Important Questions and Answers: Emerging Trends on Enterprise Resource Planning(ERP)

EMERGING TRENDS ON ERP

01.What is OLAP?

OLAP or On-Line Analytical Processing is a decision support software that allows the user to quickly analyze information that has been summarized into multidimensional views and hierarchies.

02. What is supply chain?

A supply chain is a network of facilities and distribution options, that performs the functions of procurement of materials, transformation of these materials into intermediate an finished roducts, and the distribution of these finished products to customers.

03. What is SCM?

SCM or Supply Chain Management is a generic term that encompasses the coordination

of  order  generation,  order  taking  and  offer  fulfillment/distribution  of  products,  services  or information.

04. How ERP used in CRM?

Customer relationship management (CRM) systems build on the organizational value ERP provides; specifically, they increase the flexibility of the company’s common database regarding customer service. Various kinds of CRM software are available, some from ERP vendors (including SAP) and some from third-party software companies. CRM software can lead to operational savings, but most companies buy it because they believe that creating better customer relationships will result in higher revenue. Uses of CRM have evolved since the software was initially launched; what began as a customer contact repository has extended its capabilities to include sophisticated business intelligence. CRM can be installed in-house or on-demand.

05. Define business analytics.

Business analytics is a term used to describe a range of different applications and technologies used to extract and analyze large amounts of data to aid in decision making.

06. What do you mean by Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing can be defined in simple terms as the delivery of a software product to a user via the Internet. The user typically accesses the cloud product through a Web browser or a lightweight (meaning small and simple) application for a computer or mobile device.

07. How the ERP systems enabled with internet?

E-commerce needs are driving companies to connect their business applications, such as ERP systems, both internally and externally through the Internet. Software designed with an SOA can be quickly deployed and reconfigured as business conditions require changes to the applications, databases, and other infrastructure hosted in data centers owned by a company. The combination of software tools that enables an organization’s

various systems and applications to communicate with other applications is called Web services.

08. What do you mean by open source ERP?

Open source ERP provides the users with free versions of software programs without license, other rules and regulations.opern source erp platforms the user is able to access the source code and know how the applications work and can change the code as per the business needs. This has been commented as one of the main reasons for small and medium sized orgainsations to select open source ERP platform rather than outsourcing the developing applications that suit the business requirements.

9. What are the advantages of business analytics?

Strategic workforce performance information

Evaluates supplierand customer performance

Accelerate activites of human resources

Achieves greater visibility

Receives daily activities.

Controls and monitors maintenance process

10.What are the components of extended ERP?

Business intelligence components

Customer relationship management

Supply chain management

E-business

11.            What are the benefits of cloud computing? Reduces cost

Economies of scale Virtualization Payment basis Maintenance costs Thin client Scalability

12.            State the limitations of the cloud –based ERP applications. Limited functionality and availability

Reduced customization Security risks

Organizational conflict

1.     State some key points of the contract with the consultant, which should be addressed.

·        Profile of the consultants’ team with the resume of each member

·        Consulting fee and payment details

·        Implementation methodology

·        Time schedule and the implementation budget

·        Terms and conditions of knowledge transfer and employee training

·        List of deliverables (reports, manuals, knowledge bases etc)

Project monitoring and status reporting systems

02.How the internet used in Cloud computing process?

Cloud computing can be defined in simple terms as the delivery of a software product to a

user via the Internet. The user typically accesses the cloud product through a Web browser or a lightweight (meaning small and simple) application for a computer or mobile device. Cloud computing is not a completely new concept, rather it simply represents the latest stage of the development of computing and the Internet. To better understand how cloud computing will impact ERP system development, it is useful to review the development of SAP’s ERP systems with the advent of the Internet.

SAP and the Internet

In 1996, SAP introduced its joint Internet strategy with Microsoft. The core of SAP’s first effort to integrate the Internet with its products was the Internet Transaction Server (ITS) a server-based software system that enabled efficient communication between an SAP ERP system and the Internet. To provide some context for the state of the Internet at this time—in 1996, Amazon.com was only one year old, and the online travel agencies Expedia and Travelocity were both just being founded. Many other Internet services we take for granted today did not exist at this time.

In May 1999, SAP announced mySAP.com, a new strategy designed to completely realign the company and its product portfolio. The goal of this initiative was to combine e-commerce solutions with SAP’s existing ERP applications, using cutting-edge Web technology. In 2000, SAP began building on the mySAP.com vision by adding the capability for electronic marketplaces and corporate portals.

03.How the Business Analytics process used in ERP ?

Business intelligence (BI), also referred to as business analytics, is a term used to describe a range of different applications and technologies used to extract and analyze large amounts of data to aid in decision making. BI includes data-mining tools and querying tools, which are often interactive and visual. The growth of data-generating technologies such as RFID,combined with improvements in BI tools, has led to significant growth in the BI market. Prior to 2008, almost all of SAP’s ERP business came from traditional ERP suite applications.

However, in the period from 2008 to 2011, the percentage of the business that came from BI rose to 50 percent.On the left side of the diagram are the potential BI data sources, which are growingboth in number and in the volume of data produced. For example, sources such as Facebook, Twitter, and other social media applications can provide information on consumer reaction to new products.

The center section represents the analytical capabilities of BI; it includes items such as analytic applications and business intelligence, which are similar sets of data analysis tools. In SAP’s framework, analytic applications are data analysis tools applied to specific industries, such as financial services, manufacturing, consumer products, retail, and utilities or to functional areas, such as supply chain management, finance, human resources, IT, and service, sales, and marketing. Enterprise performance management is the concept of developing strategic goals for the organization and then gathering data to evaluate how the organization is performing in relation to those goals. The governance, risk, and compliance category represents a group of activities focused on ensuring an organization is functioning ethically and legally.

Governance refers to the processes that ensure that top management is receiving accurate and timely data necessary to run the organization and that control mechanisms are in place to make sure that management directions and instructions are being carried out. Risk, or risk management, consists of processes to identify risks to the organization and to develop plans to minimize the potential damage to these risks.

Data warehousing is the technology used to store the large volumes of data used in the analysis. Enterprise information management is a relatively new term that describes the business and technology functions that manage information as a corporate asset. Previously, this was primarily through personal computers, but with the growth in mobile technology, an increasing variety of devices can now be used to access BI.

4.       What are the emerging trends in ERP?

·        ERP platforms

·        Open source ERP

·        Supply chain management

·        Customer relationship management

·        Business analytics

·        Extended ERP