Although PowerCerv (now Verticent) did not intentionally focused on any particular industry, its product has found place within many metal fabricators in a make-to-order (MTO), configure-to-order (CTO), and make-to-stock (MTS) environments. This may very well help Verticent to secure its position in the competitive ERP landscape. For additional information on Verticent's background see The Strengths of a Vertically Centric Enterprise Software Provider.
Part two of the The Strengths of a Vertically Centric Enterprise Software Provider series.
Basically, Verticent's solution, ERP Plus, provides tools that metal fabricators need to streamline their quoting, order entry, inventory control, production, labor collection, shipping, and invoicing processes. Like many peer products, ERP Plus can typically help manage a gamut of production activities from sales order release to work order closing. It can enable reviews of near real time information about operations and products on the shop floor; give users the ability to respond rapidly to customer demands; streamline planning, scheduling, and purchasing; track material and labor; and ensure consistency and accuracy across the shop floor. For users with international needs, Verticent provides international date formats, custom documentation, and supports international phone numbers and addresses. Also, its full multicurrency support allows enterprises to conduct transactions in foreign currencies and translate receipt amounts to the base currency for actual costing.
ERP Plus also allows shop floor supervisors and planners to deliver job dispatches electronically; simulate finite loading and post their plan at work centers; and use electronic Kanban to pull demand through the shop. Finite scheduling capabilities may also enable users to create more accurate production schedules based on finite capacity constraints and simulate schedule changes by conducting what-if scenarios. Built-in workflow management capabilities can then send action messages to specific individuals, notifying them when their actions are needed and keeping everyone informed.
Also, machine operators can be more efficient by building the right product at the right time, by accessing electronic drawings and process information. They can report production, labor, scrap, and quality issues with relative ease in near real time. Additionally, Verticent solutions easily manage distribution requirements across multiple facilities, if required. This functionality allows employees in different facilities to access inventory information by tracking movements, allocations, movement histories, and inventory transfers.
The product has also been used by industrial machinery and equipment manufacturers and distributors, which tend to value product configuration features, as well as planning and production, inventory control/management, manufacturing resource planning (MRP), finite scheduling, and workflow management functionalities. As will be described later, although some of these functionalities are delivered via partnerships with third party providers, Verticent (and former PowerCerv) insists that some core competency functional capabilities cannot be obtained this way, and instead require a deeper level of native integration.
The best example is product configuration, which requires a tremendous amount of integration deep within an enterprise resource management (ERP) system because it leverages the item master, bill of material (BOM), work operations (routing), costing/pricing, work order management, sales order, and sales quote management information. Configurators are need to, for example, add or change an operation, change the work center where the operation is performed, change the run rate on that operation, and change the set-up time. They also need to produce special instructions or comments on the work order, sales order, or invoice (see Product Configurators Pave the Way for Mass Customization). Further, each of those parameters affects cost, and the available-to-promise (ATP) date. Therefore, the third party product approach lands itself with problems like redundant data elements that need to be repeatedly and tediously synchronized between disparate databases and systems. It also leads to very common problems such as different user interfaces (look and feel), different release schedules, programming languages, and in some cases, even different database technologies.
This is Part Two of a two-part note. Part One presented Verticent's background.
Beyond Verticent ERP Plus
In addition to integrating with ERP systems, another area of native integration that the vendor has long embraced is customer relationship management (CRM), because a bigger issue in efficiency is data reconciliation, such as customer master data, and integrate inter- and intra-enterprise business processes.
For MTO products, the overall process starts with capturing customer requirements at the front-end and dynamically converting the information into work orders, routings, and other procedures via product configuration engines. The traditional use of CRM software focuses on sales opportunity management, contact management, and customer database tracking, and then grew into post-sale customer-support activities. As a result, it has produced many natural integration points from CRM and ERP all the way down to the shop floor. Consequently, the Verticent enterprise business system delivers specific functionality for the sales and marketing teams, including Web-based CRM functionality for lead capture and management, contact management, opportunity management, time management, marketing automation, customer support, and more.
Verticent products have also long exhibited a componentized architecture, which has been crucial for the deployment of e-business products. The Web-based collaboration and commerce functions are found in the vendor's eSeries e-Business collaborative portal applications, written in Microsoft Visual Basic (VB) as Component Object Model (COM) objects that communicate with Microsoft Terminal Server (MTS). MTS, is a feature of the Microsoft Windows NT Server operating system (OS) that allows the development and deployment of server-centric applications built using COM technologies. This integrates with ERP Plus, and include the following modules: eOrder, eView, eCRM, eDashboard, and eConfigure.
eOrder and eView respectively provide the ability to do either business-to-business (B2B) or business-to-consumer (B2C) transactions over the Internet. Users can view and query enterprise information including customer invoices, credit memos, on-account transactions, open-order status, and detailed inventory information with the real time product availability. eOrder, to that end, provides features like B2B order entry, shopping cart "basket", order or quote hold, confirmation, item lookup, credit checking, freight/tax, view customer-specific pricing, e-mail acknowledgements, credit card functionality, order status, and real time transactional processing. eView provides several browser-based inquiries, like invoice status, order status, inventory availability, shipment status, product inquiry, and customizable portal.
eCRM is the Web enablement of some of the CRM functions featured within ERP Plus, such as lead capture, knowledgebase, lead management, campaign management, diagnostics, product registration, and case management. eDashboard, on the other hand, is an on-line version of Verticent Intelligence representing a customizable Web-based screen that tracks key business drivers that are important to executive level personnel such as chief executive officers (CEO) and chief financial officers (CFO). Such drivers include income statement, balance sheet, current ratio, inventory turns, days of sales outstanding (DSO), cash flow, customer service, customer returns, competitive analysis, sales forecast performance, item analysis, and cost variance reporting. Last but not least, eConfigure a Web-based sales configuration solution is also a key module in ERP Plus.
Product Strategy
Because rewriting ERP Plus' current client/server architecture, so it becomes .NET-compliant will do little to serve Verticent's market, and will be a huge expense for the vendor, the solution will remain on its current traditional client/server architecture. On the other hand, the eSeries modules are being rewritten in VB. NET and Active Server Pages (ASP).NET to be extensible markup language (XML) and Web services compliant. As a Microsoft server-side Web technology, ASP.NET is used to create Web pages and Web services and is an integral part of Microsoft's .NET vision. It takes an object-oriented programming approach to Web page execution, where every element in an ASP.NET page is treated as an object and run on the server. An ASP.NET page gets compiled into an intermediate language by a .NET Common Language Runtime-compliant (CLR) compiler, and then a just in time (JIT) compiler turns the intermediate code into native machine code, and that machine code is eventually run on the processor.
Because the code is run straight from the processor, pages load much faster than classic ASP pages, where embedded ActiveX scripting technologies (usually VBScript or Jscript) have to be continuously interpreted and cached. When a browser requests an ASP, the Web server generates a page with hypertext markup language (HTML) code and sends it back to the browser. For more information, see Understanding SOA, Web Services, BPM, BPEL, and More.
In the future, Verticent plans to deliver similar modules that would expand beyond its current realm of customer self-service to include suppliers and employees. Even the former PowerCerv had attempted to move beyond combining integrated ERP and CRM applications for mid-sized manufacturers, yet it never had the chance to "beef up" its collaborative supply chain management (SCM) capabilities. In other words, all it managed to do was advocate a business case for combining these functional capabilities under the concept of Integrated Enterprise Response, a moniker still retained by Verticent to highlight what its software should mean to customers. The idea is that its customers should be able to share valuable inventory information three ways: by enabling their Web-based order processing, engaging them in Web-based CRM activities such as self-service diagnostics and lead-capture capabilities, and by generally developing a more responsive organization.
SOURCE:-
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-plus-and-beyond-18312/
Part two of the The Strengths of a Vertically Centric Enterprise Software Provider series.
Basically, Verticent's solution, ERP Plus, provides tools that metal fabricators need to streamline their quoting, order entry, inventory control, production, labor collection, shipping, and invoicing processes. Like many peer products, ERP Plus can typically help manage a gamut of production activities from sales order release to work order closing. It can enable reviews of near real time information about operations and products on the shop floor; give users the ability to respond rapidly to customer demands; streamline planning, scheduling, and purchasing; track material and labor; and ensure consistency and accuracy across the shop floor. For users with international needs, Verticent provides international date formats, custom documentation, and supports international phone numbers and addresses. Also, its full multicurrency support allows enterprises to conduct transactions in foreign currencies and translate receipt amounts to the base currency for actual costing.
ERP Plus also allows shop floor supervisors and planners to deliver job dispatches electronically; simulate finite loading and post their plan at work centers; and use electronic Kanban to pull demand through the shop. Finite scheduling capabilities may also enable users to create more accurate production schedules based on finite capacity constraints and simulate schedule changes by conducting what-if scenarios. Built-in workflow management capabilities can then send action messages to specific individuals, notifying them when their actions are needed and keeping everyone informed.
Also, machine operators can be more efficient by building the right product at the right time, by accessing electronic drawings and process information. They can report production, labor, scrap, and quality issues with relative ease in near real time. Additionally, Verticent solutions easily manage distribution requirements across multiple facilities, if required. This functionality allows employees in different facilities to access inventory information by tracking movements, allocations, movement histories, and inventory transfers.
The product has also been used by industrial machinery and equipment manufacturers and distributors, which tend to value product configuration features, as well as planning and production, inventory control/management, manufacturing resource planning (MRP), finite scheduling, and workflow management functionalities. As will be described later, although some of these functionalities are delivered via partnerships with third party providers, Verticent (and former PowerCerv) insists that some core competency functional capabilities cannot be obtained this way, and instead require a deeper level of native integration.
The best example is product configuration, which requires a tremendous amount of integration deep within an enterprise resource management (ERP) system because it leverages the item master, bill of material (BOM), work operations (routing), costing/pricing, work order management, sales order, and sales quote management information. Configurators are need to, for example, add or change an operation, change the work center where the operation is performed, change the run rate on that operation, and change the set-up time. They also need to produce special instructions or comments on the work order, sales order, or invoice (see Product Configurators Pave the Way for Mass Customization). Further, each of those parameters affects cost, and the available-to-promise (ATP) date. Therefore, the third party product approach lands itself with problems like redundant data elements that need to be repeatedly and tediously synchronized between disparate databases and systems. It also leads to very common problems such as different user interfaces (look and feel), different release schedules, programming languages, and in some cases, even different database technologies.
This is Part Two of a two-part note. Part One presented Verticent's background.
Beyond Verticent ERP Plus
In addition to integrating with ERP systems, another area of native integration that the vendor has long embraced is customer relationship management (CRM), because a bigger issue in efficiency is data reconciliation, such as customer master data, and integrate inter- and intra-enterprise business processes.
For MTO products, the overall process starts with capturing customer requirements at the front-end and dynamically converting the information into work orders, routings, and other procedures via product configuration engines. The traditional use of CRM software focuses on sales opportunity management, contact management, and customer database tracking, and then grew into post-sale customer-support activities. As a result, it has produced many natural integration points from CRM and ERP all the way down to the shop floor. Consequently, the Verticent enterprise business system delivers specific functionality for the sales and marketing teams, including Web-based CRM functionality for lead capture and management, contact management, opportunity management, time management, marketing automation, customer support, and more.
Verticent products have also long exhibited a componentized architecture, which has been crucial for the deployment of e-business products. The Web-based collaboration and commerce functions are found in the vendor's eSeries e-Business collaborative portal applications, written in Microsoft Visual Basic (VB) as Component Object Model (COM) objects that communicate with Microsoft Terminal Server (MTS). MTS, is a feature of the Microsoft Windows NT Server operating system (OS) that allows the development and deployment of server-centric applications built using COM technologies. This integrates with ERP Plus, and include the following modules: eOrder, eView, eCRM, eDashboard, and eConfigure.
eOrder and eView respectively provide the ability to do either business-to-business (B2B) or business-to-consumer (B2C) transactions over the Internet. Users can view and query enterprise information including customer invoices, credit memos, on-account transactions, open-order status, and detailed inventory information with the real time product availability. eOrder, to that end, provides features like B2B order entry, shopping cart "basket", order or quote hold, confirmation, item lookup, credit checking, freight/tax, view customer-specific pricing, e-mail acknowledgements, credit card functionality, order status, and real time transactional processing. eView provides several browser-based inquiries, like invoice status, order status, inventory availability, shipment status, product inquiry, and customizable portal.
eCRM is the Web enablement of some of the CRM functions featured within ERP Plus, such as lead capture, knowledgebase, lead management, campaign management, diagnostics, product registration, and case management. eDashboard, on the other hand, is an on-line version of Verticent Intelligence representing a customizable Web-based screen that tracks key business drivers that are important to executive level personnel such as chief executive officers (CEO) and chief financial officers (CFO). Such drivers include income statement, balance sheet, current ratio, inventory turns, days of sales outstanding (DSO), cash flow, customer service, customer returns, competitive analysis, sales forecast performance, item analysis, and cost variance reporting. Last but not least, eConfigure a Web-based sales configuration solution is also a key module in ERP Plus.
Product Strategy
Because rewriting ERP Plus' current client/server architecture, so it becomes .NET-compliant will do little to serve Verticent's market, and will be a huge expense for the vendor, the solution will remain on its current traditional client/server architecture. On the other hand, the eSeries modules are being rewritten in VB. NET and Active Server Pages (ASP).NET to be extensible markup language (XML) and Web services compliant. As a Microsoft server-side Web technology, ASP.NET is used to create Web pages and Web services and is an integral part of Microsoft's .NET vision. It takes an object-oriented programming approach to Web page execution, where every element in an ASP.NET page is treated as an object and run on the server. An ASP.NET page gets compiled into an intermediate language by a .NET Common Language Runtime-compliant (CLR) compiler, and then a just in time (JIT) compiler turns the intermediate code into native machine code, and that machine code is eventually run on the processor.
Because the code is run straight from the processor, pages load much faster than classic ASP pages, where embedded ActiveX scripting technologies (usually VBScript or Jscript) have to be continuously interpreted and cached. When a browser requests an ASP, the Web server generates a page with hypertext markup language (HTML) code and sends it back to the browser. For more information, see Understanding SOA, Web Services, BPM, BPEL, and More.
In the future, Verticent plans to deliver similar modules that would expand beyond its current realm of customer self-service to include suppliers and employees. Even the former PowerCerv had attempted to move beyond combining integrated ERP and CRM applications for mid-sized manufacturers, yet it never had the chance to "beef up" its collaborative supply chain management (SCM) capabilities. In other words, all it managed to do was advocate a business case for combining these functional capabilities under the concept of Integrated Enterprise Response, a moniker still retained by Verticent to highlight what its software should mean to customers. The idea is that its customers should be able to share valuable inventory information three ways: by enabling their Web-based order processing, engaging them in Web-based CRM activities such as self-service diagnostics and lead-capture capabilities, and by generally developing a more responsive organization.
SOURCE:-
http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/erp-plus-and-beyond-18312/
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