Senior supply chain analyst Bob Eastman was at the Epicor Customer Conference, Insights 2013, in Nashville last week.

Epicor invited Bob to share his insight into current technology trends in the supply chain space. Check out that conversation on YouTube.

In this almost 9-minute video, Bob talks about the acceleration of the business cycle and some of the enabling trends (such as cloud and mobility) that address the challenges the speed of business presents to the supply chain.

Bob also discusses the pursuit of supply chain excellence—how strategy and technology must go hand in hand—and identifies three key requirements for success today: visibility, sales and operations planning, and metrics.

Blackboard Inc. announced a new release of its learning management system (LMS). New functionality focuses on student retention and outcomes.

The release introduces Retention Center, an embedded feature that unveils student performance and engagement. Instructors can recognize risk factors such as missed deadlines and poor grades. Consequently, professors may identify those students that need extra help to improve their performance. Furthermore, instructors have the option to define risk factors on top of the pre-loaded ones. Read the rest of this entry »

TEC principal analyst P.J. Jakovljevic will be talking about key trends that are driving cloud ERP in a panel discussion on May 14 (3 pm), as part of SuiteWorld 2013.

The event will be moderated by blogger and influencer Vinnie Mirchandani. P.J. will be joined by fellow experts Phil Wainewright, Dennis Howlett, and Brad Kugler in discussing how technologies such as social networks, mobile devices, and advanced analytics are changing the way companies relate to their customers, engage with employees, and bring innovative products and services to market.

SuiteWorld 2013—an event for NetSuite users and partners—takes place May 13–16 in San Jose, California.

It’s my pleasure to announce that another software product within the manufacturing ERP model has been recently certified by TEC. The Process Industry solution for Microsoft Dynamics AX, developed by Edgewater Fullscope, now features the “TEC Certified Product” badge in TEC’s IT Showcase, meaning the software vendor has filled out TEC’s functionality questionnaire and gone through a comprehensive demonstration of the product with TEC analysts, whereafter we were able to confirm that the product fits the process industry vertical and can be used by businesses in food and beverage, pharmaceutical, chemical, and other areas of manufacturing where recipe-based and formula-based processes are extensively used. Read the rest of this entry »

TEC is developing a new market survey report on field service management (FSM), and we would like to hear your thoughts on FSM solutions. Your responses to the following six questions will help us reveal the market trends in the needs of real-world organizations that are automating their field service activities. Read the rest of this entry »

We are pleased to announce the launch of TEC’s first buyer’s guide of 2013: CRM for Medium and Large Enterprises. Download your free PDF copy now.

This buyer’s guide provides in-depth insight from TEC CRM analyst Raluca Druta on a how a comprehensive customer relationship management (CRM) system can help medium and large enterprises better understand and address their customers’ needs and challenges. With three points of contact with prospects and clients—i.e., sales, marketing, and customer support—such a system presents three different opportunities for positive interactions with and influence on their customers. Read the rest of this entry »

We are pleased to announce that the business intelligence (BI) and analytics product BI360 by Solver is now part of TEC’s certified BI applications family of products, and is available for evaluation online in the Business Intelligence and Data Management Evaluation Center.

Read the rest of this entry »

TEC is pleased to announce that Rapid Response Manufacturing (RRM) software from ProfitKey International, a developer of enterprise resource planning (ERP) software for manufacturing, has been TEC certified for online evaluation in TEC’s ERP Evaluation Center. An in-depth demonstration of its capabilities was conducted in order to evaluate how RRM holds up to industry benchmarks. We saw the system in real time and assessed its performance on requested tasks and its workflow capabilities. We tried out the system’s navigation along with selected features and functions. Read the rest of this entry »

CRM analyst Raluca Druta interviews TEC’s marketing specialist.

Recently, the task of selecting customer relationship management (CRM) software tools appears to reside in the front yard of the chief marketing officer (CMO). Is this a natural evolution of the CMO’s job responsibilities?

It makes sense. The CMO is responsible for making the most of the data that passes through the CRM system. But to do that, the marketing department relies on all kinds of tools that aren’t necessarily part of the CRM system itself. The CMO is the best person to advocate for a system that plays nicely with other marketing software. Read the rest of this entry »

TEC’s Aleksey Osintsev will be presenting at the Glovia Customer Event in Las Vegas, Nevada, which happens next week, February 18 and 19. If you’re at the event, be sure to say hello to him.

Aleksey will be talking about the current ERP market, and will explain TEC’s methodology to show how the glovia G2 ERP solution measures up against the competition.

We’ll have highlights from his presentation available for you online after it’s been delivered.

TEC is pleased to announce that Coda Financials software by UNIT4 has been TEC certified and is now available for online evaluation in the TEC Accounting and Financial Packages Evaluation Center. As usual, the vendor performed an in-depth demonstration of software capabilities following a demo script suggested by TEC research analysts. So we had a good opportunity to see the system in real time, assessing its performance with requested tasks and its workflow capabilities, in addition to trying out the system’s navigation, and selected features and functions.

Netherlands-based UNIT4 is well-known as a global ERP and other business software vendor; in fact it is in the top ten mid-market ERP vendors worldwide. Its customer base is also impressive—the group has more than 6,000 clients with over 2 million users, and there have been more than 10,000 global deployments of UNIT4’s software applications.

The company has been pioneering and successfully leveraging its solution within a unique market niche of software that offers the capability of accommodating any business-related changes easier, faster, and, consequently, at a much lower cost compared to other solutions offered by competitors in the space. As such it targets a segment of the market that’s referred to as “Businesses Living IN Change” (BLINC). The change-friendly design runs through all of UNIT4’s applications. Read the rest of this entry »

I am very excited to be joining Technology Evaluation Centers (TEC) as senior analyst, supply chain management.

TEC’s decision-support engine, robust feature/function models, and rich database of vendor capabilities enable TEC clients to realize faster time-to-value in software decisions.  Watching the evolution of how clients use software advisory firms, and, then, starting up my own analyst firm, has persuaded me more strongly than ever of the value of such an online capability for software evaluation. Read the rest of this entry »

It gives me immense pleasure to join the analyst team at TEC.

As all of us know, the information technology (IT) landscape is changing rapidly, and the practices and trends that existed five years ago are considered antiquated today. Further, enterprise software users are being challenged to innovate with existing resources, while both software vendors and end users are facing an increasingly discerning customer base.

My main focus at TEC is in the area of innovation and governance systems. Read the rest of this entry »

Lozeau, a retail company providing cameras, video cameras, accessories, and services, recently selected Commsoft to meet its enterprise resource planning (ERP) needs. Commsoft was chosen from among ten vendors of viable solutions during a selection process headed by TEC’s selection services group.

Lozeau looked to the expertise of TEC’s team for assistance throughout the software selection process and in the vendor contract negotiations. Read the rest of this entry »

TEC’s business intelligence analyst, Jorge García, will be presenting at Salon BI 2012 at the Palais des congrès de Montréal, this Tuesday, November 6 (9:35 am).

Jorge will be talking about three areas that are receiving a lot of research and development attention and dollars—augmented reality, motion-based technology, and voice-recognition technology—and their applications to the BI space.