The transformation from traditional manufacturing to web-based business has created a need for radical redesign of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) investment, according to a new international study conducted by Cap Gemini. The study argues that e-business requires ‘new capabilities for ERP systems which imply significant new architecture redesigns’, and says that ‘simple web access enabling will not be enough’.
Cap Gemini found that 85 per cent of European companies are satisfied with their ERP investment, while 84 per cent of ERP projects in Europe cost under US$5 million and almost 50 per cent are completed in under 12 months. 1,400 large corporations were surveyed for the study.
While finance/accounting and HR functions are the greatest users of ERP, the third most important application in both Europe and the US is customer relationship management (CRM). ‘Increasingly, companies are using ERP to maximise transaction management, marketing, sales and after-sales information,’ says Peter Minogue, account director with Cap Gemini in Ireland.
‘The real challenge for ERP will be to move away from the traditional internal focus to an external view driven by the E-economy’, he says.
According to the study, 27 per cent of ERP expenditure goes on hardware, 37.5 per cent on software, with the remaining 35.5 per cent going on services. |
