Posts Tagged ‘Epicor’

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Research Report: Rethink Your Next Generation Business Intelligence Strategy

Published on June 28, 2010 by R "Ray" Wang

BI Solutions Must Address The Information Management Matrix

A confluence of changing business requirements and on-going vendor consolidation leads many organizations to rethink their business intelligence (BI) strategies.  Many buyers face decisions to move beyond departmental solutions or to stay with an integrated apps based BI solution.  Meanwhile, some buyers must decide whether or not an integrated platform provides the right balance between business impact and cost of technology.  Additionally, most organizations seek support for new data types and new deployment options.  As BI continues to evolve from fragmented and historical reporting to pervasive, predictive, and real-time decision support, an organization’s success increasingly depends on the support for a expanding information matrix of (see Figure 1):

  • New and traditional data types. A proliferation of data types from social, machine to machine, and mobile sources add new data types to traditional transactional data.  Examples include content, geo-spatial, hardware data points, location based, machine data, metrics, mobile, physical data points, process, RFID’s, search, sentiment, streaming data, social, text, and web.
  • Visualization and reporting paradigms.  Users expect more than the traditional charts, gauges, and dials.  Web 2.0 innovations show how Rich Internet Applications (RIA) through tools such as AJAX, Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight can create interactive BI experiences.  New and old paradigms include ad-hoc query builders, business performance management (BPM) systems, dashboards, production reports, scorecards, and advanced visualizations.  New visualization types include matrix charts, network diagrams, bubble charts, tree maps, word trees, tag clouds, phrase nets, and others.
  • Approaches and styles. Analytical techniques continue to improve as data volumes explode.  New and traditional approaches include advanced analytics, business activity monitoring (BAM), BI workspace, decision support systems, low latency BI, meta data generated BI apps, non-modeled exploration and in-memory analytics, scenario analysis, and OLAP.
  • Deployment options. With data coming from so many different sources, users are seeking new deployment options.  Common solutions in the BI portfolio include BI appliances, BI in the Cloud, BI specific DBMS, Mobile BI, open source BI, on-premises packaged BI apps, private BI clouds, and SaaS based BI.

Figure 1.  The Information Management Matrix Drives Next Gen BI


Explosion In Semi-Structured And Unstructured Data Challenges Existing Solutions

Along with new business requirements, the old world of structured data must make way for a plethora of new data types in unstructured data.  More importantly, solutions must support a growing number of industry vertical standards in semi-structured data.  Unfortunately, no single vendor can support all the data types that fit into the following three categories (see Figure 2):

  • Structured data. Structured data remains the most understood type of data.  Traditional sources comprise of data in transactional systems such as ERP, CRM, SCM and other database management systems.  Solutions conduct analysis via OLAP and traditional apps centric and database centric BI systems.
  • Semi-structured data. Common examples include flat files in record format, RSS feeds, XML documents, and data in spreadsheets.  Industry-specific XML data standards and cross-enterprise data-exchange standards such as ACORD, EDI, HL7, NACHA, and SWIFT will continue to grow as BI goes vertical.  On the document print stream front, new systems should support ASP, Met code, and PCL.
  • Unstructured data. Sources include natural-language text from e-mail, blogs, SMS, social networking sites, text fields, audio, video, and images.  Unstructured data represents up to 80% of today’s data sources.  Enterprises are challenged in discovering and organizing unstructured data for the real-time delivery of information to the right user.

Figure 2.  Data Types Fall Into Three Main Categories


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News Analysis: Infor Bets On Microsoft

Published on June 25, 2010 by R "Ray" Wang

Infor Takes A Bold Stance By Standardizing Their Technology Stack

On June 23rd, 2010,  Infor announced that the Alpharetta, GA, based software solutions provider would align its future tools and technology platform with Microsoft.  Infor intends to use and integrate Microsoft server-based products to improve time to market for future product development.  In addition, Infor announced Infor ION for apps interoperability, data management, and data sharing.  Key takeaways about the new Microsoft based Infor technology stack focus on (see Figure 1):

  • User experience. Microsoft Sharepoint 2010 plays a key role in the unified graphical user interface for its applications.  Sharepoint 2010 will serve as the key portal.  In areas requiring dynamic graphical interface elements and rich internet applications, Infor plans to use Microsoft Silverlight.

    Point of View (POV):     Sharepoint gives Infor’s product teams and customers more than just portal capabilities.  Some key features include a number of business connectivity services, business performance management (i.e. dashboards, scorecards, and KPI), digital asset management, enterprise search, excel services, health monitoring, managed metadata, records management, and Visio services.  Sharepoint also improves collaboration with social computing services such as blogs, presence, wiki’s, and RSS feeds.
  • Middleware technologies. On the database side, Infor will select Microsoft SQL Server as the preferred database.  Subsequently, Microsoft Reporting Services will play a key role in the long term Business Intelligence (BI) strategy.  Authentication, security, and access control will come from Microsoft Single Sign-On service.  Where possible,  Microsoft Windows Server will serve as the preferred on-premise operating system.

    POV:     The middleware in the Microsoft Tech stack has substantially improved.  For example, SQL Server 2008 R2 Core Editions comes with dynamic chart integration to Sharepoint 2010, self service BI through Power Pivot and Office Excel 2010 that supports instant sort on 100 million rows of data, backup compression, data compression with UCS-2 Unicode support, and a basic but high-scale complex event processing with SQL Server StreamInsight.   With Windows Workflow Foundation (WWF), Infor and customers gain industry standard tools to deliver user interface page flows, human work flows, business rule-driven workflows, document-centric workflows, composite workflows for service oriented apps, and even system management workflows.
  • Approach to integration. Infor’s investment in OpenSOA results in a simplified approach.  Infor ION intends to connect applications, analyze information, network business collaboration, and organize business processes across the legacy and new Infor portfolio.

    Point of View (POV):     Infor ION builds on the lessons learned from the original OpenSOA strategy.  Given the diverse portfolio, integration will require interoperability among BizTalk and WebSphere to be successful with existing customers.  If successfully launched by the end of 2010, ION will give Infor a key tool in bringing new functionality to the existing base with minimal migration costs.

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Research Report: How SaaS Adoption Trends Show New Shifts In Technology Purchasing Power

Published on June 21, 2010 by R "Ray" Wang

SaaS Adoption Surveys Often Overlook Audience Composition

Over the past year, analyst firms, tech media, and even mainstream business media have happily showcased positive news about SaaS adoption.  The common theme remains clear – SaaS adoption moves beyond the tipping point in 2010.  Cloud adoption will reach a tipping point in the next 12 months.  All this bodes well for customers and SaaS providers as organizations now embrace SaaS as an acceptable deployment option in their apps strategy.  Unfortunately, recent SaaS/Cloud adoption surveys continue to provide confusing and sometimes contradictory data about adoption.  Close examination of these surveys reveal that not all adoption surveys are equally created.  The unspoken question, who’s answering the surveys?

SaaS Decision Making Firmly In The Hands Of The Business Buyer

Anecdotally, business users drive SaaS decisions, while IT leaders remain skeptical.  To validate this hypothesis, Software Insider conducted a quick survey of 100 Global 2000 organizations.  Starting with the most senior IT leaders, the question was posed, “Are you using SaaS in your organization for major business processes?” (see Figure 1).  Of the 46 organizations who responded, the procurement leaders were then asked the same question (see Figure 2).  After comparing survey results, the following conclusions emerged:

  • IT leaders aware but hesitant on SaaS adoption. A little under a quarter of IT leaders (23.91% or 11/46) responded that they were using SaaS applications.  Key applications deployed include CRM, strategic HCM, expense management and project based solutions (PBS).  Delving deeper into these verbal and in-person interviews highlighted a desire to learn more about SaaS.  As one CIO at a major food and beverage concern stated, “The business heads keep showing up with these SaaS apps and then want us to integrate them.  We need to get a handle on all this!”  Key concerns included, “I don’t know if we can integrate all this in the future”, responded the CIO of a large Fortune 500 retailer and “I think we need better governance and security”, remarked the Director of Enterprise Apps for a Top 25 banking, financial services, and insurance (BFSI) entity.
  • Procurement leaders reveal surprising adoption by business leaders en masse for SaaS solutions. Conversations with the procurement managers highlight how business users have taken matters into their own hands.  Every one of the surveyed organizations (100% or 46/46) had an existing SaaS contract, contradicting the IT leaders who did not respond that they ran SaaS solutions.  In fact – these contracts ranged from five seat deals to 2000 seats at one organization.  As the procurement head at a large professional services firm indicated, “The teams will buy whatever they need now.  IT has no clue!”.  “Business has to go around IT because they are too busy keeping the lights on”, retorted a procurement manager at a global 10 pharma.  A procurement manager for a large multi-national manufacturer stated, “Our main issue with SaaS is finding enough solutions that will support our needs.”
  • Business leaders take charge but fail to communicate with IT leaders.  The key finding – lack of coordination among business, IT, and procurement.   Amazingly, the 35 IT leaders who stated they did not run SaaS apps for major business processes still may not know about the CRM, HCM, Project Based Solutions, and Finances deployments in their organization.  When some of them were shown the results, these leaders expressed amazement and surprise.  Organizations should be alarmed but not surprised by this lack of coordination between business and IT.

Figure 1.  IT Leader Responses Show Muted Adoption

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Software Insider Index™ (SII): 2009 SII Top 35 Enterprise Business Apps Vendors™

Published on March 18, 2010 by R "Ray" Wang

2009 Results In Major Revenue Declines For On Premise And Officially The Year Of SaaS

A review of last year’s financial performance should erase any doubts about the viability of SaaS as a deployment option and a business model.   Traditional on-premise business apps vendors took the brunt of the beating earlier in the year but have slowly recovered.   This year’s Software Insider Index™ (SII) highlights two major themes:

  • Legacy On-Premise Vendors Retain Operating Margins But Lose Revenue Share. Almost every on-premise software vendor lost revenue on a year-over-year (YoY) basis in 2009 (see Figure 1).  IFS (3.87%) and SAS Institute (2.21%) grew in the midst of the financial onslaught.  SAP is still double the size of Oracle in apps revenue!  Vendors such as QAD (-31.42%) and Manhattan Associates (-26.84%)saw the worst YoY declines (see Figure 2).  Most vendors relied on their maintenance and support to bolster their revenues. For example, CDC, Epicor, Exact, Lawson, Manhattan, Oracle, QAD, and SAP exceeded a 1:2 ratio in new license to maintenance revenue.  Why?  Customers chose not to upgrade, purchase new licenses, and expand their footprint.   Despite the downturn, most vendors survived with operating margins between 10% an 50%, well above those achieved by SaaS vendors.   Traditional vendors clearly felt pressure from SaaS/Cloud.
  • SaaS Models Prove Themselves In 2009. Meanwhile, every SaaS vendor grew, from Ariba with the lowest YoY revenue growth (0.44%) to SuccessFactors with the highest (38.73%). Overall the SaaS vendors tracked in the 2009 SII grew 7.98% in YoY revenue. SaaS deployments expanded in all areas from CRM to HCM to spend management. Of note, Salesforce.com exceeded the $1.3B mark, a milestone for the SaaS industry.

Figure 1. Software Insider IndexTM (SII) Top 35 Enterprise Business Apps VendorsTM (Calendar Year Revenue)

screen-shot-2010-03-18-at-110717-am

Copyright © 2010 R Wang and Insider Associates, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Tuesday’s Tip: When To Go With A Two-Tier ERP Strategy

Published on March 2, 2010 by R "Ray" Wang

Single Instance ERP Harder And Harder To Justify

The holy grail of an ERP implementation used to be the single instance deployment.  However, market forces, a move to adopt new disruptive technologies, slow pace of innovation from incumbent vendors, and high maintenance fees have changed many organization’s perspectives.  Add a slew of rapidly changing business requirements battling rigid legacy infrastructures and next gen CIO’s have been forced to depart from the standard apps strategies.  In fact, improved integration, web services, and SaaS deployments have now improved the success rates and ROI for Two-Tier ERP apps strategies.

Purpose Built Capabilities And Cost Savings Drive Push For Two-Tier Apps Strategies

Recent Software Insider data surveys of next gen IT leaders in Q3 2009 and Q1 2010 show a 10% increase among organizations considering a Two-Tier ERP apps strategy (see Figure 1).  Key drivers behind moving to a Two-Tier ERP approach stem from:

  • Purpose built or industry requirements (89.61%). Next gen IT leaders remain frustrated by the lack of innovation and progress in completing out promised functional footprints.  As market competition intensifies, industry specific, purpose built solutions provide the competitive advantage needed for survival and success.
  • Existing systems too expensive (70.13%). ROI calculations on existing ERP systems often show high cost factors.  The culprits – overruns in implementation, customization of reports, maintenance payments on shelfware, increasing costs to staff, and rigidity of system.
  • Upgrade too expensive (45.45%). Many customers face upgrade costs equivalent to reimplementation.  Cost factors could equal up to 85% of the original implementation cost.
  • Need to innovate (35.06%). Some organizations find that their vendors have not innovated fast enough. Social channels have not been accounted for.  User experiences seem dated.  Reporting and analytics require experts to deliver.  Paucity in mobile solutions hinder productivity.
  • Regulatory compliance (24.68%). The need to meet industry specific regulatory compliance drive organizations to choose purpose built solutions.  Many choose SaaS to mitigate the costs of legislative and regulatory updates.
  • Geographic requirements (19.48%). Country or region specific requirements may require two-tier strategies based on geography.  Some ERP systems lack the language or tax requirements and a separate instance will prove cheaper to run than customizing a monolithic large ERP solution.
  • Existing systems too rigid (15.58%). Rigidity may lead to the inability to integrate and work with other systems, new channels, and emerging stakeholders.  Integration solutions can assist, but long term, next gen IT leaders will begin to surround legacy solutions with newer technologies.

Figure 1. Two Tier ERP Strategies Gain Favor In Next Gen IT Leader Apps Strategies

screen-shot-2010-03-02-at-53732-pm

Figure 2.  Industry Requirements And Cost Drive Push To Two-Tier Apps Strategies

screen-shot-2010-03-02-at-53724-pm

The Bottom Line – Users Should Consider Scenarios Based On Business Models And Geographic Needs

Detailed apps strategy conversations highlight 3 scenarios where Two-Tier ERP strategies make sense.  A number of vendors have proven to be strong partners in enabling Two-Tier ERP (see Figure 3).

  1. Different business models. Organizations with very different lines of businesses often consider hub and spoke implementations.  The drive to standardize on a single ERP system makes little sense when one subsidiary delivers services and the other manufactures goods.  Several large multi-national conglomerates leverage more than two-tiers of ERP to handle a warranty business, financial services, and power generation manufacturing.
  2. Country specific deployments. Deploying a full scale ERP solution makes little sense for new subsidiaries when options exist at lower operating costs and higher ROI.  One large Japanese manufacturer found cost savings with local based systems in North America and EMEA.
  3. Phased modernization efforts. Organizations looking to upgrade and modernize their systems may keep some legacy systems in place as they upgrade to more modern systems.  One large entertainment concern has kept their financials systems and updated their retail systems with a more modern, web services based, SOA architected product.

Figure 3. Vendors To Watch In Two-Tier ERP Apps Strategies

screen-shot-2010-03-02-at-71143-pm

Your POV.

Have you deployed a Two-Tier ERP strategy? How has it gone?  What’s worked? What’s not?  You can post or send on to rwang0 at gmail dot com or r at softwaresinsider dot org and we’ll keep your anonymity.

Please let us know if you need help with your enterprise apps strategy by:

  • Developing your enterprise apps strategy?
  • Addressing disruptive technologies like Social CRM, Cloud Computing, SaaS deployment, and Two-Tier ERP?
  • Assessing the ROI of a Two-Tier ERP strategy?

* Not responsible for any factual errors or omissions.  However, happy to correct any errors upon email receipt.

Copyright © 2010 R Wang and Insider Associates, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Tuesday’s Tip: 10 Cloud and SaaS Apps Strategies For 2010

Published on December 22, 2009 by R "Ray" Wang

Keep In Mind Basic Rules Still Apply Regardless Of Deployment Option

The proliferation of SaaS solutions provides organizations with a myriad of sorely needed point and disruptive solutions.  Good news – business users can rapidly procure and deploy, while innovating with minimal budget and IT team constraints.  Bad news – users must depend more on their SLA guarantees and deal with a potential integration nightmare of hundreds if not thousands of potential SaaS apps.  Though the 7 key benefits of SaaS outweigh most downside risks, organizations must design their SaaS apps strategies with the same rigor as any apps strategy.  Just because deployment options have changed, this does not mean basic apps strategy is thrown out the window.  Concepts such as SOA, business process orchestration, and enterprise architecture will be more important than ever.  Here are 10 strategies to consider as organizations take SaaS mainstream:

  1. Begin with the business process and desired business value. Understand the desired business value and outcome.  Map back the key performance indicators (KPI’s) to the business processes. Identify what processes will be covered by the SaaS solution.  Determine overlaps and hand-offs between on-premise and SaaS to SaaS that are required to measure the desired KPI’s.
  2. Engage stakeholders early and often. Today’s apps strategies must constantly evolve. Change is happening so fast that line of business leads and IT leaders must collaborate in real time.  The result – an ever changing list of requirements.  While SaaS allows business leaders to make go-it-alone decisions, success will require close collaboration on short term and long term requirements, dependencies, and strategy.
  3. Bet on future suites, SaaS platforms or PaaS (Platform-as-a-service). Winners and losers will emerge in this wave of Cloud computing.  Vendors such as Netsuite, Workday, Zoho, Epicor, and SAP have built or will be building suites.  They provide safe bets as more and more functionality will be rolled into their offerings. Concurrently, organizations should also choose vendors who bring a vibrant and rich ecosystem to the table because those vendors will win in the market.  Salesforce.com and NetSuite already provide users with a platform to build on apps.  Other vendors such as as Google Apps Engine, Microsoft Azure, IBM, and Zoho provide rich developer communities.  Partner and customers will drive innovation which is why platform adoption (i.e. today’s middleware) makes a difference.
  4. Augment with best of breeds, but avoid best of breed hell. No one platform can provide every solution, but choose wisely.  Best of breeds provide deep vertical capabilities and rich last mile solutions.  However, no one wants to manage hundreds of vendor relationships.  Create frameworks that allow business users to work with vendors which support open standards, integrate well with your existing integration strategies, and follow the bill of rights.   Reduction in the number of vendors will become a priority in 2010 going on into 2011.
  5. Assume hybrid will be the rule not the exception. Prepare for hybrid deployments throughout the decade.  Despite the benefits of SaaS and broad adoption in 2010, legacy apps will not go away.  Just count the number of mainframe and client-server apps still in use today.  Many on-premise apps will take time to migrate to SaaS. In some cases, legal requirements will prevent data from being stored off-site.  Software plus services offerings from companies such as Infor, Lawson, Microsoft Dynamics, and SAP may become the norm in 2010 as companies seek private and public cloud solutions.
  6. Design with good architecture. Keep your enterprise architects (EA’s) or hire some more.  Inevitably, more and more SaaS solutions will enter the organization.  EA’s will proactively plan for new scenarios and account for future business requirements.  Organizations should keep some rigor in terms of standards for solution adoption while accounting for the need to rapidly innovate.  Business leaders will need some frameworks on which solutions to adopt.
  7. Choose the right integration strategy for the right time. SaaS integration strategies will evolve based on the organization’s SaaS adoption maturity.  The first set of solutions will probably require point to point integration of data.  Over time, users often migrate to centralized integration services that account for process.  Some will go full enterprise service bus (ESB) and look at business process orchestration as well.  Consider solutions from CastIron, Boomi, Pervasive Software, Informatica, and SnapLogic.  Going forward customer data integration and master data management will be more important than ever.
  8. Minimize long-term storage costs with archiving. Storage represents a significant long term SaaS cost.  Savvy clients can reduce the cost of SaaS storage with a myriad of technologies such as EMC, IBM Optim, and RainStor.  By archiving, organizations will experience faster transaction times, maintain compliance, and reduce storage fees.
  9. Hedge risk with SaaS escrows. Most SaaS vendors will require 5 to 7 years to achieve profitability.  End users often demand software escrows in the on-premise world when they are concerned about vendor viability, takeover threats, and other related breaches to performance or service level agreements.  Software escrows vendors serve as the trusted third party independent organization which holds a copy of the software code.  This often includes user data, source code, documentation and any application executables. SaaS escrows work in a similar way.  Vendors such as EscrowTech, InnovaSafe, Iron Mountain, NCC Group. and OpSource can provide such services.
  10. Protect your rights. Client – vendor relationships in SaaS are perpetual.  Organizations have one shot to get the contract right and begin the relationship with the right tenor.  Apply best practices from The Customer Bill of Rights: SaaS. Work with vendors to find the right balance in approach.

The Bottom Line For Customers – Build Frameworks That Support Easy Line Of Business Adoption

The broad adoption and trajectory of SaaS solutions requires organizations to rapidly replace edicts and 5 year plans with guidelines and policy frameworks.  The goal – enable anyone in the organization to procure a SaaS solution that meets key guidelines and standards.  The result – flexibility, security, and scalability that allows solutions to be used on-demand and in concert with existing applications.

Your POV.

As you work out your SaaS apps strategies, drop us a line and let us know how you are deploying, what challenges you’ve faced, and what successes have you achieved.  We’re happy to weigh in.  Feel free to post your comments here or send me an email at rwang0 at gmail dot com or r at softwareinsider dot org.

Copyright © 2009 R Wang and Insider Associates, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Event Report: Epicor Perspectives 2009 – Continued Transformation Towards Next Gen Apps

Published on November 10, 2009 by R "Ray" Wang

Perspectives 2009 highlights continued market, corporate, and product transformation

Epicor Perspectives Hall of SolutionsEpicor's Community Managers James Norwood Vice President of Product Marketing on Epicor's Roadmpa
Pool at Caesar's PalaceA Night With Tom Papas At Epicor Perspectives 2009A Night With Tom Papas At Epicor Perspectives 2009A Night With Tom Papas At Epicor Perspectives 2009

(Photos by R Wang & Insider Associates, LLC.   Copyright © 2009 All rights reserved.)

Celebrating its 25th anniversary, Epicor hosted over 1500 partner, customer, and employee attendees at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas, NV.  Conference highlights include:

  • Update on Epicor 9 adoption. Epicor has (deployed 11/19/2009 ) shipped 30,000 seats to 60 customers since GA in December 2008.  More than 890 customers have purchased the product with 590 implementations in progress.   The company hopes to be in 50 countries and 30 languages by end of year.

    POV: With over 22,000 customers worldwide, product adoption may at first appear below average.  But given the recessionary factors, Epicor has done well in taking its time to ramp up and build customer references for this next generation app.  Epicor’s success will require a future specialization into verticals and indirect partner channels.

  • Shared benefits program. Epicor launched a new program to improve implementation outcomes with shared risks and benefits.  Vendor and customers will own project scope definition and agree on outcomes and ROI.  If the project is under budget, Epicor shares the savings with the customer.  If the project runs over budget, the customer pays for half the contracted professional services hourly rates.

    POV: Epicor builds on its previous program where it targeted a 1:1 license to implementation ratio.  While there may be open issues about unintended consequences (i.e. as raised by fellow Enterprise Advocate Frank Scavo), Epicor’s intent to change the relationship is a great step towards improving outcomes for clients in the enterprise software world.

  • New eCommerce solution. Epicor launched an all-in-one eCommerce solution that covers design to delivery.  Users of Epicor Commerce can synchronize master data elements such as products, pricing, customers, and inventory levels while managing website content and delivery.  Other features include support for payment options, merchant account/gateway integration, and tax calculations via Avalara.

    POV: Commerce customers at Perspectives were expressing interest in the new SaaS-ready options as well as hosted options.  Prospects should take a close look at the Order Hub integration from retail activities to the back end ERP systems as this will prove the greatest integration value.

Feedback from 37 customers remain mostly positive

Conversations with 17 Vantage, 12 Enterprise, 5 Avante, and 3 Vista customers showed quite positive customer sentiment.  Most (15/17) Vantage customers expected to move to Epicor 9 in 2010.  Key drivers:

  • Key functionality addressed in newer release
  • Better usability
  • Newer technology
  • Greater ROI

However, only 3 Enterprise customers, 2 Avante, and 1 Vista customers expected to make the move in the next 12 months.  Key drivers for not making the upgrade include

  • Economic recession
  • Waiting for functional parity
  • Over customization of existing product

Your POV.

If you get a chance, let us know:

  • Which Epicor products do you use?
  • When will you migrate?
  • What do you think about the shared benefits program?
  • Will you look more closely at Epicor as an alternative to SAP and Oracle?

Feel free to post your comments here or send me an email at rwang0 at gmail dot com or r at softwareinsider dot org.

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