Practices
Accounting Systems & Enterprise Resource Planning
Infassure’s Accounting Systems & Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) practice works with small and medium-sized organizations to move from their outdated or inadequate accounting software to Microsoft Dynamics™. Microsoft Dynamics™ includes integrated, adaptable business management solutions that automate and streamline financial processes in a way that helps you drive business success. These solutions are easy to use and easily accessed by your people so your business can thrive.
In order to understand the value of an integrated Accounting & ERP system such as Microsoft Dynamics to your organization, following are the 5 major reasons to undertake an implementation.
- Integrate financial information—As the CEO tries to understand the company’s overall performance, he may find many different versions of the truth. Finance has its own set of revenue numbers, sales has another version, and the different business units may each have their own version of how much they contributed to revenues. ERP creates a single version of the truth that cannot be questioned because everyone is using the same system.
- Integrate customer order information—ERP systems can become the place where the customer order lives from the time a customer service representative receives it until the loading dock ships the merchandise and finance sends an invoice. By having this information in one software system, rather than scattered among many different systems that can’t communicate with one another, companies can keep track of orders more easily, and coordinate manufacturing, inventory and shipping among many different locations at the same time.
- Standardize and speed up manufacturing processes—Manufacturing companies—especially those with an appetite for mergers and acquisitions—often find that multiple business units across the company make the same widget using different methods and computer systems. ERP systems come with standard methods for automating some of the steps of a manufacturing process. Standardizing those processes and using a single, integrated computer system can save time, increase productivity and reduce head count.
- Reduce inventory—ERP helps the manufacturing process flow more smoothly, and it improves visibility of the order fulfillment process inside the company. That can lead to reduced inventories of the stuff used to make products (work-in-progress inventory), and it can help users better plan deliveries to customers, reducing the finished good inventory at the warehouses and shipping docks. To really improve the flow of your supply chain, you need supply chain software, but ERP helps too.
- Standardize HR information—Especially in companies with multiple business units, HR may not have a unified, simple method for tracking employees’ time and communicating with them about benefits and services. ERP can fix that.
In order to successfully implement ERP on-time and on-budget, organizations must be aware of the following key considerations when building a project budget.
- Training—Training is the near-unanimous choice of experienced ERP implementers as the most underestimated budget item. Training expenses are high because workers almost invariably have to learn a new set of processes, not just a new software interface.
- Integration and testing—Testing the links between ERP packages and other corporate software links that have to be built on a case-by-case basis is another often-underestimated cost.
- Customization—This happens when the ERP software can’t handle one of your business requirements.
- Data conversion—Most CIO’s require corporate information, such as customer and supplier records, product design data and the like, to be moved from old systems to new ERP homes.
- Data analysis—Often, the data from the ERP system must be combined with data from external systems for analysis purposes.
- Consultants—Companies should identify objectives for which its consulting partners must aim when training internal staff.
- Waiting for ROI—Most of the systems don’t reveal their value until after companies have had them running for some time and can concentrate on making improvements in the business processes that are affected by the system.
Infassure’s ERP practice delivers Dynamic solutions that can be tailored to meet specific industry profiles. Following are examples of how Dynamics will satisfy your company’s and industry’s most stringent requirements.
Microsoft Dynamics for multi-site and international organizations
Integration between the IT systems of MIO locations is critical for effectively sharing information, supporting common needs, and functioning successfully as one entity. However, individual sites typically don't require the same level of complexity in their business management solution as the parent company, and they may not have the resources to acquire and maintain a system designed for a larger company. The ideal solution for the MIO business model is a strong core platform and solution that has the flexibility to meet the unique needs of local sites, regardless of their complexity, specialization, or location.
Often, sites have the same level of business complexity as the parent company, but on a different scale and without the same IT resources. The solution that is best for the parent company is often too big, complicated, cumbersome, and costly for its sites. In addition, the parent company's system may not address the local requirements or specific business needs of the local sites.
Microsoft Dynamics helps MIOs balance the need for complexity without requiring a large IT staff or extensive user training. The solution is easy to customize and deploy. Using the familiar Microsoft Office system interface helps your people get up to speed quickly. It also uses industry standards and tools to help ensure smooth integration with the parent company's business management solution. This makes it a good fit for local MIO sites that need robust and tailored functionality with low TCO and strong return on investment (ROI).
Sites located in different countries need a solution that meets local regulatory and market requirements as well as industry- and location-specific practices for bookkeeping, reports, and financial statements. Organizations like these need a standard solution that will integrate with the parent company's system, that can be localized to address individual market and business requirements, and that can also be supported by their local IT resources.
With more than 40 localized versions that include multicurrency and multi-language capabilities, Microsoft Dynamics adapts to local legislative and market requirements, and supports sales to companies in more than 150 countries.
Microsoft Dynamics for chemical manufacturing
Microsoft Dynamics (formerly Microsoft Business Solutions Navision) enables chemical manufacturers to effectively manage formulas, quality, government regulations, production, and financial reporting. This integrated, easy-to-use system helps your people improve productivity, lower cost of compliance, improve customer service, and increase revenues.
A Microsoft Dynamics solution can help Chemical Manufacturers:
Efficiently manage regulatory compliance processes and documentation
Automatically build MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheets) based on current formulation data
Manage an unlimited number of chemical formulations
Develop efficient production schedules based on orders, inventory, and production equipment available
Empower your workforce to maximize skills, time, and operational resources.
Microsoft Dynamics for food and beverage regulatory compliance Regulatory compliance is costly—especially for small and midsize companies. But it's also an opportunity to improve your business processes, provide better service, and deliver more value to your customers. The question is: How do you adapt your business to meet customer and regulatory demands in an affordable way—and still grow your business? Successful food and beverage companies are leveraging technology to build agile business processes and are transforming the challenge of compliance into a competitive advantage. And a flexible, adaptable IT business solution—like Microsoft Dynamics —is the cornerstone of their strategy. Microsoft Dynamics is an integrated business management solution especially designed for growing small and midsize companies. It is ideal for companies looking for one solution they can implement rapidly, learn and use easily, and customize and maintain with minimal disruption to their business.
Microsoft Dynamics can help Food and Beverage companies with :
Automated product tracking and tracing from the supplier to the retailer
Marketing promotion management
Integrated automated data collection (ADC) solutions and catch-weight capabilitis
Real-time reports and alerts to management and retailers
Responsiveness to customer demands
Customized business reports
Accurate demand-forecasting
Microsoft Dynamics for high-tech companies
Companies in the high-tech manufacturing and service segments face daily upheaval and change. The rate of innovation and intense competition demand superior insight and extreme agility in the race to achieve first-to-market positioning. Meanwhile, only deft control of complex value networks can hold down costs and fight price erosion while ensuring the flawless process integration required for success. Small to midsize companies that can't seize opportunities and thrive in such volatile conditions don't make it.
A reliable, integrated management system is crucial in this business environment to getting information where it's needed, when you need it. A flexible, attractively priced business solution, Microsoft Dynamics can help you share information, control processes, improve operational efficiencies, and link members of your supply chain and value networks. This single comprehensive solution connects all your critical financial, technical, and operational data with market intelligence, so you can make sound, rapid decisions and respond quickly to change. With its open development environment and feature-rich application areas, Microsoft Dynamics is easy to customize, so employees can begin improving your market agility right away. With support from a global network of Microsoft Certified Partners that specializes in developing and implementing solutions for high-tech companies just like yours, your organization can tailor an application to suit your unique industry and business needs.
Microsoft Dynamics solution can help high-tech companies:
Respond more quickly to market and technical changes.
Collaborate with others in effective supply chains and networks.
Gain control of product quality and support life cycles and overall value to customers.
Improve cost control for greater profitability and a competitive edge.
Empower your workforce to maximize skills, time, and operational resources.
Microsoft Dynamics for industrial-manufacturing companies
Industrial equipment companies have long recognized the value of efficient manufacturing practices. And today, the rise of globalization makes achieving operational efficiency even more important. With globalization comes more competition, stringent regional compliance regulations, and more diverse customer demands. For companies who are not operating efficiently, all of this can mean a decrease in profits. But for the savvy manufacturer, globalization can mean new opportunities to increase revenue by providing services, extending business into new regions, or supporting product end-of-life.
Successful companies are leveraging technology to improve operations from Request for Quotation (RFQ) to product end-of-life. And a flexible, adaptable IT business solution, like Microsoft Dynamics, is the cornerstone of their strategy. To remain competitive, industrial equipment companies must be able to deliver more to their customers than just machinery. They must deliver exactly what their customers demand—from product design to fulfilling regional safety requirements—before, during and long after production. This also includes managing your customer's asset efficiency and compliance. This requires an agile organization and a business management system, like Microsoft Dynamics, that empowers employees to manage the project process, from quotation to delivery, more efficiently.
Microsoft Dynamics for public administration
Many public administration organizations are not able to budget to keep pace with the growing set of responsibilities they are being given. Agencies are being asked to do more with less—and to provide detailed, timely information about how all public funds are spent. In nations and local municipalities across the globe, agencies are finding it increasingly difficult to meet the demands of their citizens for more responsive service and to keep up with reporting requirements without overspending the budget.
Complex reporting structures and management processes, as well as incompatible legacy systems, hinder many public sector organizations from consolidating and standardizing their business systems. Without integrated, flexible systems, implementing progressive new practices—such as keeping up with government compliance surrounding accounting and budget reforms—is difficult, time-consuming, and expensive. Many services, reporting activities, and operational processes remain manual and require redundant data entry from system to system. As a result, government agencies, social service organizations, and civil authorities struggle against potential delays, inaccuracies, and other process inefficiencies and are thus deterred from moving forward with reform.
Microsoft Dynamics is a flexible, affordable business management solution that can help small and midsize public service agencies improve operational efficiencies and deliver on the promise of better service to citizens and employees. With a Microsoft Dynamics solution, you can connect people, information, and processes across your organization with a single comprehensive solution that integrates all your critical financial, human resources, and customer relationship data.
Microsoft Dynamics for wholesale distributors
Wholesale distributors often find themselves squeezed between increasing customer demands, competitive pressures, and the accelerating spread of manufacturers across the globe. Tight margins and the high cost of excess inventory make cost control and efficiency critical, especially for small to midsize companies that can't afford to make mistakes. But these changes and challenges can create new opportunities to increase operational efficiency across your business, fill orders faster, and reduce inventory and distribution costs.
Microsoft Dynamics (formerly Microsoft Navision) is an integrated business management solution especially designed for growing small and midsize companies. It is ideal for companies looking for a solution they can implement rapidly, learn and use easily, and customize and maintain with minimal disruption to their businesses. With a comprehensive Microsoft Dynamics solution, you can get immediate feedback about business performance, automate manual procedures, reduce rekeying data, improve replenishment decisions, process orders more quickly, improve fill rates and customer satisfaction, and get better returns on inventory investment. With its open development environment and feature-rich application areas, Microsoft Dynamics is easy to customize. Supported by a global network of Microsoft Certified Partners who specialize in developing and implementing wholesale distribution solutions for businesses like yours, your company can tailor an application to suit your unique requirements.
Microsoft Dynamics solution can help you:
Monitor and evaluate your 'company's current performance and opportunities
Take control of your inventory to maximize value
Reduce manual processes and streamline warehouse operations for faster, more accurate fulfillment that avoids costly noncompliance penalties
Microsoft Dynamics for consumer packaged goods
It used to be that supplying the right product at the right time was enough to be successful. Today, your company must do more. Trends such as customer self-service, strategic sourcing, and fee-based services and pricing are challenging small and midsize businesses to think in new ways about their business, their relationships, and the value they provide in the supply chain. But for the savvy distributor and manufacturer, these changes and challenges are creating opportunities, too—to increase profits and grow their business.
Integrate labeling and shipping into pick/pack and invoicing processes, even with multiple warehouses Empower your workforce to save time, reduce costs, and increase customer satisfaction Gain visibility into your most profitable products, customers, and opportunities.