheets. Once the data is extracted from the systems, it is very difficult to ensure its integrity. James F. Dowling pointed out in the TEC article, "Business Basics: Unscrubbed Data is Poisonous Data" data should be managed as a corporate asset that appreciates in value over time. Historical data must be addressed with as much care as current database content".

The Data Warehousing alternative uses a better approach. It "packages" the information in data cubes that are customized for each group of users. Once the information is packaged in a data cube, users can extract the information using an On Line Analytical Processing (OLAP) tool. Today, OLAP tools are available as client-server applications or can be operated from a Web browser.

The data warehouse also can include information that is not in your ERP system. By adding information from outside the ERP system, IT can provide users access to ALL the transaction information that the company collects as well as whatever information they might want to collect from OUTSIDE the company. This is a significant difference and a potentially powerful advantage. Pat Clifford, Director of Business Consulting at the Boise ID agri-business giant the J. R. Simplot Company, found after installing a data warehouse comprised of company information from their ERP and several legacy systems, " it not only gave more information to our employees, but allowed them to move from just reading reports to performing managerial analysis."

What is the Best Way to Integrate Your Old ERP with Data Warehousing?

There are two basic strategies that can be used to start a data warehousing project. For certain ERP systems third party providers have developed 'off the shelf" data warehousing solutions that are pre-built to the fit the features of your ERP system. If you have an old ERP system that is supported by a data warehousing "solution", you should seriously consider this option. Data warehouse solution products are usually based on the ERP modules you have installed. You can roll out the data warehouse to one module at a time making it easier for IT to manage. One major advantage of using a data warehousing solution is that it can be done in a significantly shorter timeframe than if you have to buy an entire data warehousing tool set.

If your old ERP system is not supported by a data warehousing solution product, you will need to "build your own" using a tool set provided by a data warehousing vendor. At Simplot, Clifford found there were advantages in defining the project by functional areas instead of trying to create one big project: "Different functional areas look at information in different ways, so it's important to work with each group as you build the data warehouse". The advantage of a data warehousing tool set is that it gives you total control over what kind of information you want to present to your users. The disadvantage is that it will take more time and internal resources to implement.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/can-you-add-new-life-to-an-old-erp-system-16444/

ERP Getting a New Breath of Fresh Air in Europe

According to silicon.com, a leading European IT TV News Service, European companies began to realize the importance of customer oriented ERP applications and are set to dramatically increase their investment in related projects over the next two years. A report commissioned by Oracle and enterprise systems provider Bull claims European companies will increase ERP projects by 50 per cent, double the volume of business intelligence (BI) and data warehousing (DW) projects and treble the use of CRM applications in the next two years. Two out of three companies surveyed regarded integration of established ERP systems with new CRM solutions as a crucial business strategy. The survey, conducted by IDC, was based on the IT strategies of 1,000 enterprises throughout Europe.

According to Peter Reed, marketing manager for enterprise solutions at Bull, the drive towards customer focused applications is accelerating now as e-commerce takes off and as company resources are freed from developing Y2K solutions. He said while the results of the report were positive, it highlighted a worrying trend of European companies embracing CRM applications as a cost reduction exercise rather than copying the US trend of using it as a method of customer acquisition.

Market Impact

This is a confirmation of a trend we have long noticed in the global market rather than any kind of a surprise. All major business applications players realized the need to shift from an internal to an external focus some time ago, particularly after feeling the Y2K-induced pinch. Over the last few years, the main players have been actively developing internally or partnering in order to provide solutions that allow businesses to collaborate more effectively. Also, while the vast majority of vendors have distanced themselves from using the unpopular, outdated term ERP in their marketing campaigns, at the same time, they have tacitly been enhancing their traditional back office functionality and/or providing hooks to external 'killer' e-business applications.

The real reason for this lies in the fact that the boundaries between ERP, CRM, e-commerce, BI and Supply Chain Management (SCM) have been blurred. If the ultimate objective is to win and retain customers, one must consider the entire chain, which includes traditional ERP and SCM functions as well as the more remarkable CRM and e-commerce activity, with the inevitable need for extrapolating useful information for all management levels by using BI.

The ERP system remains the backbone of the supply chain. It sets the structure a company needs to do business and to communicate with other businesses. The combination of ERP, supply chains, and the Internet, or collaborative commerce, is an integration designed to offer faster and easier access to business transactions as well as customer and supplier data. This combination does not mean ERP systems become obsolete over night. While the traditional introverted mind-set of ERP becomes history, its functionality remains critical. The 'new economy' will not cause the obsolescence of general ledger and accounts payable & receivable for example. On the contrary, it may only emphasize the importance of their efficient use. Integration and interconnectivity are therefore the name of the game in the future.

We also concur with the above-mentioned opinion that implementing CRM and e-commerce only for cost cutting and process streamlining is a rather myopic strategic move. The much stronger demand for extended-ERP components than for a core ERP system are also not unexpected, mainly due to a large ERP market penetration and saturation compared to other much more recent markets.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-getting-a-new-breath-of-fresh-air-in-europe-16008/

ERP Showdown: Deltek Costpoint vs. Microsoft Dynamics AX vs. Oracle E-Business Suite

Introduction
More and more discrete enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions are entering the marketplace these days. So we thought we'd shed some light on three of the most popular solutions for medium-sized businesses in the $25 million - $250 million (USD) range. Using TEC's ERP Evaluation Center, we compared Deltek Costpoint, Microsoft Dynamics AX, and Oracle E-Business Suite head-to-head, based on the most recent data supplied to us by the three vendors.
We looked at eight standard ERP modules. To eliminate any chance of bias, and to ensure a level playing field, all 3,600 criteria that make up the modules and submodules in our ERP Evaluation Center were given equal weight and priority. In other words, no area of functionality was treated as being more important than any other.

The chart below shows the overall rankings.

Results

As you can see above, straight out of the box', Oracle E-Business Suite ranked first overall, with Deltek Costpoint coming in second, and Microsoft Dynamics AX placing third.(Overall scores were based on the average level of support the vendor offers across the entire ERP spectrum.)

As the chart below shows, Oracle finished first in six of the eight modules, with Deltek and Microsoft finishing first in one module each

However, as with most aspects of enterprise software, it's not that simple or clear-cut.

Rankings, either overall or by module, do not tell you everything you need to know. What they do provide is a basic, high-level view of vendors' general strengths and weaknesses right out of the box'. However, the fact is, few businesses, if any, can use an ERP solution right out of the box'. Businesses have special needs and priorities that need to be supported by any ERP solution they use.

For example, if your business requires an especially robust HR functionality, even though Oracle E-business finished first overall, Microsoft Dynamics AX ranked first in the HR area, and may therefore be a better choice for your organization than Oracle.

The same applies within individual modules, where the top ranking vendor may not necessarily be the right one for your organization's needs. Although Deltek was first overall in Purchasing Management, Microsoft was stronger in pricing, as shown in the chart below. If pricing is a critical area in your organization's business model, Microsoft may be a better choice than Deltek (the Purchasing Management winner), or even Oracle (the overall winner)

SOURCE:

http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-showdown-deltek-costpoint-vs.-microsoft-dynamics-ax-vs.-oracle-e-business-suite-18915/

ERP Showdown—Round 2! Exact Macola ES vs. Infor SyteLine vs. QAD MFG/PRO

Introduction
Continuing our look at mid-market discrete ERP solutions, today's ERP Showdown pits Infor SyteLine vs. Exact Software Macola ES vs. QAD MFG/PRO, all aimed at medium-sized businesses in the over $250 million (USD) range.
Once again, we used TEC's ERP Evaluation Center to look at all eight standard ERP modules. To eliminate bias, and to ensure a level playing field, all 3,600 functional criteria that make up the modules and submodules in our ERP Evaluation Center were given equal weight and priority. (The results in this report are based on the most recent data supplied to us by the three vendors, indicating their level of support for each of these 3,600 functional criteria.) In other words, no area of functionality was rated as being more important than any other.


Conclusion

Given that out-of-the-box rankings rarely, if ever, reflect the real-world needs of an organization, and that rankings can shift depending on what area of functionality you look at, how do you determine which ERP solution is best suited for your business?

The fastest, simplest way is to do what we did to produce the results you see here: use TEC's ERP Evaluation Center. (We got our results in twenty minutes—as opposed to weeks or even months of struggling with huge Excel spreadsheets.)

TEC's ERP Evaluation Center allows you to set priorities that reflect your organization's business model and special needs at every level of functionality. At the modular and submodular levels, even down to the individual criteria, you can tell the system which business processes are critical, important, or not important to your organization. The system then compares your priorities against the vendor responses to produce a shortlist of solutions. You get a custom comparison—one that ranks vendor solutions not on out-of-the-box functionality, but rather on how well that functionality matches your business requirements.

It's the best way we know of to evaluate ERP solutions, and we invite you to give it a run-through. Simply click on the link below to visit our ERP Evaluation Center and conduct your fast, free custom ERP comparison. After all, there's no other organization quite like yours


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-showdown-round-2-exact-macola-es-vs.-infor-syteline-vs.-qad-mfg%2Fpro-18947/

Welcome to ERP Showdown! Infor SyteLine vs. Exact Software Macola ES vs. QAD Enterprise Application

Today's ERP Showdown pits Infor SyteLine vs. Exact Software Macola ES vs. QAD Enterprise Application, all aimed at medium-sized businesses in the $250 million (USD)—plus range. Once again, we used TEC's ERP Evaluation Center to look at all eight standard ERP modules. To eliminate bias and to ensure a level playing field, all 3,600 functional criteria that make up the modules and submodules in our ERP Evaluation Center were given equal weight and priority. The results in this Showdown are based on the most recent data supplied to us by the three vendors, indicating their level of support for each of these 3,600 functional criteria. In other words, no area of functionality was rated as being more important than any other.

Chart 1. Overall rankings.

Results

As you can see in Chart 1 above, straight out of the box, QAD Enterprise Application finished first, barely nudging out Infor SyteLine in second place, with Exact Macola ES placing third. Overall scores are based on the average level of support the vendors offer across the entire ERP spectrum.

As the chart below shows, QAD finished first in four of the eight modules, Infor finished first in three of the modules, and Exact Software finished first in one module.

Chart 2. Rankings in the eight ERP modules.

However, as with most aspects of enterprise software, it's not that simple or clear-cut.

Rankings, either overall or by module, do not tell you everything you need to know. What they do provide is a basic, high-level view of the general strengths and weaknesses of vendors' solutions right out of the box. However, the fact is, few businesses, if any, can use an ERP solution straight out of the box. Businesses have special needs and priorities that need to be supported by any ERP solution they use.

For example, your business may require an especially robust human resources (HR) functionality. Even though QAD finished first overall, Exact ranked first in HR by a significant margin, and may therefore be a better choice for your organization. QAD has a low score for the HR module because the vendor does not offer HR functionality in its discrete ERP solution. In other words, the solution would have to be provided by a third party. Accordingly, if you want a separate best-of-breed HR solution that integrates into your ERP system, QAD may represent the best choice.

The same applies within individual modules, where the top-ranking vendor may not necessarily be the right one for your organization's needs. Although QAD was first overall in Purchasing Management (Chart 2), Infor was strongest in Requisitions and quotations., as shown in Chart 3 below. If that's a critical area in your organization's operations, Infor may be a better choice than QAD.

SOURCE:

http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/welcome-to-erp-showdown-infor-syteline-vs.-exact-software-macola-es-vs.-qad-enterprise-application-19328/

Will That Wretched ERP Finally Die? Possibly, But Only the Acronym!

"The traditional ERP model is dead and collaborative commerce (c-commerce) is emerging to take its place." This was yet another ERP demise prediction, this time given by a speaker at a symposium in Europe at the beginning of April, which was hosted by a leading research house. He went on to predict that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Supply Chain Management (SCM) would become as important as ERP in the electronic economy by 2004. A prediction was given that ERP systems will only host 40 percent of business applications by 2004 due in part to the rise of collaborative commerce, or c-commerce.

With traditional ERP systems, attention is placed on internal productivity. What will happen to alter that model is the emergence of a more diverse enterprise framework. From now until 2004, a more dynamic online marketplace will emerge, where companies can collaborate with employees, customers, stockholders, sales channels and suppliers through a multi-enterprise framework. It was also predicted that due to a more dynamic marketplace, ERP vendors would have to focus on either 1) creating functionally stronger ERP components or 2) creating functional c-commerce frameworks.

Market Impact

There is nothing new in these statements that the market has not already been aware of. The currently infamous 'ERP' acronym may face extinction, but not its basic concept. All of the major ERP vendors realized the need to shift from an internal to an external focus a long time ago. Over the last few years, the main players have been actively partnering or finding other ways to provide solutions that allow businesses to collaborate more effectively. Also, the vast majority of vendors have recently stopped using the term ERP in their marketing campaigns, or have at least been downplaying it. Part of the reason for doing this lies in their attempts not to be branded as outdated by market requirements.

However, the real reason lies in the fact that the boundaries between ERP, CRM, e-commerce and SCM are blurred so much that this attempt to functionally separate them becomes pointless. If the ultimate objective is to win and retain customers, one must consider the entire chain, which includes traditional ERP and SCM functions as well as the more remarkable and supposedly more relevant CRM and e-commerce activity.

The cycle begins with the attraction of the customer through sales and marketing. This hopefully results in an order management and fulfillment process and ends with a customer service, which can involve anything from field installations through to enquiry and complaint management. All of these steps have to be executed well without exception. Otherwise, the customer will end up on a competitor's list of customers.

Therefore, the relative importance of CRM vs. ERP, ERP vs. SCM or of any other match-up is irrelevant. All of these functional areas are critical, except for some esoteric or autistic businesses. The 64,000-dollar question is how all business processes work together. In the electronic world, the degree of flexibility and efficiency of processes relating to the customer lifecycle, product development, and so on, to name but a few, will be a big determinant of losers and winners. Therefore, while the traditional introspective mind-set of ERP becomes history, its functionality remains critical. The 'new economy' will not cause the obsolescence of general ledger and accounts payable & receivable for example. Quite the contrary, it may only emphasize their importance.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/will-that-wretched-erp-finally-die-possibly-but-only-the-acronym-15710/

Can You Add New Life To an Old ERP System

Recently, TEC featured an article by Olin Thompson titled, "The 'Old ERP' Dilemma: Replace or Add-on" which discussed options available to companies who want to add business functionality to their "Old ERP" systems. Certainly, there are many options now available in new business functionality that run the gamut from Supply Chain Planning (SCP) to Customer Relationship Management (CRM). The pros and cons of replacing or adding on to your existing ERP system were set forward in Thompson's article. But before you look to new ERP functionality, you should see if you are getting the full benefit out of your existing system. If not, are there ways to add new life to your current ERP system without going into an extensive development project.

Whether you have an old or new ERP system you have probably learned that to maximize its value, you have to work hard at getting information from the ERP system to key users. According to Thompson, " the data checks in, but the information can't check out of many ERP systems". You also may be finding that as e-business strategies are emerging in your supply chains, you could need access to more externally generated information than your ERP system, in its current configuration, can handle. For an Information Technology manager, both situations are problematic. Many companies should take another look at data warehousing before deciding that what to do with the "old ERP" system.


*In Memoriam

Does Data Warehousing Really Work?

Bob Cramer, Director of IT for Appleton WI based Anchor Food Products has found that, " lots of the pain we have with our old ERP system is based on users not having access to information. We see data warehousing addressing most of the problems our users have with the old ERP system". Today, most reporting from older ERP systems is directly from the ERP transaction processing (OLTP) system. Typically, users take ERP transactional data and input it to an Access database or a spreadsheet to generate the reports they need to make business decisions. From a user perspective, the extraction and re-inputting of information is both time consuming and potentially error prone. From an IT perspective there are no opportunities to build in validation checks to ensure that the information is either reliable or the most current available.

Data warehousing provides another way of getting information from legacy systems. Many companies have found it necessary to "build around" their ERP system to some extent. For example, Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS) systems have often been added after the ERP installation. Companies find that they can report from either their ERP or their APS systems, but have difficulty combining data from both systems without having to create new databases or spreadsheets. Once the data is extracted from the systems, it is very difficult to ensure its integrity. James F. Dowling pointed out in the TEC article, "Business Basics: Unscrubbed Data is Poisonous Data" data should be managed as a corporate asset that appreciates in value over time. Historical data must be addressed with as much care as current database content".

The Data Warehousing alternative uses a better approach. It "packages" the information in data cubes that are customized for each group of users. Once the information is packaged in a data cube, users can extract the information using an On Line Analytical Processing (OLAP) tool. Today, OLAP tools are available as client-server applications or can be operated from a Web browser.

The data warehouse also can include information that is not in your ERP system. By adding information from outside the ERP system, IT can provide users access to ALL the transaction information that the company collects as well as whatever information they might want to collect from OUTSIDE the company. This is a significant difference and a potentially powerful advantage. Pat Clifford, Director of Business Consulting at the Boise ID agri-business giant the J. R. Simplot Company, found after installing a data warehouse comprised of company information from their ERP and several legacy systems, " it not only gave more information to our employees, but allowed them to move from just reading reports to performing managerial analysis."

What is the Best Way to Integrate Your Old ERP with Data Warehousing?

There are two basic strategies that can be used to start a data warehousing project. For certain ERP systems third party providers have developed 'off the shelf" data warehousing solutions that are pre-built to the fit the features of your ERP system. If you have an old ERP system that is supported by a data warehousing "solution", you should seriously consider this option. Data warehouse solution products are usually based on the ERP modules you have installed. You can roll out the data warehouse to one module at a time making it easier for IT to manage. One major advantage of using a data warehousing solution is that it can be done in a significantly shorter timeframe than if you have to buy an entire data warehousing tool set.

If your old ERP system is not supported by a data warehousing solution product, you will need to "build your own" using a tool set provided by a data warehousing vendor. At Simplot, Clifford found there were advantages in defining the project by functional areas instead of trying to create one big project: "Different functional areas look at information in different ways, so it's important to work with each group as you build the data warehouse". The advantage of a data warehousing tool set is that it gives you total control over what kind of information you want to present to your users. The disadvantage is that it will take more time and internal resources to implement.

Conclusion

IT managers are under increasing pressure to deliver information that can be used to perform managerial analysis. Decision makers in companies are no longer content to read the simple reports that are generated by old ERP systems. They need to have access to multi-dimensional information based on transactions generated both inside and outside your company. A well thought out data warehousing project can address many of the user issues behind their perceived need for a new ERP system.

SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/can-you-add-new-life-to-an-old-erp-system-16444/

ERP Getting a New Breath of Fresh Air in Europe

According to silicon.com, a leading European IT TV News Service, European companies began to realize the importance of customer oriented ERP applications and are set to dramatically increase their investment in related projects over the next two years. A report commissioned by Oracle and enterprise systems provider Bull claims European companies will increase ERP projects by 50 per cent, double the volume of business intelligence (BI) and data warehousing (DW) projects and treble the use of CRM applications in the next two years. Two out of three companies surveyed regarded integration of established ERP systems with new CRM solutions as a crucial business strategy. The survey, conducted by IDC, was based on the IT strategies of 1,000 enterprises throughout Europe.

According to Peter Reed, marketing manager for enterprise solutions at Bull, the drive towards customer focused applications is accelerating now as e-commerce takes off and as company resources are freed from developing Y2K solutions. He said while the results of the report were positive, it highlighted a worrying trend of European companies embracing CRM applications as a cost reduction exercise rather than copying the US trend of using it as a method of customer acquisition.

Market Impact

This is a confirmation of a trend we have long noticed in the global market rather than any kind of a surprise. All major business applications players realized the need to shift from an internal to an external focus some time ago, particularly after feeling the Y2K-induced pinch. Over the last few years, the main players have been actively developing internally or partnering in order to provide solutions that allow businesses to collaborate more effectively. Also, while the vast majority of vendors have distanced themselves from using the unpopular, outdated term ERP in their marketing campaigns, at the same time, they have tacitly been enhancing their traditional back office functionality and/or providing hooks to external 'killer' e-business applications.

The real reason for this lies in the fact that the boundaries between ERP, CRM, e-commerce, BI and Supply Chain Management (SCM) have been blurred. If the ultimate objective is to win and retain customers, one must consider the entire chain, which includes traditional ERP and SCM functions as well as the more remarkable CRM and e-commerce activity, with the inevitable need for extrapolating useful information for all management levels by using BI.

The ERP system remains the backbone of the supply chain. It sets the structure a company needs to do business and to communicate with other businesses. The combination of ERP, supply chains, and the Internet, or collaborative commerce, is an integration designed to offer faster and easier access to business transactions as well as customer and supplier data. This combination does not mean ERP systems become obsolete over night. While the traditional introverted mind-set of ERP becomes history, its functionality remains critical. The 'new economy' will not cause the obsolescence of general ledger and accounts payable & receivable for example. On the contrary, it may only emphasize the importance of their efficient use. Integration and interconnectivity are therefore the name of the game in the future.

We also concur with the above-mentioned opinion that implementing CRM and e-commerce only for cost cutting and process streamlining is a rather myopic strategic move. The much stronger demand for extended-ERP components than for a core ERP system are also not unexpected, mainly due to a large ERP market penetration and saturation compared to other much more recent markets.

SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-getting-a-new-breath-of-fresh-air-in-europe-16008/

ERP Showdown: Deltek Costpoint vs. Microsoft Dynamics AX vs. Oracle E-Business Suite

Rankings, either overall or by module, do not tell you everything you need to know. What they do provide is a basic, high-level view of vendors' general strengths and weaknesses right out of the box'. However, the fact is, few businesses, if any, can use an ERP solution right out of the box'. Businesses have special needs and priorities that need to be supported by any ERP solution they use.

For example, if your business requires an especially robust HR functionality, even though Oracle E-business finished first overall, Microsoft Dynamics AX ranked first in the HR area, and may therefore be a better choice for your organization than Oracle.

The same applies within individual modules, where the top ranking vendor may not necessarily be the right one for your organization's needs. Although Deltek was first overall in Purchasing Management, Microsoft was stronger in pricing, as shown in the chart below. If pricing is a critical area in your organization's business model, Microsoft may be a better choice than Deltek (the Purchasing Management winner), or even Oracle (the overall winner)

Conclusion

Given that out of the box' rankings rarely, if ever, reflect the real world needs of an organization, and that the rankings can shift depending on what area(s) of functionality you look at, how then do you determine which ERP solution is best suited for your business?

The fastest, simplest way is to do what we did to produce the results you see here: use TEC's ERP Evaluation Center. (We got our results in 20 minutes, versus weeks or even months of struggling with huge Excel spreadsheets.)

TEC's ERP evaluation center allows you to set priorities that reflect your organization's business model and special needs at every level of functionality. At the modular and sub-modular levels, even down to the individual criteria, you can tell the system which business processes are critical, important, or not important to your organization. The system then compares your priorities against the vendor responses to produce a shortlist of solutions. You get a custom comparison, one that ranks vendor solutions not on out of the box' functionality, but rather on how well that functionality matches the business requirements of your organization.

It's the best way we know of to evaluate ERP solutions, and we invite you to give it a run through. Simply click on the link below to visit our ERP Evaluation Center to conduct your fast, free custom ERP comparison. After all, there's no other organization quite like yours
SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-showdown-deltek-costpoint-vs-microsoft-dynamics-ax-vs-oracle-e-business-suite-18915/

Welcome to ERP Showdown

Results

As you can see above, straight out of the box, Infor ERP LN 6.1 ranked first overall, with Lawson M3 Discrete Manufacturing Solutions coming in second, and Epicor Vantage placing third. (Overall scores were based on the average level of support the vendor offers across the entire ERP spectrum.)

As the chart below shows, Infor finished first in five of the eight modules (although by some fairly small margins in a few cases), with Lawson finishing first in three modules (two of which were extremely close), and Epicor failing to finish first in any of the eight modules.

As you can also see in the chart below, there’s an especially wide range of results in Human Resources. Infor ERP LN 6.1 is the only one of the three solutions that currently provides full HR functionality. Epicor Vantage requires third-party functionality, while Lawson M3 plans to offer full HR functionality in future releases. (It should be noted that clients do not always require an HR component in a new ERP system, as many prefer to retain their existing HR solution or add on a third-party solution.)
However, as with most aspects of enterprise software, it's not that simple or clear-cut.

Rankings, either overall or by module, do not tell you everything you need to know. What they do provide is a basic, high-level view of vendors' general strengths and weaknesses right out of the box. However, the fact is, few businesses, if any, can use an ERP solution right out of the box. Businesses have special needs and priorities that need to be supported by any ERP solution they use.

For example, if your business requires an especially robust quality management functionality, even though Infor finished first overall, Lawson scored higher in the Quality Management module, and may therefore be a better choice for your organization.

The same applies within individual modules, where the top-ranking vendor may not necessarily be the right one for your organization's needs. Although Infor placed first overall and in Product Technology, the chart below shows Lawson as stronger in both the Reporting and Workflow and Document Management submodules. If either of these functional areas is key to your organization's business model, Lawson may be a better choice than Infor.
Conclusion

Given that 'out of the box' rankings rarely, if ever, reflect the real-world needs of an organization, and that the rankings can shift depending on what area(s) of functionality you look at, how then do you determine which ERP solution is best suited for your business?

The fastest, simplest way is to do what we did to produce the results you see here: use TEC's ERP Evaluation Center. We got our results in less than 20 minutes, versus weeks—or even months—of struggling with huge Excel spreadsheets.

TEC's ERP Evaluation Center allows you to set priorities that reflect your organization's business model and special needs at every level of functionality. At the modular and submodular levels—even down to the individual criteria—you can tell the system which business processes are critical, important, or not important to your organization. The system then compares your priorities against the vendor responses to produce a shortlist of solutions. You get a custom comparison—one that ranks vendor solutions not on out-of-the-box functionality, but rather on how well that functionality matches the business requirements of your organization.

It's the best way we know of to evaluate ERP solutions, and we invite you to try it out. Simply click on the link below to visit our ERP Evaluation Center and conduct your fast, free custom ERP comparison. After all, there's no other organization quite like yours.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/welcome-to-erp-showdown-infor-erp-ln-6-1-vs-epicor-vantage-vs-lawson-m3-discrete-manufacturing-solutions-19338/

Will That Wretched ERP Finally Die? Possibly, But Only the Acronym!

"The traditional ERP model is dead and collaborative commerce (c-commerce) is emerging to take its place." This was yet another ERP demise prediction, this time given by a speaker at a symposium in Europe at the beginning of April, which was hosted by a leading research house. He went on to predict that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Supply Chain Management (SCM) would become as important as ERP in the electronic economy by 2004. A prediction was given that ERP systems will only host 40 percent of business applications by 2004 due in part to the rise of collaborative commerce, or c-commerce.

With traditional ERP systems, attention is placed on internal productivity. What will happen to alter that model is the emergence of a more diverse enterprise framework. From now until 2004, a more dynamic online marketplace will emerge, where companies can collaborate with employees, customers, stockholders, sales channels and suppliers through a multi-enterprise framework. It was also predicted that due to a more dynamic marketplace, ERP vendors would have to focus on either 1) creating functionally stronger ERP components or 2) creating functional c-commerce frameworks.

Market Impact

There is nothing new in these statements that the market has not already been aware of. The currently infamous 'ERP' acronym may face extinction, but not its basic concept. All of the major ERP vendors realized the need to shift from an internal to an external focus a long time ago. Over the last few years, the main players have been actively partnering or finding other ways to provide solutions that allow businesses to collaborate more effectively. Also, the vast majority of vendors have recently stopped using the term ERP in their marketing campaigns, or have at least been downplaying it. Part of the reason for doing this lies in their attempts not to be branded as outdated by market requirements.

However, the real reason lies in the fact that the boundaries between ERP, CRM, e-commerce and SCM are blurred so much that this attempt to functionally separate them becomes pointless. If the ultimate objective is to win and retain customers, one must consider the entire chain, which includes traditional ERP and SCM functions as well as the more remarkable and supposedly more relevant CRM and e-commerce activity.

The cycle begins with the attraction of the customer through sales and marketing. This hopefully results in an order management and fulfillment process and ends with a customer service, which can involve anything from field installations through to enquiry and complaint management. All of these steps have to be executed well without exception. Otherwise, the customer will end up on a competitor's list of customers.

Therefore, the relative importance of CRM vs. ERP, ERP vs. SCM or of any other match-up is irrelevant. All of these functional areas are critical, except for some esoteric or autistic businesses. The 64,000-dollar question is how all business processes work together. In the electronic world, the degree of flexibility and efficiency of processes relating to the customer lifecycle, product development, and so on, to name but a few, will be a big determinant of losers and winners. Therefore, while the traditional introspective mind-set of ERP becomes history, its functionality remains critical. The 'new economy' will not cause the obsolescence of general ledger and accounts payable & receivable for example. Quite the contrary, it may only emphasize their importance.


SOURCE:
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/will-that-wretched-erp-finally-die-possibly-but-only-the-acronym-15710/

Manage the Change or Change the Management during an ERP Software Selection – Introduction

This is the first of a series of four blog posts in which I intend to describe how change management can affect a company’s ERP software selection project.

Part 1 (Introduction): I will describe the challenges a company faces when managing the change caused by the replacement of its ERP system.
Part 2 (The Change): I will show the difference between general change in a company (e.g., management team, moving to new offices, etc.) and change during an ERP selection process.
Part 3 (The Management): I will describe the different methods and tools used to manage change during an ERP selection project.
Part 4 (Conclusion): I will provide a plan that companies can use when managing change during an ERP selection process.

Change Management Challenges that Companies Face during ERP Software Selection

Probably one of the most important challenges is internal communication. Even before starting the selection process, all parties involved should know what is going to happen and why the decision to buy or replace the current ERP software was made. The decision to replace the existing ERP solution should be discussed with the employees. Of course, in companies with hundreds of users, the chief information officer (CIO) or chief technical officer (CTO) will not speak to all of them; but there are other ways to find out what they think by using surveys, polls, etc.

After the decision to replace the system is made, the next challenge is to define a strategy that will make the selection and implementation process as painless as possible (i.e. a plan of action to accomplish a specific goal). It doesn’t have to be very detailed, but it should contain the risks faced during the implementation process and the ways to deal with them. No matter what vendors tell you, there is no project with zero risk.

Now that you have created a strategy, you will need to find people who can implement it. No matter the size of the project, you will need to create a team for the ERP selection project, made of people from different levels and different departments and led by a project manager whose main task is to supervise all actions related to the project. When building the team, try to select people who will be willing and available to work on the project (do not take very busy people or employees that are likely to leave the company).

No matter who makes the decision that leads to an ERP selection, or who manages the project, all the employees in the company will be affected. Therefore, everyone should be involved and allowed to contribute. In order for that to happen, transparency is extremely important because people cannot get involved if they don’t know what’s going on. All employees (from users to top managers) should know what’s going on and have the opportunity to give their feedback on the project.

Another important challenge is external communication with software vendors, consultants, or companies offering software selection services. If you’ve already addressed the challenges mentioned above, it will be much easier to work with vendors, consultants, or software selection companies.

Please remember that these challenges are related to change management for an ERP selection project. Ideally, these challenges should be addressed before you start the selection process, and not along the way.

In my next blog on change management, I will define change and describe what makes it such an important issue during an ERP selection process. In the meantime, please let me know what your thoughts are on change management and on this blog post.

Change happens all the time—but why are changes in our personal lives similar to those in our professional lives? There are some major events that oc

If you haven’t read the blog post ERP Vendors, Are You Green Enough? that I wrote a little over a year ago, I recommend you read it first. After you’ve checked it out, I assume you’ll understand that I used a flawed and extremely simplified approach to “confirm” my impression of the correlation between the size of enterprise resource planning (ERP) vendors and the greenness of their offerings (see below for further explanation). About a year later, I used the same method to go through the same seven ERP vendors I had looked into the last time, and this time my focus was the growth of the green counts. My “conclusion” is that, on average, these ERP vendors have become 71 percent “greener” over the time span of roughly one year. Let me show you some data:

fig-1.jpg

Figure 1. Green counts from Google Search, 2008 and 2009.

Figure 1 shows the growth in the numbers of search results that include “green” on those ERP vendors’ Web sites. Google was used as the search engine, as it was last year. The result shows that almost all the vendors have significantly increased their use of “green” on their Web sites.

After going through a few of the vendors’ sustainability-related activities in 2009, I’m convinced that the increase in“green” count does have some connection to the enhancements some vendors have made.

When I checked SAP’s press releases for 2009, I found a lot of announcements related to the company’s efforts in sustainability. Below are a few examples:

* SAP Unveils Online Marketplace for Sustainability Solutions from SAP and Partners (October 27, 2009)
* SAP, Microsoft, and Accenture to Co-develop New Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Carbon Benchmarking System (September 24, 2009)
* SAP to Acquire Carbon Management Solution Leader Clear Standards, Inc. (May 11, 2009)

In fact, SAP has a dedicated Sustainability Newsroom Web page to showcase both its capabilities in helping customers increase sustainability and its own sustainability achievements.

Let’s take another vendor—Oracle. Below are some press releases I found:

* Oracle Delivers New Governance Risk and Compliance Suite with Vital Policy Oversight and Control Execution Integration (December 7, 2009)
* Oracle and OMRON Join Forces to Deliver New Environmental Sustainability Solution (October 12, 2009)
* Oracle OpenWorld 2009 Green Program Promotes Awareness, Education, and Sustainability (September 30, 2009)

It seems that not only does “green” as a word appear more frequently on ERP vendors Web site, but also some vendors do add to their offerings to help customers become greener. However, as I explained in last year’s blog post, the flaw of the green count approach is obvious. The word “green” doesn’t always represent vendors’ abilities to support customers’ initiatives toward tackling environmental issues and improving sustainability. Thus, again, I have to warn you that the “green count” approach should not be used for any serious purpose.

Manage the Change or Change the Management during an ERP Software Selection: The Change

Change happens all the time—but why are changes in our personal lives similar to those in our professional lives? There are some major events that occur and change things forever. For an individual, such a change can be caused by marriage; for a company, by the selection of an ERP system. There is always a way out when relationships stop working (both between people and companies), but it can be painful—and stressful to go through.

Why are Changes in Our Personal Lives Similar to Those in Our Professional Lives?

Companies are made up of individuals who have similar behaviors—both at work and at home. Let’s take a look at the similarities between the two:
1. We usually have our initial meeting with our partner-to-be in a public place (restaurant, night club, concert, etc.). The same applies when meeting a software vendor (tradeshow, conference, expo, etc.). Either way, we try our best to make a good first impression.
2. On our first date, we’ll try hard to impress our partner-to-be, as the vendor will try to impress a potential customer during a product demo. In both cases, we tend to forget to mention our weaknesses—and put more emphasis on our strengths.
3. When we decide to take the big step, we need to really understand what the change (caused by both marriage and purchasing an ERP) entails. Most failures, in marriages and implementations, are caused by decisions that were not very well informed.
4. Finally, when things are not going very well with our partner or software vendor, we start looking elsewhere and (oftentimes) decide to change. This is perfectly normal; as long as we learn from our initial mistakes and try to do it right the second time.

You can take control of the change by following these simple steps:

1. Do not blindly following the others or let yourself be influenced: In both marriage and software selection, we sometimes tend to follow others because it seems like the right thing to do. You shouldn’t get married because all your friends are doing it and you shouldn’t look for or replace your current ERP system because everyone else in your industry is doing it.
2. Understand the disadvantages: It’s important to understand the disadvantages change will bring preferably before it happens. It is more important to understand the disadvantages of change, because it’s the weaknesses—not the strengths—that can make a relationship (personal or professional) fall apart, if not understood and dealt with accordingly.
3. Be reasonable and realistic: Do not expect a major change to happen and answer all your problems. A partner and a vendor can help you deal with problems and issues, but do not expect them to fight your wars or come up with miracle solutions to everything.
4. Do not try to hide the dirt under the carpet: Remember, there are always two parties involved in a major change such as software selection or marriage. Change can and will be less painful if the two communicate and share thoughts, feelings, etc. It can only be successful when everyone involved is aware of what’s happening and can contribute.

ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning)

The emergence of the Internet, evolving customer demands, pressure to accelerate business process, and the need to establish more collaborative relationships with key suppliers and business partners are all pushing organizations towards ERP solution. So, what is ERP?
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is described as an "information system package that integrates information and information based processes within and across functional areas in an organization" [1].

Traditional stand-alone applications were designed for specific customers, with limited functionality, and isolated from other applications. On the contrary, ERP is a business tool that integrates all the applications required by an organization as a whole, and connects the organization to other enterprises in a network form. It is usually compromised of several modules such as: a financial module, a distribution module, or a production module. Today, ERP have added new functions such as supply chain management, product data management, electronic commerce and warehouse management. Thus, ERP opens a window of opportunity for businesses to compete globally, respond to competitive pressures, and increase revenue.

ERP Characteristics & Basic Operations:

ERP facilitates company-wide Integrated Information System covering all functional areas like Manufacturing, Selling and distribution, Payables, Receivables, Inventory, Accounts, Human resources, Purchases etc.

- ERP performs core business activities and increases customer service satisfaction.

- ERP facilitates information flow across different sections or departments of the organisation.

- ERP bridges the gap between business partners allowing ongoing collaboration.

- ERP is a good solution for better project management.

- ERP is built as open system architecture, meaning it allows automatic introduction of the latest technologies such as: Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT), Electronic Data Interchange (EDI), Internet, Intranet, Video conferencing, E-Commerce etc.

- ERP not only addresses the current requirements of the company but also provides the opportunity of continually improving and refining business processes.

- ERP provides business intelligence tools like Decision Support Systems (DSS), Executive Information System (EIS), Reporting, Data Mining and Early Warning Systems (Robots) for enabling people to make better decisions and thus improve their business processes.

- ERP tracks a wide range of events in an organisation, and plans for future activities based on these events.

Quote-to-order: A Newcomer Causes a Stir in the Market

The first part of this series provided a detailed background of the still-evolving quote-to-order (Q2O) space, including historical examples to show why the market is increasingly demand driven. Part one summed up by making general observations as to how Q2O software solution vendors have addressed the market, and about the additional features and functionalities they will need to incorporate as demand shifts.

Now it's time to take a look at one of those high-flying "newcomer" providers: enter BigMachines, Inc. (www.bigmachines.com), a rapidly growing company founded in 1999, and with North American headquarters (HQ) in Chicago, Illinois (US), and European HQ in Frankfurt, Germany. The vendor also offers global customer support and hosting operations with a technology center in San Mateo, California (US), a West Coast data center in San Francisco, California (US), an East Coast data center in Sterling, Virginia (US), and an Asian research and development (R&D) center in Hyderabad, India.

According to the BigMachines Web site and associated press releases, the vendor is a provider of on-demand configurator, quoting, and proposal software and associated professional services. Its clients are in the high tech, industrial equipment, medical instruments, and software and services industries. The company's solutions help its clients' sales teams and channels to streamline their selling processes from customer inquiry-to-order. The BigMachines solution digitizes complex selling processes and captures an organization's tribal knowledge. By doing so, it provides online product selection, configurator, quoting, and ordering capabilities for new products and aftermarket parts, and streamlines configuration, pricing, quoting, proposal generation, and order management. BigMachines' rapidly growing customer base of over 100 corporations includes global leaders such as Kodak GCG, Siemens, Ingersoll Rand, and NTT Communications, as well as innovative growth companies such as ShoreTel and Aruba Networks.

Getting Cozy with Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Powers

BigMachines' Lean Front-end (LFE) solution provides reporting capabilities that help analyze sales activities, and integrates to existing enterprise resource planning (ERP), computer-aided drawing (CAD), and CRM systems, including those from Salesforce.com, Oracle CRM OnDemand, Oracle, and SAP.

For Salesforce.com and Oracle CRM OnDemand customers, BigMachines offers two different product editions: SPP (standing for selection, pricing, proposal) and CPP (standing for configuration, pricing, proposal). The SPP is an entry-level solution that does not include the configurator module. Both solutions enable users to streamline their entire Q2O processes, all within the familiar Salesforce.com CRM interface.

The CPP and SPP product pricing capability includes BigMachines' certified and packaged integration to these two CRM products above. The vendor also offers Professional and Enterprise editions which have different price points, minimum numbers of users, bundles of other BigMachines modules, and other add-on original equipment manufacturer (OEM) software. All of these product editions are part of the umbrella BigMachines solution.

Professional Services Automation: Affordable Hosted Solutions for the Small to Medium Business Market

The dot-com age of the mid-nineties introduced the application hosting model to the business world. Thus, a plethora of companies offering a wide range of software as a service (SaaS) typically offered hosted legacy customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, allowing many to join the Internet revolution. Unfortunately with the sudden burst of the dot-com bubble in 2001, the application services provider (ASP) business model never really had a chance to prove its worth to the business world. Only in the last couple of years have we seen software giants like Salesforce.com prove that the ASP model can work. Banking on the recent momentum of this model, a number of professional services automation (PSA) solutions have built business models on ASP technology.

For professional services organizations (PSOs) that have limited resources and limited information technology (IT) infrastructures, the ASP model represents an attractive offering. Smaller PSOs may benefit from the quick deployment and affordable initial price point provided by hosted PSA solutions. In addition, increased security measures have ensured the critical protection of sensitive data within these organizations. Consequently, a niche group of PSA vendors have emerged to serve PSOs in the small to medium business (SMB) market.

Ramco Ships Technology And Products

At the end of February, during the National Manufacturing Week (NMW) in

Chicago, IL, Ramco Systems Limited , a provider of

enterprise business applications and accompanied services, with a global HQ

in India, announced the delivery of a series of enterprise application suites

that it claims will "change the economics of application software". Instead

of releasing one application suite that is intended to meet the needs of

multiple industries, Ramco is providing distinct suites that are tailored to

meet the specific vertical industry requirements for process manufacturing

(Ramco Enterprise: Process), discrete manufacturing (Ramco Enterprise:

Discrete) and asset-intensive industries (Ramco Enterprise Asset Management).

In addition, the company delivered horizontal solutions in human resources

(HR) management (Ramco Human Resource Management System) and business

intelligence (BI) (Ramco Business Decisions); as well as back-office

solutions for finance and distribution (Ramco Corporate Solutions), tailored

to retail and service industries.

Ramco Enterprise Series Release 4.0 applications have been built on what the

vendor claims to be groundbreaking, model-based application development and

delivery platform called Ramco VirtualWorks. The platform includes a model-

based architecture based on a comprehensive model of granular business

processes, representing 70 different industries, a web-enabled set of

workbenches for the application development lifecycle, as well as

methodologies for all stages of development and implementation.

This is Part Two of a two-part note.

Part One detailed the Ramco announcement and discussed the Market Impact.

User Recommendations

Existing Ramco customers should continue to follow Ramco's product path. They

should evaluate the new products and technology with an eye towards moving

forward with Ramco.

Companies that see themselves as early adopters of technology should evaluate

Ramco to validate the potential breakthrough benefits. We suggest a pilot

project with Ramco may prove to be a very good investment.

Companies who are looking for new or replacement systems should not ignore

Ramco, which has proven its products, technology and services, and should

challenge the other competing vendors to match Ramco's value proposition.

Companies with both Process and Discrete manufacturing segments to their

business should particularly place Ramco on their short list. Multi-site and

multi-national corporations and/or their divisions should consider the

Ramco's value proposition, being cognizant of competitive offerings. The

verticals that would benefit the most likely from evaluating Ramco are:

* Batch Process Industries Food & Beverage, Cement, Specialty Chemicals,

Plastics, Textiles, and

* EAM Intensive Industries Aviation, Utilities

Companies who are working to "fill-in" their application portfolio and

perhaps bridge the gaps in existing applications should evaluate Ramco's

modules/components and technology. A strong point of the offering appears to

be the combination of application function, technology and offshore

development.

Companies who believe they need to deploy custom developed systems should

evaluate Ramco's approach to near term development and its long-term

consequences.

While Ramco covers most of the world its regional capabilities and industry

focus may vary. Therefore, potential clients should conduct a thorough

preliminary research on local industry expertise and reference sites when

Ramco is included in the selection process.