ERP
market. Without that level of understanding, you won’t be able to provide them with a solution that fits.” Steve Tattum believes functionality differentiators are relatively few as vendors seek to broaden their offering by development, acquisition and partnering. “The Devil lies in the detail,” he said, “so vendors’ ability to deliver a common business application module across multiple countries and legislations – and to deliver this in a short timescale and to agreed budget – is paramount.” Bull makes the point that most modern ERP systems have rich and extensive levels of functionality that have been developed over time. However, he adds that not all of these systems have the ability to be deployed in a way that is flexible and agile. “Businesses change and adapt to market conditions or they fall by the wayside,” he said. “And having a system that is able to react to change – easily and effectively – means that opportunities can be quickly responded to and business advantage achieved.” Phil Lewis considers that the differentiation debate mainly revolves around monolith software versus loosely coupled suites; generic software versus industry-specific software; one-size-fits-all versus dedicated applications for a particular industry sector; and ‘jet planes versus cheese production. Like some of our other commentators, he also references the influence of the consumer world and the impact of Social Business, which is rewiring the way people create, consume and share information.
Possible future trends What might be the next key developments to look out for over the next year or two? Bull believes fully Cloud-hosted solutions are on their way, with the ERP authors able to host the systems on the Internet for a business, or to have the system hosted by hosting partners or to operate in a hybrid manner with a mix of elements being managed in different ways. He also believes integration and cooperation with social media services such as Facebook and Twitter will make their way into the new releases of the most visionary ERP systems. “A simple example of social media integration might include allowing sales campaigns and promotions to be communicated to prospective
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customers, offering discount vouchers and processes to redeem them,” he said. “A more complex example might be the identification of negative product coverage and reacting to this with managed communications.” In addition, Bull points to the extended availability of ERP apps for a wide variety of device platforms as another trend to watch, as is also the case with increasing power and complexity in Business Intelligence tools – not only in the trending of historic data but also in the delivery of predictive information that is based on a wide variety of factors both internal and external to the business. Lewis’s view is that most innovations will continue to be based on today’s key technologies – Social, Mobile and Cloud. He also references Big-Data as something that will continue to get attention, especially the ability to ‘number crunch’ far more raw data than ever before, due to the on-demand resources capability of the Cloud. “This will provide organisations with far more meaningful analytical results based on massive amounts of raw data, something that was unachievable in the past,” he said. Lewis also anticipates that user expectations will continue to shape the way enterprise application vendors deliver functionality and experiences. He adds that the consumer world will continue to set the way for how people use software. Orme considers that in the near future there will be the continuing evolution and innovation in the type of devices that people will use to access data in their ERP system. “Whether it’s more sophisticated tablets and smartphones, to more intuitive touchscreens on the production floor, getting accurate data into and out of the system will become simpler and more important in maintaining competitive advantage,” he said. “This will facilitate the ongoing streamlining of existing business processes to enable manufacturers to remain leaner, more agile and more responsive to customer need.” Cook explains that Microsoft Dynamics is very focused on usability and is in the process of developing a new user interface. She adds that Microsoft Dynamics is also looking at how better to deploy its services through the Cloud. “Everything we do will build on our experience of working with all types of businesses across a broad range of sectors, to ensure that we can provide a solution that is tailored to suit the
needs of individual businesses,” she said. Cook added that ERPs are in transition. We believe we are leading the way with Dynamics because it’s a much more modern architecture,” she said, Phil Lewis, business consulting director, adding that the market transition is about moving ERP away from the monolithic, slow, expensive, and inflexible representation and into a representation that is about enablement and innovation for manufacturers. “And to enable innovation it has to be able to surface the most relevant information up to all the workers within manufacturing,” said Cook. “In this way, everyone can be engaged in improving processes and product.” Tattum reflects we are now in the third generation of ERP. He elaborates: “All vendors did a good job and automated nearly all transactional processes. People spend their time in managing exceptions and pursuing opportunities using tools other than their ERP system. The new generation of ‘digital native’ users has joined businesses. Their world is Web 2.0 tools, user communities, social networks, mobile working, dashboards etc. ERP systems must become more user-centric and relevant to all types of users in the enterprise, rather than continuing to focus on the traditional enterprise users.” He adds that a modern business solution taking full advantage of the three Cs of Cloud, Collaboration techniques and Communities can help business reach the fourth C of ultimate Connectivity. As a final word of advice, Orme suggests that users to see any ERP investment as a business decision first and an IT decision second. “You’ve got to think it through in terms of how it will affect every element of the company and then you need to involve every element of the company,” he said, concluding: “Make sure you’re 100 per cent convinced before you commit. If you’ve any doubts, talk them through with your prospective vendor. If you’re not entirely put at ease, walk away. The relationship is key, so why start with anything other than complete assurance you’re dealing with the right people?”
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MANUFACTURING
December 2013
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