ALTERNATIVES
Ryan Suarez was able to articulate different alternatives regarding to the ERP System proposal.
ALTERNATIVE 1: Financing Program to avail ERP System. SAP offers financing program which allows clients to pay under flexible payment terms and even postpone their first payments and maintenance payments up to one year.
ADVANTAGES:
- The company can be flexible with their financial plan regarding the purchase of the software.
- Once acquired, the benefits of the software’s ability to solve the company’s problems in department integration and resource planning.
| DISADVATAGES:
- High cost, in terms of employee training, switching cost for the database and other maintenance and upgrades.
- Since there are a lot of features to familiarize with, it would cost the company a lot of time that will interrupt the company’s operations.
- Inflexible, employees may change work methods.
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ALTERNATIVE 2: Acquiring module-based implementation of ERP System. ERP System is composed of 11 modules on average. Instead of acquiring it as a whole, Ryan proposed to acquire one or two modules at a time to be used in inventory management, logistics, and distributions.
ADVANTAGES:
- This will address the issue in inventory management.
- The company could choose modules that would be helpful to them in the overall process.
- Less costly in terms of purchasing ERP System since they are not really required to purchase all modules. They can purchase whatever is mostly needed.
- Less risky, relatively fast to install, and least expensive approach.
| DISADVANTAGES:
- High implementation costs, given that it would purchase one or two modules at a time.
- It would take periods of time to familiarize a module. Therefore, if the company will acquire another module, it would take another period of time to perfectly fit it to the company’s process.
- Cost of employee trainings to study the modules should also be taken into consideration.
- Could affect the productivity of the company.
- Expansion problems in time and costs.
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ALTERNATIVE 3: Avail ERP Systems that is compatible with the current database.
ADVANTAGES:
- Enhance the utilization of the database.
- Low switching cost of the database.
- Increase the productivity of the company.
| DISADVANTAGES:
- High maintenance cost.
- Compatibility-testing costs
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Note: Different ERP Systems: Lawson, Epicor, Infor, QAD, SAP, Oracle, etc.
ALTERNATIVE 4: Improvement of the current system, LS10 Software, with the help of Infrontier.
ADVANTAGES:
- With the upgraded software, it is expected to work better than before.
- Reduce the cost of purchasing new software.
- Less implementation costs.
| DISADVANTAGES:
- Will not be able to address the integration problem among departments.
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