They say a picture is worth a thousand words—but in my opinion, graphs are sometimes worth even more. Therefore, I decided to let the graphs do most of the talking about the main differences between Oracle JD Edwards EnterpriseOne (JDE) and E-Business Suite (EBS).

In order to do that, I have selected our Mixed-mode Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Evaluation Center because it has functionality from ERP for discrete, ERP for process, and ERP for engineer-to-order (ETO) manufacturing. Read the rest of this entry »

If you did not get the chance to read the article about the 2009 APICS Conference, I thought I should share with you some of the things we (Khudsiya and I) did or learned there.

I thought I would start by imagining a conversation about imaginary analysts, between two imaginary people, in an imaginary kitchen of an imaginary company: Read the rest of this entry »

Vox populi is Latin for “voice of the people”– in broadcasting and television, they use the “vox pop interview” to get spontaneous opinions on a subject, from different, randomly selected people. My idea is to apply the concept to our blog—whenever you see a blog post starting with “Vox Populi,” it means we’re seeking your opinion.

In broadcasting, only a few people are interviewed, and the answers are edited. On our blog, everyone can leave a comment—we will not change or edit what you say (although our moderators will remove comments that are abusive). That being said, here’s your first assignment: Read the rest of this entry »

How many different systems does a bank employee use when changing a customer’s contact information? The last time I moved and had to change my address, the bank employee used two systems, asked three or four of her co-workers for help, and took about 15 minutes to do it because the information from one system did not transfer right away to the other system. It goes without saying that this was not my best experience dealing with banks, but not the worst either. Actually, having implemented business solutions in the past, I find it quite amusing when it happens because it reminds me of the “good old days” when I used to get blamed for faulty systems. Read the rest of this entry »

The conference really started today, with a general session featuring guest star speaker Jason Jennings, business thought leader and best-selling author. And quite a showman, we might add. Read the rest of this entry »

We recently got a sneak peek of the new version of Sage ERP X3 that is scheduled to be released in October 2009. We were given a detailed demonstration of some of its core functional changes and advancements and we have summarized our findings differently.

Gabriel Gheorghiu’s Take on Version 6

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After attending the iWay seminar on Enterprise Information Management (EIM) yesterday, I was thinking that a CIO who implemented their system might sing the following after the implementation: Read the rest of this entry »

Did you know that there is hidden money in your company? No, not in the safe, nor in some secret vault that you can access by pressing on a brick in the wall—it’s in your operations. At the 2009 APICS International Conference and Expo preview webinar series (session 4), Nicholas M. Testa (CEO Acuity Consulting Inc.) tried to answer the following questions concerning your company’s hidden money: How can you search for it? What tools can you use? How can you get results? Read the rest of this entry »

The Utilities Industry

From TEC’s perspective and based on our understanding of the industry, the utilities industry consists primarily of the following service providers: electric power generators, network operators, customer power retailers, natural gas, steam supply, water supply, and sewage removal. All of these business segments have common criteria such as a mass customer service department and billing process, remote service supply or power generation, and high cost of asset owning and maintenance. Also, a big part of the utility business is project based as well. Below are some challenges the industry faces: Read the rest of this entry »

A couple of weeks ago, I published a blog post called Customer Relationship Manufacturing. In this blog post, I described the symbiosis between the sales and production departments within a manufacturing company, mentioned some customer relationship management (CRM) vendors that seem to have adapted their products for the manufacturing industry, and I also promised I would get back to you with more information on these products. Read the rest of this entry »

We recently certified Deacom Integrated Accounting and ERP Software v 10.4. Before sharing my impressions of Deacom’s product, I would like to briefly describe the certification process so you can better understand how it works. Read the rest of this entry »

Years ago, I took a job as an interviewer because I thought it would be interesting to talk to different people to find out what they thought on a variety of topics. I soon realized that people were not so eager to share impressions and give us their thoughts on products, events, etc. Some of the survey’s topics were not very pleasant, (e.g., writing a will and testament and preparing for unpleasant events like disability and death) and I understood quickly why people would get angry if we called while they were eating or sleeping. Read the rest of this entry »

A couple of weeks ago, we started a series of blog posts product lifecycle management (PLM) about how TEC defines different types of enterprise resource planning (ERP) and what sets them apart. We will continue with a detailed description of process manufacturing ERP, and we will introduce some of the top-rated vendors in this domain. Read the rest of this entry »

What you should not do is ignore whatever you see on the screen. If you don’t trust computers, remember that they were created and programmed by humans like you. And if something pops up while you’re working, it’s either because you are about to do something important that needs validation, or because the system encountered an error.

There are two major types of messages that you can get: warning messages and error messages. Let’s take a closer look at what they represent and what you should do when you see them. Read the rest of this entry »

The future is tomorrow’s present. Many have tried to predict it using silly or scientific methods, from chiromancy (palm reading), aleuromancy (fortune cookies), and other -mancies, to the three Ps (possible, probable, and preferable futures) and a W (or wildcard—low-probability events with a high impact on the future) used in futurology. Read the rest of this entry »