Pros and Cons Erp Essays

Pros and Cons Erp Essays Pros and Cons Erp Paper Pros and Cons Erp Paper even six months are considered to be short period for implementation * Reduced or no Dependency on ERP Vendor As the open source ERP packages have proper documentation and user manuals, there is no or reduced dependency on ERP vendor to come and fix the issue. A good programmer can handle the issue in considerably less time. * High Accuracy and Quality The productivity and accuracy is high in the case of open source ERP systems. Also, the failure rates are often discovered to be on the lower side in comparison to commercial ERP packages. All open software has strong user community which is also very responsive and very knowledgeable. * Open source testing The open source users in the process of development are able to thoroughly test and 99% of the bugs are reported and highly secure. Except a very few, most of the commercial ERP systems are tested to a decent extent, but still are many security flaws, traps, pitfalls and loop holes, which can be easily harnessed by the hackers. * Handling security With the ever evolving nature of technology, security has become a problem of the past. And, there are many open source security applications on the market today which can be easily used with open-source ERP, which include; Nessus, Snort, Nagios, SpamAssassin, ClamAV, Open SSL, OpenSSH, Nmap, Ossec HIDS, and Wireshark. Open Source ERP Solution Cons * Risk of over-customization Delivering customized codes could prove troublesome for some organizations just in case you get into over-done customization and you can’t get out of it. Too many customizations can be a definite issue. * Difficulty in finding implementation and support resources Open Source ERP solutions also calls for the best and finest programmers of open source  ERP solutions on the code. This may be difficult and may cause higher support costs at times. Compatibility Issues with Proprietary Packages Some of the open source ERP packages are incompatible with the proprietary products of certain corporations like Microsoft, Oracle, or IBM etc (sometime due to variation in platform used for implementation). * Lack of Dedicated Support from a Specific Vendor Despite all of the benefits of open source ERP packages, the fear of the failure of open source ERP package during crucial stages of a project is considerable driving forces for commercial ERPs where vendors provide dedicate support in lieu of big bucks on licensing costs. Unstructured approach to issue resolution There are no proper defined product roadmaps and time line as most of the enhancements and bug fixes are done by freelancers and independent consulting companies and developers based on their requirements. * Devoid of feature- richness Proprietary software are feature-lade and have more features that are not found in the case of open source ERP packages mostly and may be cited helpful by commercial ERP vendors as a tool of ease and productivity. Open Source ERP Success Story Open source ERP has had its own share of successful implementations. There is no better argument for the use of an ERP solution than a testimonial by and organization which has used the system and reaped benefits from what the software has to offer. Let us take a look at a successful implementation that happened at a Danish pharmaceutical firm named Pharma Nord. The implementation was done by a firm by the name Compiere Company Overview Denmark-based Pharma Nord is one of Europe’s largest manufacturers of preventive dietary supplements and herbal remedies. The 500-person company, founded in 1981, develops, manufactures and markets scientifically well-founded dietary supplements, herbal remedies and medical drugs with optimal bio-availability. Pharma Nord’s products are available in 50 countries throughout Europe, Asia and North America. Issue At Hand Due to market success with its initial line of dietary supplements, Pharma Nord was continually expanding its product line and markets served. Growth in the regulated pharmaceutical industry, however, requires precise inventory management to address business and regulatory complexity. Pharma Nord’s ERP solution requirements extended well beyond the standard set of distribution and accounting functionality that performs at a global scale. They viewed the selection of an ERP solution as having a 15-20 year life. For a solution to succeed for more than 15 years, product licensing, ease of customization and confidence in the vendor were as important as out-of-the-box functionality The Solution Pharma Nord uses Compiere to manage its sales orders, invoicing, cash collections, purchasing and accounting for its sales subsidiaries and also to manage receipts and shipments in its warehouses. Pharma Nord liked what they saw in the earliest versions of Compiere in 2001. Using knowledge gained at a Compiere training class, Jacob Pedersen, Compiere Project Manager, completed an initial Compiere deployment in early 2002 focused on a single subsidiary. â€Å"We did it on the basis that we would probably find things that need to change along the way. And we have. It’s been with us, it’s been upgraded and we’ve changed quite a few things. We’ve been able to migrate to new versions of Compiere all the way from 2002 and now we’re here at 2008. I find that quite impressive. Before selecting an ERP solution, Pharma Nord assessed a number of offerings, notably Compiere and Navision. Midway through the evaluation, Navision was acquired by Microsoft. A few months later, the Linux version of Navision was discontinued. These events were eyeopening for Pharma Nord’s information technology and executive teams. The result was an even stronger requi rement for the kind of open source licensing offered by Compiere to ensure Pharma Nord’s long-term ERP success. Services from the Compiere Partner Network and Compiere helped Pharma Nord succeed. For example, the 2001 version of Compiere lacked support for tracking lot/batch numbers and expiry dates- essential functionality for the pharmaceutical industry. Pharma Nord’s sponsorship accelerated the development of this general use functionality. â€Å"We wrote the specification of exactly what the software should be able to do and it was developed by the Compiere team. † Pedersen Results Seven years after initial deployment, Pharma Nord is still going strong with Compiere. Their database has grown over the years as they’ve added business partners, products and transactions. Having transaction history available for analysis and reporting is a nice benefit from using a single product continuously over time. â€Å"What’s great about Compiere is that everything is stored at the most detailed level,† explained Pedersen. â€Å"So whenever you need to do reporting, you have a number of dimensions to work with. You can combine each product, different sizes, and different countries. All of those will be dimensions. Since you can report and group on these dimensions, you can get the answer you’re looking for by grouping and merging these data afterwards. With its sales and distribution operations productive with Compiere, Pedersen is looking toward the future: â€Å"Pharma Nord is also a manufacturing company. We manufacture all of our products ourselves. We know that Compiere is also working on manufacturing capabilities. † The Bottom Line Several unbelievably productive, efficient and highly secure open source ERP packages are not y et well recognized in the market, most of the customers are still prepared to shell out big bucks on custom commercial ERP packages. This might be due to the credibility that the big ERP producing organizations like SAP and Oracle. In times that are proving increasingly tough for organizations the world over; organizations are taking measures to tighten their operations and keeping stock of each and every penny that is spent; open source ERP packages provide a very robust and cost effective alternative for midsize companies who might not have a big budget allocated to cover their IT requirements. Even the large corporations can cut maintenance costs by making use of these brilliant packages. However, lack of support from a particular vendor is something that the open source ERP packages badly lack, and compatibility issues with other custom third party apps are one of their biggest turn-offs. Open source ERP scores higher than commercial ERP on many aspects. Yet, commercial ERP still have major share in ERP markets. This is because open source products are quite new and people are a bit conservative about choosing ERP software, because if implemented ERP software does not work, then there is serious business trouble. The first adopters of open source ERP were in Latin America, Europe, and Asian countries because of economic reasons. Now, open source ERP is gaining popularity even in US markets and one day, it will be able to challenge the domination of commercial ERP in ERP markets of USA Top Open Source ERP Applications to Look Out for The finance applications, especially the custom ERPs, can be extremely costly and burn big holes in the pockets of business owners, and as such the demand for open source apps in the field of finance has been increasing dramatically. So, let us take a look at the top open source finance applications * Goodness of Open Source ERP Packages Not only do the open source finance packages come totally free of cost, but they are also not dependant on a particular platform. However, the proprietary programs work well on only specific platforms, as theyre designed only for specific needs. As such, even after paying a lot of money on licenses, the proprietary financial packages don’t allow you to work with all platforms and require additional licenses based upon the number of machines on which, the software is used. On the contrary, the open source packages can be used on as many systems as needed, and they work well on all open source platforms like FreeBSD, UNIX, Linux, Solaris etc. * Open Source ERP Packages To cater to the needs of small business owners, countless open source finance packages were developed, such as Adempiere (an ERP Business Suite), GnuCash (a double-entry book-keeping system), ERP5 (a Zope/Python based ERP solution), and the likes of them. Turning the focus towards other popular open source ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) packages, Compiere, an ERP solution that automates processes like accounting, managing sales orders, inventory, and supply chain is also quite popular, while packages like Grisbi, a single-entry and KMyMoney a double-entry book-keeping program, have also gained significant levels of popularity. * FriFinans is yet another impressive open source finance application that offers facilities like taking orders, generating invoices, ordering products and doing a lot more. It is still under final stages of development, and isn’t tested completely yet, but even at this stage it looks quite promising. * Java-Based Open Source Finance Apps jFin, JGnash (double-entry book-keeping), JQuantLib (Quantitative Finance API framework), and JStock (stock market software) are some of the popular Java-based open source finance packages that have become extremely popular these days. * Latest Developments Looking at the latest developments,  n21 eBusiness Suite, a web-based ERP/CRM package is quite a powerful open source finance package that has emerged in the market, while  Mifos  - Microfinance Institution management software, Openbravo, and OpenERP have also been recently developed and gained high popularity soon enough. TurboCASH  is a popular double-entry book-keeping for Windows environment, while  GnuCash  is a treat for Linux/Unix/FreeBSD lovers. HomeBank  is an open source application for personal use, and  Marketceterais an open source trading platform for those whore interested in stock trading, but dont want to spend any money on using paid tools. Note:  All Linux financial tools are not necessarily free there are some proprietary packages that require licenses, and dont come under the GNU/GPL free distribution license, but majority of Linux/UNIX based finance packages are totally free for personal and commercial usage. GnuCash: The Ultimate Free Open Source Accounting Software Primarily coded in C,  GnuCash  is a free open source accounting software, and happens to be a part of the GNU Project. It runs on platforms such as OpenBSD, Solaris, UNIX, Linux, Mac OS X, FreeBSD, and the likes of them. Looking at the features of GnuCash, you’ll discover that the package allows you to perform double-entry bookkeeping, maintenance of Stock/Mutual Fund Portfolios, Scheduled Transactions, and Mortgage and Loan Repa yment Druid. It also offers support to HBCI and Multi-Currency Transaction Handling. GnuCash also comes with Transaction-Import Matching Support, OFX, QIF Import facilities, Small Business Accounting Features and even Multi-User SQL Support, making it an extensive open source finance application. What’s more, GnuCash can also export data to TXF format and can be used in tandem with the tax preparation programs with great ease. You can virtually perform all kinds of finance related tasks with the help of GnuCash.