Isn't it Time for Free ERP Systems?

 Can we imagine a Free ERP system where users can raise Purchase / Sales Orders like they do in a few clicks on Amazon / Flipkart with all the required details visible on a single page?

In today’s era of Digitization, ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) systems have been the first steps of any organization on its way towards becoming a Technology based enterprise. It has served its first purpose of making the organizations paperless. The seamless integration of ERP with multiple systems has been the basis of architecture of all the organizations. Nowadays it is not very uncommon in very big organizations to see the Cloud based ERP system at the core with other 40/45 client facing applications compared to the earlier robust on premise ERP systems with a lot of customized programs.

Companies like SAP, Oracle (EBS, JDE, Siebel), Baan (Infor), IFS have been in the market since decades and cloud based organizations like Salesforce, Workday, Microsoft etc. have changed the dynamics and cost for the customers drastically. Implementation times that were years for on premise solution has come down to days with cloud based systems and automations. Investment costs have come from large infrastructures to user based subscriptions and maintenance costs have reduced drastically. 

At the same time, the futuristic systems are moving to further add the in-built Analytics and integration frameworks for AI & IOT based algorithms. Earlier the majority of the revenue of the IT services came from building the robust custom developments for the ERP systems, building peripheral applications and analytics for the same. 

Recently the focus of the demand from customers is changing from these custom developments to the new edge developments like RPAs, Chatbots, AI / ML based Analytics and IOT / Blockchain based platforms. All the Technology companies are focused on this future and the ERP companies like SAP / Oracle / Microsoft / Salesforce need to think about their business model. 

Basic ERP transactions like purchasing, Order Management, Inventory Management & CRM has become very user friendly and convenient on other platforms like Ecommerce websites like Amazon, Flipkart and ebay. Google & Microsoft has provided so many applications that basic EPR systems can be developed at nominal costs on platforms like android. 

Wouldn’t it be revolutionary for all the startups and SMEs if Google / Microsoft can provide the basic ERP with “Free of Cost” and charge them for additional services like 

1. Analytics & Advanced report 

2. Complex / Industry specific processes (e.g. Chemical / Process mfg.)

3. Localizations & Tax configurations

4. AI / ML & IOT Plugins / API / Algorithms etc

5. Blockchain solutions

6. PaaS / IaaS requirement from clients

7. Advertisements from the screen 

8. Maintenance / Upgrades

9. On-premise / Private Cloud solutions

10. Advance securities

11. Users beyond a limit (For large Industries)

12. Shipping / Logistic solutions by partners

Users of these SMEs / Startups won’t mind to see some ads while punching some POs or Sales Orders! Moreover they may also navigate to explore / browse the purchase options from these Adds :) 

ERP systems have become as essential as that of emails / Whatsapp / Messenger / Online meeting solutions and most of these come Free or at nominal cost. This savings in technology will help all small companies to move to a new level of digitization with more focus on End Customer requirements than managing internal operations.

Key AI Industries & Applications collated from various sources

Key AI Industries & Applications collated from various sources:

Agriculture:

It has been stated that our planet would need 50% more food than that being produced today by the year 2050. And once again, AI could be the solution to this challenging task. PEAT is a Berlin-based start-up that has successfully designed and developed an AI application software for analyzing the nutrient profile of the soil.

Some of the ways they are helping solve the problems of the agriculture industry are by enabling higher production and reduced operational cost and increasing the efficiency of cultural practices.

Apart from the information regarding the soil profile, the new age IoT-based AI modules assist with applications of climate prediction, crop management practices, fertilizer optimization, and organically nurtured produce.

Finance:

Artificial Intelligence has found many applications in the Finance industry. Some of the applications lie in credit decisions, managing risk, fraud prevention, quantitative trading, personalized banking, process automation and much more.

ZestFinance has come up with Zest Automated Machine Learning (ZAML). It is an AI-powered underwriting platform that is helping finance companies to assess the credibility of borrowers with little or no credit history. Thousands of data points are used to provide a level of transparency that other underwriting solutions fail to provide. ZAML is an end to end platform which is easily scalable.

Similarly, there are many other start-ups that are coming up with AI solutions to transform the traditional ways prevailing in the industry.

Healthcare:

Improvement in the state of healthcare system holds immense importance as it directly reflects on critical aspects such as quality of treatment, life expectancy, etc.

Enlitic, a California based AI organization that develops ‘deep learning’ based tools to streamline radiology diagnosis. The deep learning platform analyses the unstructured data such as blood tests, radiology images, genomics, EKGs, etc. along with complete patient medical history. It then provides medical practitioners with actionable insights based on this data to understand patients’ real-time needs. Enlitic has been named the 5th smartest AI company in the world by MIT. It has left behind Facebook and Microsoft in the said ranking.

Named the ‘Most Innovative Healthcare AI Developments of 2019’, BioXcel Therapeutic’s work in AI-based drug development is phenomenal. The company uses AI to identify and develop new medicines in the domain of neuroscience and immuno-oncology. They also work towards finding new applications for existing drugs with the help of AI.

Space and Aeronautics:

Artificial Intelligence has paved its way into extraterrestrial exploration and helping space scientists to find hints of life on other planets. It is being considered to send artificial Intelligence bots to other planets to conduct studies on the presence of life, based on the climatic activities and presence of natural resources around.

Another application lies with managing the humongous amount of data that is received from satellites. The significant amount of data gathered by NASA from these satellites is in the form of ocean currents, volcanic activity, ic states, and a bird’s eye view of what is happening on the Earth.

Mobile App Concepts/Ideas that an Enterprise can Build

Mobile Apps for an Enterprise and its Scope:

• Internet has been around the world since long time and has impacted many aspects of life, But the real internet revolution will be driven through the mobile device
• Rapid adoption of smart phones and Tablets has surprised many industries and most of the businesses want their enterprise data and processes to be available on their mobile devices
• Enterprise mobility has more than just the internet access through Smartphone because of its Consumerization, Globalization and digitalization
• To stay on top of the game, business world need to realize this silent revolution else it’ll be too late improve
• Enterprise Mobility Management is a form of Digitalization, which helps businesses to deal with Globalization, as well as consumerization
• The new players embrace the opportunity to become faster, smarter and better at executing their strategies by using the latest mobile technology. 
• Their aim is to reduce the distance between them and the current market leaders which is dramatically increasing the competitiveness
• CRM, Sales, Finance & SCM are the key functions and are the first few to see the advantage of not having to carry the laptop / Desktop. Then the functions like HRM, Knowledge Management, Social Networking, News & Announcement apps etc. joined the party. 

Key Facts of Enterprise Mobility:

• Today one in every five phones sold is a Smartphone; hence both Employees & Customers are using them and businesses are tapping into the devices to connect with them.
• Forty-three percent of businesses are planning to increase their mobile use in the future, and by 2015, it’s expected that half of all devices on corporate networks will be mobile devices. 
• This explosion in the use of mobile devices in the enterprise will help fuel demand for mobile apps, with the worldwide market expected to grow from approximately $6.8 billion in 2010 to $25 billion by 2015
• It is expected that within the next five years more than 500.000 businesses across Europe will go through some kind of „mobilization“ process.
• 38% of the businesses polled in a GigaOm Pro survey on the new workplace report using mobile phones more than the previous year.

Overview of Key Concepts and existing key apps:

• CRM Apps: Quick and easy access to Client Contact information
• Field Service Apps: Enables service agents to access and update key information of spare parts and customer requests
• iExpense: Employees can upload the expense claims using the device while traveling
• Inventory Management Apps: Sales people can benefit from the real-time inventory data
• Mobile Supply Chain Applications (MSCA): These are widely used for warehouse management processes in loading the tracking the shipments through mobile devices
• Knowledge Management Apps: Quickly and easily accessible library of all documents 
• Calendar and Scheduling Apps: Through this shared resource, other will be able to see your schedules
• News & Announcement Apps: Communicating big news from a single location
• Social Networking Apps: This will add strength to your business by increasing morale and accomplishing team-building exercises
• Parking Apps: In metros like Mumbai, Employees can see the parking availability before entering the premises
• Online Purchasing Apps: Employees can sale and purchase the used stuffs from their colleagues
• Online Training Apps: Employees can complete the mandatory trainings while travelling
• HRMS Apps: Tracking time, vacations, leaves, expenses, PMD, learning
• R&D: Just enter the component and you can find its ingredients and specifications
• Sourcing & Purchasing: Purchase department can mange the PO documents, approvals through mobile

Envision of additional features and Recommendations:

• Enterprises will go for their own in-house Apps Stores
• Business will adapt to MDM tools that allow to manage the device and set up policies and security, and most of those tools 
• A lot of the traditional mobile device management vendors are now building mobile application management features into their products
• It's not about only managing the device; you need to manage the applications. 
• Some companies are using the application virtualizing if there’s very secure data that can’t get out into the fields 

Implementation Roadmap:

• Which Apps? :- Ones that make things easier or let you do your job
• BYOD? :- Bring your own device or let enterprise provide them
• Mobile device Management : - Setup Policies and Security
• In-House or Volume Purchase?
• Building can be expensive
• But there's often a pretty good upside
• The expenses come in integrations with 
• the complicated enterprise systems

Challenges for Mobile Apps:

Challenges	Path Ahead
Data Access	synchronization capability to help ensure that once you are back in range, you can update again
Security	Secure Authentication Server side validation Data Encryption
User Interface	Use of icons Intuitiveness
Choosing Development Technology	Gartner, Inc., a leading information technology research and advisory firm, recently confirmed this trend by going on record to say that 90% of all enterprise apps in 2015 will be HTML5 or Hybrid and only 10% will be native.

ROI - Return on Investment:

While it would be ideal to have a cut and dry formula for calculating mobile app ROI, the truth is, not many companies have set baseline costs for processes like time spent on sitting down to fill out an expense report or count inventory in a stockroom. 

“E” metrics from Richard Marshall provide a good beginning framework: Efficiency, Effectiveness and Error Reduction.

• Efficiency Resources are precious at any organization and finding ways to conserve them or use them more wisely is always a good thing.
• Eliminate paper and printing costs.
• Reduce site visits.
• Cut internal communications costs. 
• Effectiveness Mobilizing your most important assets, your employees, to be more effective at their jobs is another good measure of success.
• Transform traditional processes.
• Drive additional revenue
• Improve customer support
• Error Reduction Minimizing mistakes, big and small, can add up to serious savings over time.
• Direct data entry.
• Automate inventory control.
• Reduce cycle times.  

Recommendations for Business Benefits:

• Robust Architecture
• Optimize development and testing efforts by accurately identifying which platforms  to target 
• Employ consistent and reliable development practices across all leading platforms
• The application development team should incorporate coding, testing, graphical design, and user experience skills to help applications to fulfill users’ needs
• With mobile technology still advancing, developers should look for ways to make applications perform even more efficiently, whether in terms of speed or features. 
• Creating capabilities for both initial downloads through managed application stores, periodic updates, and integrated device management for security purposes. 
• Because mobile applications do not run on an always-connected environment where IT can monitor clicks and other usage, it’s crucial to incorporate analytics features that track how users interact with the application.

Mobile Apps Case Studies:

Case Title	Muve Mag	Air Canada	Accenture Android Apps
Business	Muve Magazine is a lifestyle publication that has taken Oklahoma City by storm since its launch in 2012.	Beneath Air Canada’s leading self-service capabilities is an equally innovative technology	Develop an app for expense management, one that would potentially serve its more than 246,000 employees
Challenge	Andre LaMont, Muve Mag's creator and founder, was looking for new ways to engage his local readers with news and features about arts and culture in the OKC community.	Consolidate all self-service channels to enable a seamless customer experience	Simplifying the Road Warrior’s Travels
Solution	When LaMont discovered that he could easily build his own app with Como, he decided to "go mobile" and take the plunge.	Air Canada launched its latest industry first – the delivery of proactive travel services via iPhone® and BlackBerry® mobile devices.	Specific process based internal development of apps
Result	The Muve Mag app has made the popular publication more accessible to a considerably larger number of readers.	Relying on rules-based intelligence, the solution delivers notification messages that are always up to date.	To accommodate international travel, the Accenture MyExpenses app accommodates different currencies.

Demand Driven Supply Chain

A Demand-driven supply network (DDSN) is one method of supply chain management which involves building supply chains that are responsive to varying demand signals. The main force of DDSN is that it is driven by customers demand. In comparison with the traditional push supply chain, DDSN uses the pull technique. It gives DDSN market opportunities to share more information and to collaborate with others in the supply chain.

DDSN uses a capability model that consists of four levels. The first level is Reacting, the second level is Anticipating, the third level is Collaborating and the last level is Orchestrating. The first two levels focus on the internal supply chain while the last two levels concentrate on external relations throughout the Extended Enterprise which is achieved by ERP applications extending through partners supply chains.

In Demand driven chain, customer activates flow by ordering from the retailer, who reorders from the wholesaler, who reorder from the manufacturer, who reorder raw materials from the suppliers. Orders flow backward, up the chain, in this structure.

The property of being demand-driven is one of degree: Being “0 percent” demand-driven means all production/inventory decisions are based on forecasts, and so, all products available for sale to the end user is there by virtue of a forecast. This could be the case of fashion goods, where the designer may not know how buyers will react to a new design, or the beverage industry, where products are produced based on a given forecast. A “100 percent” demand-driven is one in which the order is received before production begins. The commercial aircraft industry match to this description. In most cases, no production occurs until the order is received

Many companies are trying to shift from a build-to-forecast to a build-to-order discipline. Chase production planning strategy that includes meeting the demand at any given point of time is used over the level strategy where production happens at constant speed with full capacity. Chase strategy is boosted with subcontracting, Just in Time (JIT), KANBAN, Advanced Demand Planning and S&OP (Sales and Operations Planning) to increase the response time and satisfy the demand variations.

Key characteristics of Demand Driven Supply Chain are:

• Product movements driven by actual demand/consumption

• Real-time demand/supply visibility across partner tiers

• Inventory managed to dynamic target operating levels

• Early identification of demand/supply continuity issues before they impact production

• Single demand signal shared across partner tiers – one version of the truth

Demand driven supply chains align their planning, procurement, and replenishment processes to actual consumption and consumer demand. Becoming demand driven allows a company to be more responsive to consumer needs while increasing profitability.

Supply chains are becoming more complex as companies expand their geographic footprint, increasingly leverage outsourced manufacturing, and expand their channel partner network. Supply chain executives are looking for ways to obtain real-time, transparent visibility across all tiers in the supply chain so as to better align supply with actual demand to help reduce supply disruptions and capital expenses.

In order to evaluate whether our supply chain network is demand Driven, we must ask following questions:

• Do you have visibility to your total demand and supply picture at any point in time? Does this visibility extend beyond your first-tier partners?
• Are all material movements driven by actual demand or by forecast?
• How quickly can you identify and respond to a potential supply continuity issue?
•  Does your entire supply chain function as one virtual organization with everyone working with the same information, processes, and metrics?
• Does it take longer than a day for demand changes to propagate to your second-tier  suppliers? 

      Hence Demand driven supply chain prepares the organization for the new era of fluctuating demands and uncertain supplies by leveraging the benefits of advanced forecasting, S&OP, Trade planning, JIT, KANBAN, Partner Collaborations and Lean enterprise.

Crafting the Digital Enterprise Internally

Next Generation Digital Enterprise leverage

• The unique methodology to engage and determine the audiences across multiple media platforms
• Active participation and knowledge sharing across various groups
• Interactive initiatives and drives across organization
• New insights that can be obtained from this valuable data
• Know how this new data can be used to demonstrate the value of your audiences and sell more effectively

Executives in all industries are using digital advances such as analytics, mobility, social media and smart embedded devices as well as improving their use of traditional technologies such as ERP to change customer relationships, internal processes and value propositions. It helps to —speed up the day-to-day processes of learning, planning and sharing knowledge delivering all the services online.

—Key Facts of Digital Transformation in Major Industries :

• Roughly 30 per cent of firms are engaging in extension or transformation with mobile, social media or analytics technologies.
• Factories including both mobile and analytics technologies to improve production significantly.
• Analytics is used by 72 per cent of respondents, mobile and social media by 62 per cent of organizations, and embedded devices by 24 per cent, despite their relative nascence within most

Key Facts of M&E (Media & Entertainment) Companies:

• Digital revenue already exceeds 50%  of their company revenue for digital leaders
• 55% of all respondents rate internal use of mobile technology “very” or “extremely” important.
• 57% of top-line revenue will be derived from digital channels by 2015
• 68% say smart mobility will “moderately” or “substantially” drive revenue growth in the next 2–3 years.
• CTOs (24%) and CEOs (23%) have the most responsibility for digital vision and strategy.
• 49% of digital leaders say they are using second-generation mobile technology to develop products and services.
• Only 19% have deployed second generation big data analytics solution in generating revenue
• 64% of digital leaders cite creating a culture of innovation as top strategic priority

Approach for Digital Transformation:

• Establish a Cross Functional Digital council
• Appoint the digital leadership
• Define landscape
• Legal guidance
• Understand company vision & social media strategy
• Benchmark and Measure

Envision of additional features and Recommendations:

• Dashboards for collaboration and resource sharing
• Easy-to-use interface for fast user adoption
• Open API for integrating 3rd party content or self-made tools
• Integration with Management Information Systems
• Innovative project pages, digital tests, online discussion forums, blogs and video recorders 
• News programs, online exercises, encyclopedia searches,  images, videos, white papers
• Automatic reports to save time and effort
• Leverage the internal lessons learned for building client solutions
• Mobile support for all internal applications

Digital Transformation in the Utilities Industry:

• Utilities have only adopted digital technologies in specific areas of the customer  experience
• Analytics is not widely used to enhance either the customer experience or internal operations 
• Untapped opportunities may exist in worker enablement and process digitization
• Data and integration issues may present challenges in other areas
• Utilities’ digital transformation management practices are relatively more mature than their use of digital technologies

Demand Planning

Demand planning is a process of managing all the demands of the products to enable the Master Scheduler / Planner to plan the supply. The two main components of the Demand are ‘Forecast’ and ‘Sales Order’.

Kinds of Demand:

Dependent Demand: It is the demand for the product caused by the demand of other products. E.g. demand for the raw material like steel and rubber increases in case the demand for automobiles is increased.

Independent Demand: If the demand of the product is not dependent on any product, then it is independent demand. Demand for the automobiles in the above example is the independent demand.

Following are the sources for demand:

·         Referrers & Consumers
·         Dealers & Distributors
·         Intercompany
·         Service needs

Demand planning covers the following activities:

·         Forecasting
·         Order entry / Promising,

·         Branch Warehouse Requirements,
·         Interplant / Inter-organizational requirement,
·         Service Parts requirements

Demand planning also helps in long-term and short term process selection, capacity planning and facility planning.

Key Demand Drivers:

Customers: Customers are king in today’s era. Customer preferences, general perception, word of mouth etc. play a key role in demand generation.

Competitors: New competitors, competitor’s differentiation in product and technology are major threats to the business.

Economic Policies: State and Central government policies has major impact on the customer spending and hence on the demand of the products.

Regulatory Policies: Legal guidelines set by the authorities can increase or decrease the demand.

Order winners or Qualifiers: Customer expectations are based on cost, quality, delivery and after sales service are the order qualifiers. If the product / service have special characteristics that attract the customers over competitors are the order winners.

Marketing strategy: Determining the marketing segment, developing market niches, analyzing competition and increasing the market share are some of the key marketing strategies that boost the demand.

Customer Relationship: In today’s cut throat competition, customers are continuously required to be informed about the new products, sales, schemes, annual maintenance discounts and so on to develop loyalty.

Characteristics of Demand:  Trend, Seasonality, Random variations, Cyclical

Demand Planning consist of collation of data, selection of appropriate techniques, forecasting and then taking corrective action if actual demand varies significantly.

Demand Planning objectives:

• Planning of long lead time resources like assembly line installations, capital equipments
• Planning of medium or short term resources like material, human resources etc.
• Shorten customer delivery time

Key forecasting principles:

• Forecast will never be accurate
• Forecast shall include estimate of error
• Forecast is more accurate for shorter periods
• Forecasts are more accurate for a family or group of products

Forecasting Methods:

·         Qualitative Techniques:

o   Grass roots

o   Market research

o   Panel consensus

o   Historical Analogy

o   Delphi Method

·         Quantitative Methods

o  Extrinsic technique: Certain set of external factors are taken into consideration like independent demand, GDP growth, agricultural production, steel production, oil prices, housing sector growth etc.

o    Intrinsic techniques: These use the historical recorded data for future estimates.

§  Average demand

§  Simple moving average

§  Weighted moving average

§  Exponential smoothening

§  Seasonal index

§  Regression Analysis

Planning Cycle

The base for the entire planning is the strategic business plan. Strategic business plan incorporates all the plan of marketing, finance and production. These are high level plans based on overall organizational perspective and devised by top management. they span across 2 to 10 years and talk about the strategic direction of the company.

Business Planning is based on the strategic plan and define the objective of various functions at an aggregate level. These are more financial oriented and address the sales, manufacturing, finance and other activities to achieve the strategic objectives. The horizon extend from 12 to 18 months.

Sales and Operations Planning include the planning of the manufacturing facilities required to support the business plan. It determines the overall level of manufacturing output broken down by quarterly / monthly time periods and ensures the integration between the production function and business plan. S&OP is responsible to determine the production rates, desired inventory levels and resource requirements for the end items / product families. Rough Cut capacity planning at this level helps in identifying and evaluating the bottleneck resources involved in the achieving production schedule.

Material requirement planning drills down further the requirement of the number of manufactured and purchased components. it is a plan for determining the production and purchase of the various components of the end items to support S&OP. Capacity requirement planning determines the detailed requirement of the labor and equipment resources needed to achieve the production of components as per MRP.