Manufacturers serving such retail giants as Wal-Mart or Costco are exposed to severe challenges—not only because of the economies of scale these outlets demand, but also because of the investment required in technology and capital equipment to manage the sheer volume of manufactured goods. Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s the context: You’re selecting an ERP system. Your office is standardized on Windows and MS Office Suite. Should you select MS Dynamics and become a full-fledged “MS shop”?

We’ll look at three reasons you should lean toward MS Dynamics—and then look at why those reasons might be less compelling than you think.

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Part I of this blog series expanded on some of TEC’s earlier articles about companies’ need for better links between the plant (”blue collar trenches”) and the enterprise (”white collar ivory tower”). It also pointed out the difficulties in achieving this idea. An obvious solution would be a tightly integrated enterprise resource planning (ERP) and manufacturing execution system (MES) package that would help manufacturers close the gap between the shop floor and the offices by gaining visibility into manufacturing operations, achieving shop floor control, managing product/process traceability, genealogy, and so on. Read the rest of this entry »

The year 2008 is approaching an end, and we still haven’t seen any major acquisitions taking place in the product lifecycle management (PLM) world. Truly, after a series of acquisitions during the years 2006 and 2007, there are not many acquisitions left to happen except the one between SAP (the one likely to be a buyer), and PTC (the one likely to sell itself). So, should SAP buy PTC?

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Purchasing an electronic medical record (EMR) system is a daunting task, as there are many software vendors who cater to this niche industry. That’s why it’s essential for you to know what kind of functional requirements your practice or hospital will require to run your daily operational needs. Read the rest of this entry »