What is ERP? Definition of Enterprise Resource Planning.
ERP software helps organisations to automate and manage processes for optimisation purposes. The adoption of ERP allows organisations to create efficiencies, improve productivity, and boost collaboration.
After initial investment, ERP has the potential to yield a strong ROI. Read more about the benefits.
How do ERP systems work?
By automating and consolidating data from various departments, ERP systems create a single data source that can be shared across the organisation, enabling employees to access and utilise all the data they need.
ERP streamlines business management, minimises data duplication and errors, helping leaders enhance overall operations and increase revenue. In effect, businesses can eliminate redundant data sources while optimising operations.
What are the core modules of an ERP system?
The purpose of each module in an ERP system is to cater to specific business functions, enabling employees with necessary data and processes to complete tasks efficiently.
When incorporated into an ERP system, each module should integrate seamlessly, ensuring consistent and reliable data, even with the inclusion of new modules. Below is a list of the core ERP modules:
What are the three types of ERP deployment?
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is a powerful tool for every organisation to have in place, to better manage its processes. However, before jumping straight into the implementation of the selected solution, it’s important to understand the different types of ERP deployment and what these mean for the business.
Cloud-based ERP Deployment: Cloud-based ERP deployment or Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is a model where the software is hosted by the vendor and can be accessed by the client organisation through the internet. Cloud-based ERP offers greater flexibility and significantly lower costs of ownership and maintenance. Depending on their needs, business leaders can scale up or down, whilst they take the burden of owning, maintaining and upgrading the system off themselves.
On-Premise ERP Deployment: On-premise deployment refers to the traditional model of an organisation installing the software using servers and maintaining it with the help of an in-house IT team. Whereas, On-premise software deployment offers complete control over the solution, however it comes with a significant upfront cost of ownership and maintenance.
Hybrid ERP Deployment: A hybrid deployment is a model that combines the best features of the cloud-based and the on-premise deployments. This option can be beneficial for organisations that choose to keep some data saved in the on-premise servers for security reasons, whilst still utilising the flexibility and scalability of the cloud-based version.
Summary of Cloud-based, On-Premise and Hybrid ERP Deployment:
Cloud-based:
- Lower upfront costs
- Automatic updates
- No maintenance needed
- Increased data security
On-premise:
- High costs of software, hardware and implementation
- Maintenance from in-house
- IT needed Limited flexibility and scalability
- Complete control over the system
Hybrid:
- Combination of the best features of cloud-based and on-premise deployment
- Tends to be more expensive
Takeaway
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