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Trends in Today’s Manufacturing Solutions

Walter GoodfieldVP, Sales & Marketing

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There are dozens of ERP solutions marketed to today’s small and medium-sized businesses. Solutions differ from complexity, price and technology making it difficult for customers to distinguish the products. Today, we will:

Explore 10 trends in the industry Identify & define industry buzzwords Recognize the leading solutions

Objectives and Focus

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1. Vertical or Horizontal2. Deployment Options3. Social Platforms4. Mobility5. User Experience6. Automation7. Specialization8. Business Intelligence9. Performance10. Self Help Tools

Trends in the Industry

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Vertical or Horizontal Vertical (Industry) Horizontal (Best of Breed)Benefits • Minimal customization

• Industry templates• Quicker rollout • Fewer 3rd party add-ons or

customizations

• Complementary business• Resource availability• Ease of use • Leverage experience across

industries

Challenges • Can overlook common requirements i.e. GAAP

• Narrow footprint• Business model changes

• Less functional depth• Implementation made-to-fit• Requires 3rd party add-ons or

customizations

Examples • Infor – Hospitality• Deltek – Gov’t Contracting• Epicor – MTO/ETO

• Sage• Microsoft• Netsuite

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Deployment OptionsOn-Premises, Hosted, or Cloud?

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Social Platforms1. Communicate2. Alert3. Take Action4. Share

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Mobility1. Anywhere from any device2. Browser agnostic3. Functional “apps”

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User Experience1. Consumer-grade experience2. Optimized for connected devices3. Visual displays 4. Workflows and role-based5. Dashboards6. Personalization toolkits

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Automation1. Barcoding2. EDI3. Employee Self Service Portals4. Customer Portals5. Vendor Portals6. Connectivity with standard tools

• XML• Microsoft Outlook• Microsoft Exchange

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SpecializationPublishers today are focusing on their core competencies while partnering with specialized solution providers and industry experts.

1. Avalara for Sales Tax2. HRMS 3. Transportation and Logistics 4. Restricted Party Screening5. Crystal Reports

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Business Intelligence 1. Access to data2. Advanced data cubes and pivot tables3. Internal & external databases4. In-context BI

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Performance1. Real-time updates2. Batchless processing 3. Date-driven versus period-buckets4. Optimized for Microsoft SQL Server and Windows OS

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Self Help Tools 1. Extensive knowledge bases2. Pre-recorded training events 3. Live web streamed training classes4. Chat communities 5. Remote Desktop Support 6. Customer Advisory Councils7. User Groups

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Summary