All-Inclusive ERP Reviews Guide - Datix...2500 companies running ERP said their system was...

All-Inclusive

ERP

Reviews Guide

Datix ERP Consulting

COPYRIGHT DATIX 2015, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

1 | P a g e Copyright Datix 2015, All rights reserved

| Table of Contents |

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: ERP for Financials

Epicor 10 vs. Infor

Epicor Financials vs. QuickBooks

Chapter 3: ERP for Manufacturing

Dynamics AX vs. Epicor 10

Dynamics AX vs. Plex Systems

Chapter 4: ERP for Economies of Scale

Epicor 10 vs. Sage X3

Plex Systems vs. SAP

Plex Systems vs. Oracle JD Enterprise One

Chapter 5: ERP for Cloud

NetSuite vs. Epicor

NetSuite vs. Plex Systems


How to use this E-book: Over the past 17 years, our experts have spent a considerable amount

of time with clients evaluating software to help them meet their

business needs. Throughout that process one thing has remained a

constant truth: fitting software to your business is about selecting

the right tool for the right job.

No one tool is a best fit for every type of industry or business

structure. As such, a significant amount of investigating is necessary

for an organization to properly select a system to support their

business functions and extract the maximum amount of ROI from an ERP

software project.

Organizations whom place an emphasis on software, yet fail to consider

the processes the software is intended to support, often end up over

budget, have poor user adoption and realize elongated time to recoup

project costs. The misconception can severely hinder an organization’s

vision, and is why considering processes on the front end of your ERP

selection process is especially important.

That’s why we’ve created this guide. It’s a way for businesses to

easily see the strengths and weaknesses of each system in comparison

to others in the ERP class. This will better allow the organization to

determine which ERP system may best support process models across

their enterprise.

Hopefully, with the help of this e-book, your business can start to

perform the necessary due diligence required to ensure that your next

ERP software system:

1. Generates ROI

2. Is Adopted By Users

3. Supports Organizational Processes and Outcomes

About Datix: Datix has been implementing and designing enterprise software

solutions for the last 17 years. Datix consults with manufacturing and

distribution businesses in the mid-market to assist in building out

their enterprise software systems. That’s our M.O. We’ve built

partnerships with some of the most popular software used inside of

these businesses, and have created a powerful reputation as an expert

who understands how all these systems should work together.

At Datix, we get it. We know enterprise software, and can visualize

how it can work to support a wide range of different business

objectives. We are innovative thought leaders that are constantly

developing proprietary applications and solutions based on the

challenges we see clients face the most. Businesses work with us when

they want to mitigate risk, solve problems and improve the way their

business operates.


| ERP for Financials | Whether you’re a small manufacturer with fifteen employees, a

financial services organization, or a multinational distributor with

vast networks, accurate and timely financial management must be a

central function of the business outcomes to ensure long-term success.

We’ve noticed a shift recently, businesses are becoming more

interested in financial software solutions that help them transform

and optimize their business; rather than just offering new

functionality. No matter the organization, there are countless

analyze, and understand the key metrics and trends that drive new

business objectives forward.

| Epicor 10 vs. Infor |

The company as the product – ERP product lines for Epicor and Infor

Our recommendation is always to find the right tool for the right job

— and with these systems —there are many things to consider. In our

comparison of Epicor vs Infor, we’ll brief you on the more elementary

facets of software selection relating to these systems, common issues

that have been experienced, and what ultimately plays the biggest role

in cost payback for different companies interested in implementing

these systems.


Thoughts on best of breed vs. industry specific software Recently, Infor hired 600 new engineers to integrate those 30 systems

into dozens of software lines. The company broke product offerings out

by featured solution per industry, per size. A recent user review

detailed an RFP nightmare with Infor; due to this process. The vendor

had offered so many lines of product, the company couldn’t decide

which one was a good fit for their business processes. In the end,

they walked away from Infor and chose to work with another ERP vendor

instead. This is not common for everyone, but if selection is pain

point, Infor will not make your choices easier; as there is rarely a

100% perfect match.

Infor offers some great options, but is currently running the risk of

actually offering too much. When those systems become too diverse,

customizing valuable processes can be a nightmare and inevitably be

very costly for businesses that they serve. As we mentioned, most

companies find it difficult to use any software perfectly out of the

box

Epicor’s offering is easier to understand. They offer a very succinct

selection of software; which include there current ERP versions (9 and

10) and Prophet 21 (their wholesale distribution line). This doesn’t

inherently make it better (in fact, it actually offers less vertical

specialization); however being able to make decisions about which

systems should be implemented, and the best way to implement them, are

critical to the success of an implementation process. As mentioned

above, finding a good system fit and integrating models on top if it

can often prove to be more effective than implementing a niche

vertical software that is outdated and difficult to use.

Ultimately, Infor is currently unable to pull IT teams from massive

internal projects to build out all of these new systems for their

clients. This is why they promote other brand solutions that they have

recently acquired as plug and play. It’s a vicious cycle and can be an

expensive game to play if you’re an organization looking to implement

a new system. We see clients that have fallen into a similar trap, and

it’s why we strongly recommend using an expert partner in software

selection and business process modeling.

expressed the ease of use of Epicor 10, and its ability to generate

powerful dashboards, as the primary reason for selecting the software.

That’s important for busy users who need to carry out operations

without becoming hung up on wonky tech jargon from a remote IT person.

Usability is one the big keys in user adoption.

Often criticisms of Epicor include issues implementing the software as

desired; something that most businesses can mitigate by working with

a certified partner. It’s also fair to mention that Epicor doesn’t

offer the same niche vertical software that Infor does. However, these

niche vertical offerings from Infor are rarely kept up with; as most

are acquisitions. User acceptance and satisfaction with these products

lines is very poor. Ultimately, the best solution may be finding a

strong ERP system and integrating vertical software modules on top of

the desired system.


UX/UI design The modern look and feel of a system encourages users to adopt the

system that increases ROI in the short term. Epicor (an upgrade over

previous 9, and Vantage systems which were slightly more cumbersome)

is one of the easier-to-use ERPs on the market among user groups. It

provides touch enabled dashboards that are adaptable to each specific

user’s needs; which is extremely beneficial for manufacturing and

distribution verticals who easily need to modify a system and remain

agile. Epicor users have taken to the new version very well. The

simple dashboards are easily customizable and need little help from IT

departments to setup. It’s rare that software upgrades like this are

so universally liked by users.

In recent months, Infor has made some attempts to redesign the look of

their system, but nothing significant compared to previous versions.

Reviews reveal the UI/UX

elements of Infor’s

applications are a

challenge for users to

consume, and the user

experience in particular

needs a serious lift.

From a UI perspective,

there are too many out

of the box fields, which

may confuse users in

different silos. A busy

front facing machine is

generally a turn off for

users. Too many add-in

fields have presented

a challenge to uncover

which channel will trigger the intended business process.

In addition, there’s not a sync design template used inside all of

Infor’s product line; making systems integration cloudy. If you

accidentally purchase one of their many new software solutions that

has yet to be upgraded, you’re really purchasing a dated product at

new product price.

Critics argue an ERP’s UX design should be one of the top three

competitive differentiators sought for ERP software. In your RFP

process, we suggest allowing employees with no technical background—

like sales or accounting personnel— to demo the system. This allocates

greater insight as to how the everyday person will engage with the

system. The color, layout, and configuration are also important design

elements to consider.

Mobility, access to data, and usability

Access to data, mobility, and system usability is more critical for

your business than ever before. In a recent study, the better half of


2500 companies running ERP said their system was “adequate” or

“basic.” The study further reported users want more flexible and

accessible ERP applications that enable employees to access

information from mobile devices.

Mobile solutions are meant to empower people, processes, and

infrastructure while sustaining business growth. Companies should be

keeping mobile solutions in their minds from the start. Rarely do

businesses perform all their profit driving operations in-house. As

such, users need instant access to a number of intelligent data to

make profitable business decisions remotely. During the development

process of your implementation, you should consider help accelerating

the deployment of mobile solutions. Epicor has optimal visualizations

that are engaging for mobile users in any silo.

In addition, Epicor has proved to be a leader in user accessibility.

User reviews say Epicor 10 illustrates a quick turnaround of

information from production events to users. They further admire the

intelligent analytics on simple, easy to use, dashboards. It is

critical to consider user engagement, since these individuals are

making the profitable business decisions beyond company walls.

Infor also delivers mobile access, however the design of their system

is considered busy for the modest layout of mobile. In March, 2015

Infor did release their latest Infor Xi platform providing a

responsive design with machine-learning and big data capabilities, but

no mention of when one of its dozen ERP systems will feature such a

robust application.

Think about the ROI

Throughout your RFP process you will come across companies that want

to “provide the perfect solution for the type of business you’re in”,

but many users say the approach isn’t working. In order to see a solid

return on your software investment, its imperative project teams

realize obvious goals at the onset, like vendor management, risk

management, and continuous improvement. Vertical niche modules can be

added to any system. None of these objectives can be properly

addressed when organizations are paralyzed by software selection and

don’t think about the most important element of the project

implementation.

Deciding between a best of breed system and an industry specific one

is no easy task. Business must look hard at their processes. What we

often find is that few businesses operate 100% like any other inside


| Epicor FM vs. QuickBooks |

Really? We’re going to compare a software system like Epicor’s

Financial Management to QuickBooks? The truth is many businesses are

on the fence about this exact decision. They don’t know if they will

receive proper ROI movement from a spreadsheets and QuickBooks style

of system to a formal ERP software ecosystem.

In today’s highly regulated market place, financial reporting is no

cakewalk. In fact, it can get downright ugly when financial management

initiatives aren’t the foundation of many business operations. For

some business this means making the choice between running finances

on QuickBooks or an ERP financial management tool; like Epicor

Financial Management solutions. This means enforcing transaction

visibility, automating posting processes, and tightening security

around data. For a young business this may sound painful, but in world

where business development depends on organic growth, mergers and

acquisitions, investing in an agile financial management solution is

non-negotiable.

A Quick Look If your bottom line is under $4 million, QuickBooks is capable of

handling financial operations for a lot of companies. The software

provides templates based on characteristics of transactions —

otherwise known as categories. This schema is then broken down further

by assigning classes to each transaction. In an example, a small

business model may display both AP/AR and procurement as separate

classes of the company.

The downside is that QuickBooks is limited to its depth of drill down

capabilities in order to manage transactions at a granular level for

either division. This can be a challenge to any company that has any

component of remote work. For managers out of the office, this can be

problematic if oversight involves the review of a department’s overall

expense report, rather than controlling corresponding hidden costs

that eat away at the top and bottom line over time.

Epicor Financial Management is a highly

flexible reporting system; allocating all

financial information based on a hierarchy

existing inside a singular system. Every

transaction inside the organization is managed

in this single suite. One of the best features

of Epicor Financial Management is the ability

for businesses to track inventory. Inventory

management can make a significant impact the

bottom line. Inventory costing can become

tricky with the volatile demands of today’s

of an industry. This often means custom processes and customer system

modifications are necessary to make your software really work. This

leads investors to often choose a best of breed model over an industry

specific one.


market. Financial oversight in this process is critical to deciding on

budgets and capacity investments.

Another key feature out of the box, “Multiple Books”, provides the

company with unlimited financial books to support a wide range of

financial requirements; such as budgeting and forecasting and US GAAP

compliance, versus managerial accounting or comprehensive

consolidations in QuickBooks. Overall, this suite takes the complexity

out of reporting and streamlines data from the transaction to

financial reports in real time.

Ultimately, if your business has a degree to complexity in its setup,

scale, or is in need of a more flexible solution, Epicor Financial

Management software provides a lot more tools and perform the work

more efficiently. If your business has a simply setup and doesn’t

require a lot specific designations — and your revenue is under $4

million — you can likely perform most functions using QuickBooks.

System Security This is where QuickBooks really

fails … miserably. And we don’t

mean to beat up on QuickBooks,

but its’ lax build alleviates

any measure of internal control.

The primary concern is the level

of accessibility

QuickBooks allocates to an

organization, specifically

posted transactions. Transaction

information can be edited at a

later date. This is bad for

budgeting, management control,

visibility, and anything else

that results in noncompliance.

Plus, QuickBooks allows sales

orders to be changed at any

time. The resulting complication is poor quality and account care;

which leads to inefficiencies further upstream. Given the pressures of

today’s business environment, even the slightest breach in quality

will cause an enterprise to be swallowed up by competitors.

Does your business need an internally controlled environment? Epicor

Financial Management software is simply better at securing quality

financial data at every juncture from quote to cash. Epicor provides

users the ability to configure validation rules to control what gets

posted to the General Ledger, from sub-ledgers. It does this based on

key compliance metrics or policy requirements (these rules control how

transaction events are cleared to post, will not post, or will issue

warnings before posting).

Epicor Financial Planning provides a security manager; which allocates

access to key data to specific employees defined by power users. It is

here that business leaders can define and submit budgets and forecasts

in their area of responsibility. This agile feature of ERP enables



Enterprise Integration A major dilemma that growing businesses can expect using QuickBooks

is making data compatible for integration with other systems or

software. In other words, QuickBooks doesn’t play nicely with other

systems. This can be a major challenge in the event of a buyout,

implementation of other software, or CRM integration; where data must

be in pristine condition in order to migrate it to new systems. In the

event a company fails to employ a BPM expert, this type of work can

lead to trouble.

It’s possible this data will need to be entered into the new system

manually. This causes projects to become extremely complex, time

consuming, and over budget. What’s worse, we often see general misuse

of QuickBooks. Users create new data over and over again, fail to

eliminate irrelevant worksheets, and cause duplicate entries to

clutter the server. In our experience with clients, unclean data has

almost always cost them an extra arm and a leg. However, growing

companies don’t know what they don’t know and for that reason moved

forward with this method.

Those are primary reasons why having a robust financial database in a

single suite makes more sense than book keeping software. For a

growing company, Epicor Financial Management can be integrated with

CRM or BI software for improved demand forecasting, supply chain

scenario comparisons, and be certain taxes are filed based on

comprehensive requirements in countries in which they do business.

Integrating Epicor Financial Management with CRM is one of the most

common projects we are seeing organizations pursuing this year. When

regulatory initiatives change — as they often do — modifications in

Epicor are instantly modified in CRM to ensure both systems relay the

same information to stakeholders. Databases are also mirrored in both

systems to ensure no duplicate entries occur and data remains in the

system, not in an alternative source like QuickBooks.

The bottom line is that it’s easy to outgrow QuickBooks. If a business

is currently using QuickBooks or exploring what financial software to

use, just be aware of the challenges that the data in QuickBooks will

have if it needs to go anywhere else.

Synopsis: Epicor Financial Management or QuickBooks?

silos to have more control over their data, operate efficiently, and

comply with fiscal regulations.

This is where the two solutions really cannot compare. If security and

precise financial reporting are critical to your business, ERP

financial management software, like Epicor FM, is pretty much a

necessity.

In the totality of this review, we’ve compared two of the most

commonly used financial and accounting management solutions.

QuickBooks is a viable foundation tool for personal or small business

users, but for a growing enterprise to adopt a healthy growth model,

Epicor Financial Management software is the clear better choice.

Whether a firm seeks to restore internal control, improve security of


| ERP for Manufacturing |

| Epicor 10 vs. Dynamics AX | We are often asked to compare Epicor vs Dynamics AX ERP systems. Our

recommendation is always to find the right tool for the right job —

and with these systems —there are many things to consider. Remember,

not even the most powerful software in the world is a “best fit” for

every organization. In our comparison of Epicor vs Dynamics AX, we’ll

brief you on the more elementary facets of software selection, common

issues that have been experienced, and what ultimately plays the

biggest role in cost payback. A priority attribute of an ERP solution

to that of an investor, is its ability to serve as the foundation for

a scale-able business model. Additionally, the buyer must ensure the

vendor’s latest version is configurable to maximize a process, not

match the current one.

data, or streamline regulatory initiatives, investing in Epicor

Financial Management software will provide the best value.

The foundation for improving the bottom line starts with knowing how

even the most finite transactions of the business can offset both

quality and productivity later on. For this to happen, modern

enterprises will need to explore a rapidly deployable ERP software

agile enough to track these everyday occurrences. Only then will

companies have the ability to optimize efficiency and remain within

regulatory spec. This is a critical enterprise decision, and should

not be taken lightly.

There are manufacturing enterprises all over the planet. Each is

uniquely different from the others, but there are several constants

these businesses generally have in common. Just about every

manufacturer must order something, sell something and ship something.

Determining which ERP software system is best for these functions

appears relatively easy right? You should already know by now that it

is not.

The unique processes running through the veins of every production

line is a game changer for how manufacturers buy, sell and ship. So

now, which ERP system is fitted for your manufacturing model?


Business Process Modeling We’ve been trained to look for the “ease of

use” phrase in vendor material, yet many times

uncover no instance of how this occurs in the

back end. (In general, investors aren’t seeking

the latter). The truth? The majority of ERP

systems — particularly category leaders like

Epicor and Dynamics AX — are not easy to use,

easy to configure or manage. So just how does

Epicor 10 and Dynamics AX stack up in this

instance? Well, it truly depends on complexity

of business process models and the

sophistication of solutions you provide your

customers.

You’ll be hard-pressed to find a user that does

not exploit the power of Epicor 10’s agile drill down components. The

profound capabilities of Epicor 10, which can be seen in an expert

implementation, truly back the premise of their development schema.

For example, if properly mapped, Epicor can alter a sales role into

that of an engineer.

One thing Epicor does better than anyone else is fusing functions of a

system together most other ERP vendors view as separate entities. This

allows processes to be carried out faster, with greater transparency,

for client facing business users. But with efficient mapping comes

complexity. Business process modeling in Epicor requires defined work

process flows and expert analysis. Because the system is so flexible,

conditions at each task within those BPMs must be expertly set up to

make sure the system reflects the process in the right area of the

system. It is often why Epicor can be attributed as complex and

requires considerable time and focus during an implementation.

Dynamics AX is often lauded for being easy to use; yet is more than

likely a general statement when we’re talking in terms of a household

name like Microsoft. The truth is Microsoft is familiar to a lot of

people, so the learning curve is lessened when using their products.

This is a major benefit to their technology in AX.

AX is one of four ERP systems Microsoft deploys. However, AX is often

criticized for a lack of diversity in its functionality for economies

of scale whom need it. These complex business archetypes are

increasingly under consideration for a mergers or acquisitions in

order to provide an end-to-end service offering in a volatile market.

We open with this caveat because businesses in the midsection today

are immensely complex; delving into platforms that enable themselves

to provide an end to end solution so client matters are managed from a

360 degree view. Plus, internal users find the added investment a much

more reliable resource when it comes down to altering a job or case

internally. It is this on-demand trend that has transformed

today’s business process management initiative, thus differentiating

the model and/or versions between vendors like Epicor and Microsoft.


Cost Accounting Both Epicor and AX are industry leaders when it comes to financial

reporting. However, largely differ in accessibility to custom reports.

Epicor enables users to view all costing schemes, resource allocation,

complex journal vouchers and discounts all from a single quote – which

many companies are finding most purposeful. As for Dynamics AX, while

it does capture some advanced time expense management posted directly

to the G/L — among other general accounting features — it does not

enable users to query potential costs for RFQs... However, for a

privately owned or standalone service provider, manufacturer or

distributor, Dynamics AX can be an essential tool for simple work

flows and standard account entity creation.

Looking at cost accounting through the Epicor vs Dynamics AX lens is

not cut and dry, and greatly depends on your business.

Implementation Partner Network

This means the presence of a midsection business is larger than ever

in the past, and as such, captures a much more robust business model.

Dynamics AX lacks proficiency when it comes to advanced BPM framing.

Suites are fairly standard and are not based on per industry dynamics.

General reviews suggests it takes many add-on components outside of AX

to exploit the same dimensions of each suite’s utilities as Epicor

does out of the box.

It should also be noted, users often criticize Dynamics AX for being a

rather laggard ERP system. This is more than likely the pitfall of its

simplistic development requiring many alterations to bring a process

to an optimum state. Moreover, since the version is from 2012, the

system may not have the capacity to perform with the advanced features

of modern applications the majority of businesses need to provide an

end to end solution. However, Dynamics has announced details of its

newest version Dynamics ‘AX7’ — a cloud based ERP — set to release

sometime later this year. Epicor too, has since announced a cloud-

first approach to their latest developments.

Those whom opt to take on an ERP implementation project are encouraged

to partner with a business solutions expert to see the project to its

completion and thereafter. The partner network is an excellent way to

invest in the software of an investor’s choice – either AX or Epicor –

and receive additional services or value that large vendors do not

necessarily provide.

Yet, the majority of VARs work outside the partner network of the

vendor which can result in poor practices throughout the

implementation. Microsoft has the largest and most mature VAR and ISV

channels in the enterprise software industry. According to industry

insiders, even with thousands of ERP channel partners, less than 50

are certified with an industry badge; and an even smaller number

service a methodology based on best practice approach or have the

ability to move a business to the cloud.

Epicor has a smaller partner network, but has placed a heavy emphasis

on training and development. The truth is, Epicor’s partner network


The Bottom Line

| Microsoft Dynamics vs. Plex Systems |

Overview - Microsoft Dynamics AX vs. Plex Systems

Epicor vs Dynamics AX is a very formidable battle; as Dynamics AX does

possess some strong capabilities for business that strictly

manufacture products with little industry deviation. However Epicor

provides more detail in the areas of cost accounting, reporting, and

business process modeling. ERP selection always comes down to

selecting the right tool for the right job. The information above

should properly help you lay out which best fits your organization.

Microsoft Dynamics AX and Plex Systems are considered leading

providers of ERP for batch and process manufacturing in respective

segments of industrial markets. There are several reasons why

manufacturing business may consider both systems. However in most

cases, one is generally a better fit than the other. We’ll help you

navigate through the differences in the following comparison.

A major difference between Microsoft Dynamics AX and Plex Systems

comes down to the segments of the industrial space in which they

service. The Plex Systems ERP software is built specifically for

process manufacturers and has an avid following in this industrial

class. Dynamics AX is primarily known for powerful functionality

tailored to human resources, retail and operations management needs;

however it does contain some nice features that could make it a

fit for small and mid-sized manufacturing companies.

Plex’s rich, deep rooted manufacturing background – coupled with its

availability on a cloud platform – has increased efficiency for

manufacturers in need of a true manufacturing ERP system. By

comparison, Dynamics AX has found a niche among small & medium-sized

manufacturing companies who require simple configurations with less of

a need for agile process modeling.


Scalability – Dynamics AX vs Plex Microsoft Dynamics AX largely services the small and medium sized

midsection of manufacturing and distribution. Yet, some businesses

moving from small scale processing to larger-scale strategies find it

challenging to scale the functionality of Dynamics AX on demand. A

lack of flexibility in the build out of AX has made some customers

reluctant to change processes and practices due to the somewhat rigid

nature of some of the configuration.

Dynamics AX is a great fit for businesses that have very little

complexity in their manufacturing practice and may not plan to grow

significantly within the next ten years. However, Dynamics AX often

becomes laggard, or slow to move through processes, when scaled up for

sophisticated business modeling – as many companies have become

dictated to do to compete in their respective markets. This can be

discouraging for a business who purchases an ERP system for efficiency

and agile throughput of data.

Conglomerate economies of scale generally require the handling of

large capacities, sophisticated materials acquisition, batch and lot

traceability and scheduling measured in real time. For example, as a

manufacturer or distributor increases capacity for private label

assembly, or do not process a standardized set of materials,

transactions could bottleneck the Microsoft Dynamics AX system; while

Plex is perfectly built for an occasion such as that. It all depends

on the complexity of the business.

Plex Systems is best suited for medium and large businesses that

require sophisticated quality management schemes post growth. These

enterprises generally acquire specialty materials and process large

amounts of inventories for a list of commodities of volatile markets

(food, automotive). Processes often involve assemblies for seasonal

variations that are both complex and require extensive auditing for

regulatory bodies. Scaling the system for an enterprise with end to

end production occurring at multi-site environment, where products

experience several points of contact, is a hallmark of Plex Systems.

Plex Systems ERP is a reactive,

agile application for complex

process manufacturing; however it

can be overkill for smaller

manufacturers with standardized

assemblers. Yet it may be worth

mentioning, because Plex Systems

operates in the cloud, it does

collect and configure continuous

data in real time which is an

important attribute for any

business, no matter their

structure.

Plex is a valuable resource for businesses who seek to become more

data-driven and require flexibility in the build out of reports and

dashboards of the more hands-off operations. Plex Cloud contains a

built-in BI feature that is specifically configured for manufacturing


Ease of use – Dynamics AX vs Plex Not even the most powerful ERP on the planet is a fit for

all businesses. Generally it requires expert customization

and integration with other business software to generate proper ROI.

Yet, not all users within a company own the degree of technical

understanding to allow this to happen. For that reason, many ERP

vendors focus on ways to repurpose complexity into something most of

us can actually drive conclusions from. Microsoft Dynamics

AX understands this very well.

Since Microsoft Dynamics AX

belongs to the Microsoft

family, most modern work

forces are experienced with

its interface and navigation.

This can help mitigate

discomfort throughout a

changeover process.

The system can be easily

synced with other Microsoft

products such as Outlook and

Microsoft Office, rendering

it available inside a suite

users are familiar with.

Dynamics AX is a powerful, yet straightforward, system driven by the

ease of use methodology. And while many positioning ease of use at the

top of their buying criteria docket, it isn’t always what they’ll

find. Sometimes these subjective goals of the business push the

Dynamics ERP to execute functions beyond the scope of its development

and inadvertently cause the system to perform poorly.

We find some IT groups are often times open to implementing new

applications (less any architectural integrity) to push the Dynamics

system to perform to non-technical user requests. But this isn’t

always the fault of IT, as Microsoft and its partners offer products

that can achieve particular objectives; it simply comes down to

ensuring there is an ideal plan behind the integration so all mapping

works in tandem as a unit. Likewise, because a majority of users own a

skill set linked to a longevity of experience with Microsoft products,

their requests seem harmless as they believe certain functions are

only a button away.

What we generally find are IT groups then fixed on integrating an

outstanding number of bolt on applications provided by other Microsoft

suites outside the AX product. Configuring them to do what needs to be

done suddenly becomes a complex, time consuming process. What’s worse,

is now someone has accidentally choked critical areas of the original

Dynamics configuration. Not to mention, if those integrations

manipulate the Dynamics AX architecture, the vendor may void service

businesses. Dynamics AX can easily integrate with Power BI, but an

organization will still have to align the BI tool to their business to

draw something meaningful.

Copyright Datix 2015, All rights reserved

Migrating to Cloud – Dynamics AX vs Plex

contracts and leave the organization managing their own service

support tickets.

If processes call for specialized custom features – pivotal to process

models – procuring a more dynamic, all-encompassing system is

certainly worthy of hard earned investment dollars.

The ERP offering from Plex Systems provides an all-in-one

manufacturing ERP solution that built to include all facets of a shop

floor to the accounting suite from a single platform. Plex Systems

recognizes many will need to inevitably integrate separate systems –

some happening to be instances of Microsoft. So, not only does Plex

provide agile features and an array of deep functionality for

integration, it plays well with external applications and web-based

tools (Not that many will need these, as Plex is one of the few

software developers providing manufacturers a large breadth of product

features most vendors delve as add-ons). Plex exposes REST API to

users so that these integrations can happen easily.

Microsoft Dynamics AX UX/UI configuration is simple and easily adopted

by modern users of digital systems. However, when the time comes to

delve new functionality to the system, it may force the ERP system to

tackle tasks in areas which it was not configured to handle. This

where Plex is often the better fit. It comes down to weighing the

familiarity of Microsoft vs the powerful functions of Plex.

One thing many may not know is the latest release of Dynamics AX

system is the first of the Dynamics family to be built upon SaaS

architecture. That’s right, the new Dynamics AX is offered in the

cloud; but this is new territory. While this certainly broadens the

functionality Microsoft offers businesses, it may take time before

everything is fully ironed out. This means businesses looking to make

the jump to the cloud (for all of the reasons mentioned here),

Dynamics AX may not be the most logical first choice.


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| ERP for Economies of Scale | The best ERP for your business will largely be determined by the

vision of the business and how the software will scale this vision

systematically. As mentioned in previous chapters, nearly every

manufacturing business largely does many of the same things. Some

ERPs are better equipped for traditional manufacturing processes than

others; but economies of scale require a highly reactive

infrastructure to incorporate their vision with new logistics.

Some systems are very rigid and require companies to use them as

outlined by the publisher, while others can be turned inside and out

to allow for flexibility to your business. Which ERP is best to scale

your business largely depends on how uncommon or complex some of your

business processes are.

| Epicor 10 vs. Sage X3 | In this Epicor vs Sage ERP showdown, we present a comparison between

two of today’s leading ERP software solutions. In our tailored

discussion, we’ll brief you on the elementary facets of software

selection, common issues that have been experienced by those seeking

these solutions, and ultimately what plays the biggest role in cost

payback.

Compliance vs. Business Intel Given the volatile nature of the market in which many manufacturers

and distributers operate, regulatory commission oversight and business

process will largely influence how you select the right tool for the

right job. If your business is heavily burdened by compliance and

quality control mandates, Epicor ERP 10 may ultimately be a

better fit. The reason Epicor 10 leads a class of ERP instances is the

depth, breadth, and precision of its build out. It has a robust

offering that is highly flexible and can be configured to drill down

to even the minutest transactions made by machine or man. Effectively,

it pinpoints finite contingencies that otherwise may go unnoticed and

snowball into something worse. This is

also important as mandates often change

and those smaller transactions can often

lead to noncompliance or nonconformance

issues.

However, if you operate in an industry

where revenue is heavily dependent upon

seasonality and requires long term

always will be) a purveyor of innovation, but ironically late to the

cloud-led ERP unlike Plex Systems.

If a cloud-led system is a requirement of your team, Plex Systems is

by far the most advanced and serviceable ERP system for modern

manufacturing and distribution businesses available. Businesses

seeking to move their data to the cloud will likely benefit more from

the Plex experience.


planning for economic oddities such as; petrochemical, Sage ERP X3 may

be a more viable enterprise solution.

Unlike the compliance heavy Epicor 10, Sage ERP X3 has been integrated

with a formidable BI tool inside their financial management suite. BI

tools are especially useful for inventory management, capacity

configurations, and demand planning. In a volatile, globalized market

where ecommerce supports individualized orders a robust BI application

is a critical resource.

However, there is a downfall to having a BI tool exclusively built

into an ERP system, particularly the

Sage line, for two reasons:

1. First, BI tools are most useful when implemented as an added

layer across the entire digital ecosystem, including the CRM,

ecommerce and transportation management applications. This way

the scope of the BI reports includes changes in departments, like

sales expenditures, machine costs, and inventory carry. Each of

those silos contribute to the bottom line, and as such, should be

benchmarked and planned for when changes in capacity occur. The

more finite transactions that go unnoticed, the more risk there

is for contingencies and errors in the future.

2. Second, Sage ERP X3 offers several solutions absent of drill down

capabilities — something Epicor ERP 10 does very well. The depth

of Sage’s inventory management and production management is

scarce. It offers straight forward functionality, with minimalist

customizations. For that reason alone, a BI tool is

unnecessary as it does not detail the most crippling areas of the

business. Additionally, basing a purchasing decision on the

Sage BI application alone can lead to poor decision making since

the ERP doesn’t provide the functionality you’ll need to actually

address those contingencies once discovered. However, if your

company is smaller with minimal complexity in the processes and

business model, Sage X3 may suit end users well.


Integration and IoT Epicor 10 is largely known for its ability to integrate with other

systems and is best in class for multi-site deployment. It is built on

service-oriented architecture (SOA) which can ease the integration of

diverse environments found in many organizations. Today, we find SOA

supports collaboration and information sharing throughout the

organization and with external partners. SOA also allows the business

to configure custom business processes without modifying the source

code. This is critical when abrupt changes occur in the business

environment; i.e. commissioned by a regulatory body. When business

process models are documented effectively and thoroughly, integrating

separate systems can be less complex as admins and implementation

experts can draft logic between those systems without altering key

tasks that may disrupt work flows.

Sage ERP X3 does boast effective integration capabilities, and is

built on SOA. However, because Sage does not provide as agile and

robust customization build outs as its competitor, an investor will be

stuck dishing out more capital to get it to support their business

processes effectively. This can also be problematic internally and to

external partners because integrating a volume of applications slows

the system down significantly. Plus, pushing applications to perform

may override other essential parts of Sage, faulting the work flow

indefinitely. Another pitfall of Sage’s integration ability is

straight forward functionality in its build out. Newer, sophisticated

applications will not be supported by Sage; meaning the finite data

throughput needed for those applications to be purposeful, Sage does

not compute. This can threaten a business significantly if they cannot

pinpoint nonconforming issues – which often occurs for the likes

of food and automotive industries.

However, probably the biggest disparity with Epicor vs Sage X3 is the

integration of IoT data. A business today will either live or die by

their ability to harness the internet of everything in the next 5-10

years. This includes integrated sensors on equipment, products, and

consumer insight to the nth degree. Sage X3 simply is not built to

take in and republish that amount of data successfully. Sage does not

provide the depth, breadth and precision, as

Epicor does, to capture key instances of data,

distribute them effectively (which many times dip

below the ERP’s surface for the data to truly

mean something), and evolve inefficiencies in a

highly competitive business environment.

Mobility and Security A major discrepancy among investors of software

is the idea all mobile solutions provide the same

level of functionality and system access for

remote users. This is not the case Depending on

the level of sophistication of business

processes, and the effectiveness of logic between

integrated pieces, mobile offerings generally


need to automate a range of resource data from business systems

outside the company network, thus expanding a secured perimeter.

Because Epicor 10 supports an end to end compliance initiative it also

leads its class in cloud security. This is important for mobile users

whom access customer information, nonconformance lists, financial and

contractual information, or any other proprietary information when and

where business happens.

Sage ERP X3 offers straightforward mobile solutions for business

users. It’s a feasible option for a smaller company with a set

supplier or distributor and do not engage in a complex selling

process. Those users can then check standard information and create

orders. But Sage X3 does not offer a supply chain management suite

which is increasingly more important for mobile users. This function

of the system enhances service levels, provides real-time access to

supplier contracts for rapid response to nonconformance and enables

sales teams to personalize a sale. Without having the ability to

implement those uses of the ERP for mobile users – monitored by a

secured connection – a company risks missing out on opportunities, and

fails to provide an audible process route of products, ingredients,

packaging materials, calibration of machines or account for economic

adulteration quickly to regulatory bodies and big box retailers.

Epicor vs Sage X3 Conclusion Epicor has succeeded, spending much of their development hours on

compliance, mobility and application integration—the three most

pressing needs of today’s modern workforce. Epicor vs Sage x3 is a

very formidable battle; however Epicor is a better fit for the

majority of manufacturing and distribution businesses with any form of

compliance or integration concerns. Sage X3 could be a better fit for

smaller businesses with strict focus on just finances (and financial

BI). ERP selection always comes down to selecting the right tool for

the right job. The information above should properly help you lay out

which best fits your organization.

| SAP vs. Plex Systems |

SAP vs Plex Systems is becoming a more common comparison for many

businesses. The design of these two systems fit well for similar

industries and business types, which make them natural competitors for

mid-sized and large manufacturing businesses.


Overview – SAP vs. Plex Systems SAP services a rather large portfolio

compared to most of its competition.

We attribute this to the longevity of

the SAP brand. The company launched

its first system in 1972, and is a

seasoned veteran of the on premises

ERP movement.

SAP’s latest ERP version was released

in 2006, and was built upon an

underlying layer of Java and ABAP

code. SAP would eventually did infuse

new features and functionality with

its enhancement package (EHP7) in 2013

for more than 83,000 total customers worldwide.

SAP touches an array of business industries and is not necessarily

tailored to perform best for one enterprise type over another.

However, SAP is generally utilized by the largest, most global-

reaching corporations -- whose processes generally involve asset

management, human capital management and operations management -- but

not necessarily capacity and production oversight of factory floors.

SAP is a proven formula for global parent or holding companies that

require rigorous snapshots of subsidiaries in which they manage.

The majority of these SAP users operate back office systems such as

finance, controlling, materials management and asset accounting.

SAP owes its success to the functionality compounded inside these

modules over the last two decades. Yet, maintenance costs of these

legacy ERP components is more expensive which has some users

questioning whether the system fits the M.O. of what they’re trying to

accomplish – that is, use the software to increase efficiency and

decrease costs.

Plex Systems includes these services in its all-inclusive solution

that is quicker and easier to perform in the cloud. It’s a limitless

software for manufacturing and capacity-driven communities (only). The

ERP vendor is often revered for its seamless upgrades, customer

satisfaction and shop-floor focused road mapping at no extra cost to

the customer. Its customers primarily include manufacturing bodies in

automotive, aerospace, defense and food and beverage. Because Plex is

built solely on cloud-technology, its applications house capabilities

that service manufacturing quote to cash, and everything in between at

a significantly lower cost (great for mid-sized companies). This

enables those with stake in the investment to turn profits into

returns in a shorter amount of time.



Industry Coverage Plex Systems is very transparent when it comes to the industry types

they service. They offer cloud-technology for manufacturing – not

banks, governments or hotels. Plex was built from the ground up by

process manufacturing engineers themselves. The ERP is designed to

connect supplier, material, machine, accounting, human resource and BI

needs for both discrete and process manufacturing businesses of all

sizes.

In its earliest stages, Plex Systems was built as a MRP tool –

configured as a communication device to provide factory floor

information to management on a real time basis. Plex has since evolved

that system into a scalable, efficient, all-encompassing ERP for mid-

sized, large and global industrial groups—including automotive,

aerospace, the DOD and food producers. Every aspect of Plex has been

configured to support those specified attributes of modern industrial

processing; including BOM tracking, accounting compliance and advanced

quality management.

Comparatively, SAP does not offer a native ERP through the

manufacturing lens. Instead, SAP offers a manufacturing execution

system – a segmented solution, compatible with the SAP Enterprise

Suite. The MES tool of SAP does an excellent job capturing production

data in real-time when mapped according to defined business process

models. Since the MES tool is typically a separate solution from the

primary ERP system, companies inadvertently purchase both to retrieve

the same functionality they’d find in an ERP built upon an MRP

foundation. Programming ERPs atop a materials resource planning

solution alleviates complexity the implementation, as much of the

system would readily support the majority of shop floor production

requirements from a single system.

Unfortunately, user reviews mistaken SAP to perform all the functions

from SAPs Enterprise Suite. Yet, after all the bolt on configuration,

the software could seem rather dilatory to users post go live. A

likely reason is there may have been a critical mistake in uniting

separate systems during the implementation; and no consideration of

the risks appraised on the implementation road map.

From a customer’s perspective, this inevitably is hard to dismiss

after funding an SAP project – first to implement it, then to

This game-changing model is a leading reason why industrial

communities are gearing up to implement Plex Software in the coming

year. Since the inception of Plex Systems in 2006, they have managed

to deploy their services across 20 countries, powering over 1,100

plants with a 95 percent renewal rate. Instead of costly software

upgrades, Plex earmarks rolling updates. This is simply the advantage

of having Plex, and the vendor’s continued action to align their

revenue with customer satisfaction. This model enables the customer

to realize ROI on their infrastructure sooner. Likewise, IT groups are

less likely to deviate from critical responsibilities to move systems

to latest versions.


Implementation Time Manufacturing-led ERPs in the cloud, like Plex Systems, are extremely

flexible and can be completely customized around

business processes. However, those businesses

with twenty plus years on their current legacy

system may mistake flexibility with volatility

and be apprehensive to move to a system requiring

such attentiveness to detail.

The uniqueness of Plex Systems architecture

stands to balance its volatile configuration with

an array of identified industrial needs readily

hard wired in the application. It requires no

additional investments in database licenses,

middleware or IT operations. Also, implementation

time is much less with Plex than other vendors as

the language of the system is derived from a

production floor which is easy for those using

the system to adopt. An added benefit to that is

it smooths over any discomfort users may

experience during an implementation process.

Plex is browser-based, meaning businesses avoid

having IT teams install or maintain hard and soft

“wares.” One of the best elements of procuring an instance of Plex is

not having to open up real estate on-premises for hardware –

allocating capital that can be better utilized for other

opportunities. Also, Plex Systems manages a comprehensive data center

to take complete control of enterprise operations. This enables

customers to focus on continuously improving processes, address user

inquires and train power users rather than testing software

environments daily.

SAP is acquired as an on-premises solution for the most part. SAP

requirements generally include desktops, servers and other meaningful

hardware; as this has been the demand that companies have generated.

Nonetheless, SAP deployment time has been somewhat shortened over the

last five years. This is most likely due to a large work force

experienced with SAP software over the last 40 plus years of

existence.

A reduced implementation time should reduce costs, but not necessarily

always the case. Since SAP is beneficial for large oversight

management, configuring a system to house the company’s requirements

will inevitably elongate implementation time. Generally large

integrate it, and inadvertently having to troubleshoot many issues

after go live.

Process and discrete manufacturers will quickly find that Plex simply

offers greater value for their business (if they’re interested in a

deployment model for industrial groups of scale); while other types of

businesses will likely enjoy the phased-in solution SAP offers. It’s

about finding the right tool for the right job; and Plex is the right

tool for process, high volume and regulatory guiding economies of

scale.


Subscription Based Model One of the unique features of Plex is its subscription-based delivery

model. Plex uses this as incentive to continuously win customer

business by creating advocacy for its brand. And rather than having

the customer amass charges for every new user license, Plex encourages

system usage by offering logins for both employees and partners at no

additional charge.

Instead of incurring hefty costs every time a business goes to

upgrade, Plex has eliminated versioning and instead rolls out upgrades

on a continual basis. Essentially, this solution continuously moves

customers to a whole new state without disruption.

Plex’s historical up time is in excess of 99.99% historically –

equaling less than an hour of downtime per year. This is great because

cost of ownership is much less. Moreover, companies have the ability

to retain business customizations whilst live on the latest system,

encouraging user adoption and lessening disruption from updates.

SAP software rose in popularity from its solutions as a global

integration tool and bridging economic barriers like currency,

exchange rates, language and culture automatically. Today, most ERP

vendors can provide this functionality at much lesser cost model than

SAP with agility and data transparency tied in at no extra charge.

SAP has built very powerful software, but to

aggregate all the functionality needed to meet

those expectations, buyers of SAP generally

procure separate solutions to get there. This can

amount incremental costs further down the road.

As we mentioned previously, SAP functionality is

architected in combination with solutions outside

the SAP Enterprise Suite, rendering the system

rigid and financially unstable.

Regardless of all the computing power of SAP,

businesses fail to move to latest versions

because it’s such an enormous amount of work on

premises. This could be a benefit, however, since

the IT department remains consistent in their job

of managing the same legacy hardware with faithful values.

SAP’s contractual agreements with customers offer little to no

flexibility – making it extremely important to choose the right tool

for the right job. The contract required to sign with SAP holds a

company with the vendor until expiry; unlike the SaaS model that

requires customers be locked in for only a year.

corporations need to integrate financials with subsidiaries, which can

be a complex process if the child company runs on a secondary

instance. And because most parent companies allow child enterprises to

utilize their own ERP systems, it can take years (if not decades) for

a project to be completed on time. It also largely depends on how keen

a parent company is to align its subsidiaries with a corporate model.


Wrap Up

| JD Edwards Enterprise One vs. Plex Systems |

Overview – JD Enterprise One vs. Plex

SAP vs Plex is an arduous battle. Both systems provide a strong

offering to different kinds of process manufacturing and financial

oversight businesses. What you’ll probably find is that most growing

manufacturing businesses, with some level of complexity, will be

happier with a Plex solution (if they are directly interested in

moving to the cloud); while those in the largest financial, banking

and human resources organizations - with multiple subsidiaries across

multiple industries and hiring scope for those with business acumen -

will likely be happier with something like SAP (although these are not

definitive statements).

There are always other factors at play when choosing software, but

it’s important that businesses perform proper selection and

implementation practices in the beginning to mitigate project risks.

To this point we’ve distinguished the features, capacities and markets

of today’s leading ERP providers in comparison to a first moving Plex

Systems. We’ve compared the young vendor to its primary competitor in

the categories of cloud, manufacturing and scalability. We’ve now

reached our comparison of Plex Systems to its most audacious

competitor yet –JD Edwards Enterprise One ERP and its Oracle driven

database manager.

We might first start off by saying these two systems service some

industries much better than others. Most buyers of software today have

grown favorable of best of breed solutions, or systems tailored

specifically to the type of jobs and tasks that make up their business

processes.

As we’ve mentioned in our previous comparisons, Plex Systems makes no

bones about the segment best suited for their ERP solution. Plex

Systems is largely installed in a manufacturing environment, with

unique configurations suitable in an automotive, food and beverage and

process production capacity.

Oracle’s JD Edwards EnterpriseOne ERP suite is a well-established

solution for these types of businesses as well, having performed

installations for over 150 medium to large supply chain enterprises;

yet, have come up with a very different means for using its solution

as a platform for a supplier-customer environment.

Plex Systems boasts strong MRP functionality beneficial for tracking

data on the shop floor, such as batch and lot numbers, serial numbers

and input materials. In fact, Plex Systems was established to sharpen

the visibility of processes at the detail level of production process

to mitigate the risk of process variation and nonconforming products.

It is this type of advanced data management that is so effective for

even the largest of manufacturing supply chains. Highly regulated

industrial businesses (food, automotive, aerospace) are becoming more


Employee Turnover Before contacting either vendor, a buyer should research these

companies to understand their products, organizational culture and

sales approach. They should familiarize themselves with the type of

leadership they follow, who’s in charge and what their values are.

This should give the buyer a better idea of what to expect in the

selling processes, the integrity of the sales people and the

experience they’ll have during an implementation – or lack thereof.

You may already be familiar with Oracle’s legendary sales force, led

by former CEO and respected leader Larry Ellison. During his reign,

Oracle successfully completed nearly 100 acquisitions of tech

companies increasing capacities and viability of its products. And

with that, product prices rose as Oracle become the dominate provider

of legacy and modern business applications.

Nearly every technology, code or database we’ve come to know today is

pegged to Oracle. And while increasing the breadth of the portfolio

benefited Oracle, it has decreased the choices for consumers. This is

especially true for those organizations whom may be looking to migrate

to a solution outside the Oracle ecosystem.

And what was once viewed as a brilliant model has recently come under

fire by of the new administration. The company has chosen to enter the

technology hardware space, as well as develop solutions built upon

SaaS architecture. While this has given Oracle the opportunity to be a

primary source for all the components of IT infrastructure – either on

prem or in the cloud – it has caused issues internally Oracle can’t

seem to nix.

This could be the result of Oracles new approach to provide both forms

of enterprise architecture and a change in their go-to market

strategy. Over the last several years, the predecessor of Larry

Ellison has reorganized Oracle’s sales department to run leaner;

prone to acquire a system with this type of functionality as

regulatory bodies tighten the gap for production variation.

JD Edwards Enterprise One provides a well-rounded sales-order

management module, complete with a configurator – an automated

selection and configuration tool to connect front-end sales and quote

entry with back-end fulfillment ops and manufacturing systems. This

type of functionality is exceptional for a business operating in a

highly specialized selling capacity dealing with a massive amounts of

new data transactions happening daily on a global scale (retail,

distribution, travel and transportation) but may not be a choice

solution for a medium or large industrial manufacturer.

There is limited capabilities in the JD Edwards Enterprise One supply

chain and production management modules, and even less its financial-

oriented sister ERP. JD Edwards Enterprise One is remarkable at

tracking quotes, but not a bill of materials forwards and backwards in

production. In a case of tracking materials from quote to cash – and

thereafter—the product configuration enrichment (a staple of Oracle)

of JD Edwards Enterprise One may not be beneficial for a business

seeking to harbor a solution instigating functionalities for quality

over quantity.


phasing out hundreds of the once legendary sales force. He has placed

lofty quotas on the sale of hardware and have amped up requirements to

sell a top to bottom infrastructure. Only a handful of large companies

can afford to obtain infrastructure top to bottom without looking

around for competitive pricing of separate components (I.e. hardware

vs. software). The majority of sales territories have become smaller

and many analysts are questioning if that has contributed to the high

attrition rate at Oracle and noticeable employee turnover with

hundreds leaving each quarter (some leaving for competitor Plex

Systems).

Those that stay remain urgent to close deals; therefore focus efforts

on convincing a buyer to purchase not only software, but hardware as

well. And because Oracle has heavily invested in the hardware

provision space, we can expect this to be an ongoing issue that will

inadvertently leave clients owning JD Edwards Enterprise One

campaigning for new project resources, shorter implementation time and

more financing.

By comparison, Plex Systems was named one of 2014’s Best Places to

Work by the Detroit Free Press, which can only mean one thing - low

employee turnover. This is especially important to consider when

considering an ERP project with your finance dollars on the line. Plex

employees are being compensated for work they already enjoy doing. It

just happens they develop an intelligent machine for the market in

which they have hands on experience - manufacturing.

Plex Systems hires seasoned manufacturing experts whom understand the

ins and outs of a shop floor framework to match Plex applications to

specific manufacturing needs. From a sales perspective, Plex’s single

cloud platform makes the sales team focus on business process models

and drive value from understanding customer requirements; compared to

Oracle with its many products, services and legacy hardware that may

convolute the client message.

From a project management standpoint, Plex employees find value in

seeing a client’s project through, reducing the chance of project

change over and derailment.

Cost Organizations deserve a solution that will optimize process and

capture new value to drive ROI on the purchase. So between JD Edwards

Enterprise One and Plex Systems, which one is making that happen for

the industrial market?


JD Edwards Enterprise One is an open

platform priced between $15 – $400K

(plus hardware, implementation and

continuous improvement) depending on

the size and scope of your business

model. We compare that to Plex’s

Manufacturing Cloud ERP with a yearly

subscription based model costing

businesses $5K per month on average.

Plex uses a subscription-based

delivery model. Plex uses this as

incentive to continuously win customer


business by creating advocacy for its brand. The continual renewals

are paid year after year. And rather than have the customer amass

charges for every new user license, Plex encourages system usage by

offering logins for both employees and partners at no additional

charge.

Instead of incurring hefty costs every time a business goes to

upgrade, Plex has eliminated versioning and instead rolls out upgrades

on a continual basis. Essentially, this solution continuously moves

customers to a whole new state without disruption. Likewise, companies

have the ability to retain business customizations whilst live on the

latest system; encouraging user adoption and lessening disruption of

upgrading.

Recently, Oracle decided to offer its JD Edwards Enterprise One

solution on a cloud platform as a subscription model. This is great

way for Oracle to sustain their position in the business technology

space, and provide the same functionality many depend on through a

less expensive model. However, we are concerned the company will

leverage the Oracle brand and keep their SaaS model price high whilst

deploying limited capabilities for the industrial segment.

Nonetheless, included in the high cost is the well-established Oracle

Database that can be hosted on a variety of operating systems as long

as the company keeps the ERP on premises – Microsoft Windows, HP-UX,

Linux x86-64, OpenVMS and more. A JD Edwards Enterprise One solution

that plays well with established internal platform can make

installation costs lower and less change of the procuring latest

hardware.

Wrap-Up JD Edwards Enterprise One and Plex Systems is an arduous battle. Both

systems provide a strong offering to a diverse group of businesses

differentiated by their ERP buying criteria and data oversight for

their global enterprise.

Ultimately, it always comes down to selecting the right tool for the

right job. What you’ll probably find is that most growing

manufacturing businesses, with some level of complexity, will be

happier with a Plex solution (if they are directly interested in

moving to the cloud); while those in transportation and travel,

communications, or professional service organizations with business

acumen and sales-oriented backgrounds will likely be happier with

something like JD Edwards Enterprise One (although these are not

definitive statements).

| ERP in the Cloud |

As a top ERP consulting firm, we speak to a wide variety of different

businesses on a daily basis. If there’s one thing we’ve learned, it’s

that all organizations are different. Even businesses that operate in

the exact same space have different practices and processes. That’s

why when we’re asked by companies if they should start moving to

a cloud ERP system right now, we don’t have an all-encompassing

answer. As it turns out, there is usually a subjective answer for each


We discuss the possibility of a cloud

ERP with many manufacturing and supply

chain verticals. And the truth is, the

future of software technology is

quickly moving in this direction.

However, it makes a lot more sense for

some organizations than others. Some businesses could financially

benefit from moving to cloud infrastructure as soon as possible, while

others can choose to possibly transition in the future if an aggregate

market dictates them to do so.

NetSuite versus Plex Systems is an inevitable comparison

many businesses are bound to encounter if they are in the process

of considering a move to the cloud architecture — or are currently

migrating to a cloud platform. Our recommendation is always to find

the right tool for the right job, and between these two systems, there

are many things to consider.

In our comparison of NetSuite vs. Plex Systems, we explore the more

elementary facets of software selection relating to these systems;

common issues that have been experienced; and what ultimately plays

the biggest role in cost payback for different companies interested in

implementing these systems.

Overview - NetSuite vs. Plex Systems

Business Size — NetSuite vs Plex

company. The secret is discovering

which business factors make certain

organizations better candidates for an

ERP system than others.

NetSuite has positioned themselves as the largest cloud ERP in the

world and is currently experiencing unbridled growth in a number of

verticals. By comparison, Plex has become the cloud ERP of choice for

many in the manufacturing and distribution market and is considered by

business technology researchers to be the innovative leader in the

manufacturing space. So, in the battle of NetSuite versus Plex, which

cloud ERP best fits which kinds of businesses? Let’s take a look at

some of the factors at play. . .

While NetSuite and Plex ERP systems are often pitted against one

another — likely because they are two of the most evolved and

established cloud ERP’s — they do serve slightly different

demographics. We’ll get in to which industries each fits best — and

why — later on. However it’s important for businesses to understand

the physical limitations of their enterprise software.

Between the two, both fit small and medium-sized enterprises very

well. Both software systems can accommodate all the needs businesses

of this size require. Each possess the ability to scale up or down on

demand to adequately meet the needs of small businesses with large

business needs. The biggest differentiation between the two

physically, is Plex ERP can also accommodate large businesses with

global enterprise needs. Likewise, there are some cases of NetSuite


Industry Fit — NetSuite vs Plex This is where the comparison really becomes an exercise in selecting

the right tool for the right job. There is a pretty clear line that

can be drawn between which cloud ERP fits best for different types of

businesses. The split directly correlates to how the software itself

is structured and what modules and features are included in the

packages.

NetSuite largely puts financials upfront in their software. This means

businesses in the e-commerce, retail and hospitality industries will

be drawn naturally to some of its robust accounting and e-

commerce features. When comparing NetSuite and Plex Systems in the

financials department, NetSuite offers a tailored overall business fit

for many; whilst most manufacturing businesses will find Plex Systems

the clear winner in this area of business for what they need

accomplished.

NetSuite’s financials are very flexible. That’s why the financials

inside of NetSuite are such a great fit for the retail industry and e-

commerce businesses. These organizations rely on this functionality

more than others and are usually accustom to more complex

financials. NetSuite also has some rather helpful business

intelligence attributes embedded in their offering that supplement

these financials well. Furthermore, the software makes it easy for

multi-channel distributors to configure automated processes (possibly

those that may need to integrate with something like Amazon.com).

Our biggest concern with NetSuite is it is often marketed as an all-

encompassing cloud ERP for a wide range of businesses; while the

software itself is not really constructed in a way that supports every

type of business. The aggressive salesforce employed by NetSuite has a

bit of reputation for fitting round software into square-sized

businesses. This may be what has contributed to some of the more

negative reviews about NetSuite from users. However, when aligned

correctly, NetSuite fits certain businesses better than others;

specifically those in the retail, e-commerce, financial, B2C and

service industries.

Plex makes no bones about who their software is designed for. Up front

they position their solution as the cloud manufacturing ERP system.

Plex offers a wide range of features and modules for manufacturers

that are missing from NetSuite’s offering. Plex offers dynamic

capabilities that can support supply chain, inventory, maintenance,

manufacturing and HR management that are must-have for manufacturing

businesses making a move to the cloud. Plex is also the only ERP

fitting into larger businesses; however users of these organizations

claimed they experienced serious difficulty scaling the ERP software

to accommodate elaborate process models.

Plex is likely the better fit for many large businesses that may be

considering both. However, investors will want to cross-reference with

their industry to ensure the software truly fits. There are some large

businesses Plex is not equipped for, as we see in later chapters.


Mobility/ UX / Remote Access — NetSuite vs Plex Since both NetSuite and Plex are both cloud-based ERP solutions,

accessibility and mobility are largely better than most other ERP’s on

the market (as others typically offer cloud and on-prem solutions).

Both offer very nice interfaces for users. Both Plex and NetSuite

recently launched brand new modern user interfaces that have been said

to improve UX for both systems. Users whom have navigated both systems

typically come away feeling that Plex UX is slightly more intuitive

than NetSuite; however there is a learning curve with both.

When it comes to mobility, Plex takes a slight edge over NetSuite.

When comparing NetSuite and Plex in terms of mobility, it really comes

down to the greater number of options offered by Plex. While NetSuite

has a well-built mobile website, Plex offers a mobile ready web

presence, android app and iOS app, as well. This gives Plex users new

ways to access the software, making it more comfortable for mobile

users that may be more accustomed to application-based utilization.

Both systems offer dynamic and speedy web portal access -- a major

advantage of cloud-based software in general. A strong internet

connection will permit both systems to run very quickly and offer

remote users a better experience than just about any other ERP

software on the market.

system with an embedded MES system. This allows businesses to connect

all smart machines and data on the shop floor with their Plex ERP

system. This functionality offered by Plex is much more comprehensive

and accommodating to those in the manufacturing space than NetSuite.

In fact, it’s almost not event fair to compare them on this

functionality alone.

Plex’s manufacturing module contains tools that give businesses better

change control, quality management and sampling abilities. These

features (and more) make Plex the choice solution (cloud aside) for

businesses with high production volume or process manufacturing needs.

NetSuite simply cannot compete with businesses that have these kinds

of manufacturing, supply chain or highly volatile distribution

needs. Plex also has embedded business intelligence; which has

received great reviews from users whom require seasonality, compliance

and quality management.


Company Reputation — NetSuite vs Plex NetSuite was founded in 1998, and is positioned as the largest cloud

ERP provider in the world. The vendor built a model that exploded

among retail and growing e-commerce businesses, and used that as a

launch pad to help them become an innovative driver in the cloud ERP

movement.

Plex was founded in 2006, and is the fastest growing manufacturing

cloud ERP in the world. Plex built their entire model on shop floor

production oversight and materials tracking. They were adopted very

early by an extremely high percentage of the auto manufacturing

industry and have since found large adoption among those with high

volume process manufacturing components in their business model.

One clear area of differentiation when comparing NetSuite and Plex

Systems is consumer satisfaction reports and the experience they

provide users of their product. Both have tremendous success stories

across many different industries; however Plex really stands out when

it comes to customer service and customer reviews. NetSuite suffers a

bit from being slightly less customer-oriented during peaking stages

of their growth. Their software is often implemented inside

organizations whom do not fit their business model well – that is,

organizations seemed rushed to implement the software as NetSuite

installations largely focused on go-live, rather than road mapping the

project with unique processes of the business in mind. This has led to

the normal complaints and rumblings that software vendors generally

deal with, but they’ve also had to deal with several major lawsuits

because of this as well.

Plex Systems may be the most positively reviewed ERP software in the

world by customers. This can largely be attributed to two main

factors:

1. Plex does not envelop where they best fit, and is typically only

implemented inside of businesses where they can be relatively well

aligned.

2. Their attention to customer service is positioned up front

internally. This seems like a marketing message from the company,

but the truth is that reviews have revealed that customers are

generally very happy with the support and help they receive from

Plex. Or quite possibly because Plex Systems has been noticed as

one of the Best Places to Work – happy people make happy employees.

Happy employees provide customers enjoyable experiences.


Another factor to consider are the partner networks of NetSuite and

Plex Systems. This likely plays a role in many of the reviews as there

are not many partners of any vendor certified to deploy ERP

infrastructure in the cloud. NetSuite has a very large partner network

that is extremely competitive. This leads to a lot of deals, and some

subpar implementations (not necessarily the software’s fault). This

risk can be mitigated by certified business process modeling

experts on the front end. Yet in stages of looming customer expansion,


Wrap Up

| Epicor 10 vs. NetSuite |

NetSuite may have neglected their capacity to provide clients with

enough viable resources to make that happen.

Plex’s partner network is very small and has been built largely around

implementation and business process expertise. This is probably

another reason why their software is receives high marks on consumer

reports. We often talk about how important the implementation

process is, and working inside a partner network that supports that

same message shows Plex understands it too. This leads to more

successful implementations across the board and is likely the reason

customers endure a pleasurable ERP project experience.

NetSuite versus Plex is formidable battle. Both systems are innovators

in the marketplace and are both growing at an extremely rapid pace.

Their dual-popularity can directly be attributed to their visions of a

cloud ERP system for their target markets.

This is a little bit different from when we compare Epicor 10 to Infor

10X, Sage X3, and Dynamics AX; as NetSuite and Epicor are more of an

apples to oranges comparison. Companies evaluating both systems will

likely find one to be a better fit for their business needs than the

other. Our goal in this piece is to help you understand what those

decision-making considerations might be. As we always say, the right

tool for the right job.

In the totality of our head to head series, we have pinned the

capabilities and user reviews of leading ERP providers and solutions

on the market today. However, no two ERP systems are quite as

divergent as Epicor 10 and NetSuite’s current version. This week we

analyze vendor credibility, how post-implementation care is disrupted

for current customers when organizational changes occur at the vendor

level, and why a vendor’s robust customer network should never be a

considered in a buying decision.


The Right Fit, and Credibility It should come as no surprise to the thousands of NetSuite customers

that attended the recent Suite World 2015 user conference that the

vendor’s cloud-led ERP instance and omnichannel commerce

suites continue to grow inside of the world’s largest global

companies. NetSuite has poured their resources into stock piling

revenue with an aggressive sales and expansion approach. This is a

testament to the popularity and utility of the software, but it does

not come without its downside. Back to back lawsuits against the ERP

vendor have detailed fallacies in NetSuite’s implementation processes

and initially proposed solutions to customers. Based on court

documents and user groups, the company is known for an overly

aggressive, over-promising sales force and poor user adoption support;

however when these risks are properly mitigated the software delivers

precisely as advertised.

If you look to our articles on ERP and CRM selection best practices,

you’ll notice we echo the same message over and over again — it takes

the right tool for the right job. It may sound cliché’ but could not

ring more true in our comparison here. NetSuite opened its doors

nearly two decades ago with only a few capabilities, and has since

grown to fully involve an end to end solution for small and medium

businesses (SMB). Yet, as more industries entered the market (i.e. the

service sector, distribution and retail) NetSuite found their solution

could remedy the pain points in each of these spaces. NetSuite

has become an industry leader in the ERP space, but the vendor also

imposes a high price tag upon these businesses for a solution that is

not a fit for all businesses or industries despite a marketing

approach that may state otherwise.

Comparing Epicor vs NetSuite, and their stories, is actually very

interesting. As both have experienced struggle and success. Epicor has

driven its brand to the top of the leader boards by simply

understanding the market in which its solution’s capabilities have the

greatest potential fit — manufacturing, distribution, batch and

discrete processing. Epicor designed a flexible, agile resource

planning software capable of being configured around each of these

value adding programs. Epicor’s primary struggles have come at their

releases which have often required multiple updates to fix bug and

glitches; however most of these are easily mitigated. It’s most recent

release Epicor 10, has really excelled; bringing the flexibility of

its hierarchy-based configuration for sophisticated industry-specific

enterprises to the forefront of its messaging. Additionally, the

vendor remained focused on core industry-specific methodologies

despite organizational changes that occurred in Q2 of 2015 that were

aimed at improving in areas where the company had been criticized.

Organizational Change at the Vendor Level Change, in many ways, is a great thing; however when industries and

software change at the same time, the results can be dramatic. This is

the primary reason the majority of manufacturing and distribution


Post Go-Live Support Another primary disparity comparing Epicor vs NetSuite is their

partner network, whom should work as a certified extension of the

business. Out of the box, NetSuite’s software is so complex and unique

to their development, locating an external source knowing the ins and

outs is robust, but can be hard to find someone specific to your

business that fully-understands the business processes that the ERP

can support. It is also why NetSuite charges higher prices for

continuous improvement and 24 hour support; because their own internal

team of experts is limited. Epicor runs on Microsoft and SQL reporting

making it easy to train non-technical users and in-house developers

that may already understand elements of the software.

Additionally, partner networks are

sources the vendor can turn to extend

the value for the investor lost in the

change at the vendor level. For the

majority of small and midsized

businesses whom employ a limited IT

division, post go live support, or any

change management, is non-negotiable.

They simply have to have it. After an

implementation partner validates the

system, and walks users through use

cases inside the system, the system

will be live and the company will

procure full ownership of it.

What then? If you’re a NetSuite user you will need to do a lot of due

diligence to properly equip your organization to mitigate future risk.

groups are looking to latest version ERP systems to support these new

changes and capabilities.

Those investing in ERP often choose to remain divested in their legacy

system, but then chooses to upgrade to meet industry demand. What

happens when the vendor restructures their business model after

implementation? These business that had waited a long period of time

to upgrade, and likely thoughtfully considered their options, are now

left with system (and price) different from the one they selected.

For small and midsection businesses whom heavily rely on a vendor

(their software and services), the main risk is losing their full

attention for post go live support. And like NetSuite, Epicor too has

undergone an organizational restructuring as of late. Likewise we’ve

touched on changes ERP vendor giant, Infor, has undergone and how it

affected their customer base. The conclusion? The manufacturing and

distribution space is undergoing rapid changes. This is a priority

reason why industry experts recommend sourcing a third

party consultant on an implementation.


Ease of Use

Wrap-Up

This means locating specific partners, and employees that are experts

in BPMs.

Investors of Epicor are fortunate. Epicor requires its partner network

undergo rigorous training and best practice configuration

certifications to render the system properly, and since the software

is specific to the manufacturing, distribution, and made-to-order/

batch-based processing industries it’s not as difficult to source or

acquire experts in industry BPM’s that can work with the software.

An important element of all software is its ease of use. In a nut

shell, ease of use reflects how users experience / understand the

software (UX), and what the interface looks like and acts like (UI).

Both NetSuite and Epicor are developed with modern flair, they are

more appealing to everyday users than most other comparable ERP’s.

Users of both systems will likely have few complaints.

All of these factors are important to user adoption. Epicor’s

interface resembles latest versions of Microsoft, with flat, large

icons and a beautifully developed external facing screen (like Windows

8 or 10). Additionally, Epicor has moved from Crystal Reporting to SQL

(SSRS) reporting in their latest 10 version. While SQL reporting can

be complex to build, more developers and administrators are becoming

trained on this type of reporting sequence. NetSuite’s cloud led ERP

is integrated with NetSuite reporting schemes; which can be more

difficult to adopt. For companies employing one or two in the IT

division, it could take months for personnel to learn how to create

these reports. In all, it is more expensive to adopt an ERP system

where specialists, developers and consultants are far and few between.

The information above should properly help you lay out which best fits

your organization. Investing in infrastructure is an emotional

decision that should be considered by many in an organization. One of

the best ways to mitigate these risks is to invest in having an expert

assist you during selection and implementation.

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