Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 now Generally Available

August 1st, 2011 Sandeep Walia No comments

Today, Microsoft announced the general availability of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 in 25 countries and 23 languages. Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 is Powerfully Simple because it has been designed to empower people to anticipate and embrace change, enabling businesses of all sizes to thrive and grow. Through Microsofts early adoption programs that Ignify has been part of there is already evidence from customers and partners on the incredible value they are realizing from this latest version. Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 delivers: A powerful foundation of prebuilt industry capabilities and comprehensive, core ERP functionality for financial, human resources and operations management

A new level of agility through a set of tools like the Unified Natural Models, which serve as a library of business processes that reflect real-world situations

Simplicity across the board, allowing amazing flexibility in configuration and customization while lowering total cost of ownership to our customers.

Ignify has been implementing Dynamics AX 2012 for several customers and can attest to the power, agility and simplicity of the new version.

Core industry functionality is built directly into the solution supporting end-to-end capabilities for: manufacturing, distribution, retail, professional services, and public sector. Microsoft Dynamics AX supports global organizations by offering multi-site capabilities, country-specific functionality, and multi-language support on a central installation. To get an overview of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 please click here. You can view a Dynamics AX 2012 product demo here. To read about Dynamics AX 2012 features visit the Dynamics AX blog. The full release, together with supporting documentation and tools is available for download here. https://mbs.microsoft.com/customersource/downloads/servicepacks/MicrosoftDynamicsAX2012. For details on product availability, localizations and translations, please download the Product Availability, Localization and Translation Guide for Microsoft Dynamics AX available here. Sandeep Walia is CEO of Ignify. Ignify is a leading provider of Microsoft Dynamics ERP solutions to mid-market and Enterprise businesses. Ignify has been ranked as Microsoft Partner of the Year Winner in 2011 and 2010 and in the Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle, Microsoft Dynamics Presidents Club in 2009. Ignify has offices and team members in Southern California, Northern California, Arizona, Tennessee, Illinois, Washington, Canada, Malaysia, India, Philippines.
Categories: CEO, Dynamics AX Tags: Dynamics AX 2012 General Availability, Dynamics AX 2012 Release timeline

Microsoft Dynamics AX and IFRSS for First Time Adopters: Part 1 of Financial Excellence in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012
July 6th, 2011 Sandeep Walia No comments

The IFRS presents a single set of high quality, understandable, enforceable and globally accepted financial reporting standards based upon clearly articulated principles. The IFRS is developed by a global body called the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) a body formed in 2001. The globally accepted part of the IFRS makes it most appealing. The EU has adopted virtually all IFRSs, though there is a time lag in adopting several recent IFRSs and one aspect of IAS 39 (Financial instruments: recognition and measurement) was modified. Most of the EU countries have adopted the IFRS in a form known as the IFRS as adopted by the EU. Countries such as Australia and South Africa have adopted the IFRS with local adaptations. The IASB and the US Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) have been working together since 2002 to achieve convergence of IFRSs and US generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). In September 2002 the IASB and the FASB agreed to work together to remove the differences between international standards and US GAAP. This decision was embodied in a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the boards known as the Norwalk Agreement. In 2007, the FASB removed the requirement for foreign issuers operating in the United States to reconcile their statements to the US GAAP as long as the organization met the IFRS standards as published by the IASB. The IASB and FASB have set 2011 as their target year for substantial convergence between the IFRS and the US GAAP and decision about possible adoption for US companies is expected in 2011. While progress on the convergence between GAAP and IFRS has been slower than hoped, the direction towards global convergence is clear. The IFRS is here to stay and will become the global financial reporting standard of the future. The table below shows the adoption of IFRS by major economies for listed companies as of April 2010 Country Argentina Australia Status for listed companies as of April 2010 Required for fiscal years beginning on or after 1 January 2011 Required for all private sector reporting entities and as the basis for public sector reporting since 2005 Required for consolidated financial statements of banks and listed companies from 31 December 2010 and for individual company accounts progressively since January 2008 Required from 1 January 2011 for all listed entities and permitted for private sector entities including not-for-profit organizations Substantially converged national standards All member states of the EU are required to use IFRSs as adopted by the EU for

Brazil

Canada

China European

Union France Germany India Indonesia

listed companies since 2005 Required via EU adoption and implementation process since 2005 Required via EU adoption and implementation process since 2005 India is converging with IFRSsat a date to be confirmed. Convergence process ongoing; a decision about a target date for full compliance with IFRSs is expected to be made in 2012 Required via EU adoption and implementation process since 2005 Permitted from 2010 for a number of international companies; decision about mandatory adoption by 2016 expected around 2012 Required from 2012 Required from 2011

Italy Japan

Mexico Republic of Korea Russia

Required for banking institutions and some other securities issuers; permitted for other companies Required for listed entities since 2005 Required for listed entities since 2005 Required via EU adoption and implementation process since 2005

South Africa Turkey United Kingdom United States

Allowed for foreign issuers in the US since 2007; target date for substantial convergence with IFRSs is 2011 and decision about possible adoption for US companies expected in 2011.

NOTE: The list refers to listed companies only. The table is not an authoritative assessment of the use of IFRS in those countries. In the majority of cases, the information has been provided by the relevant national authorities or is based on information that is publicly available. For definitive information on the use of IFRSs in any particular country or countries contact the relevant national authority or authorities directly. Microsoft Dynamics AX provides rich support for IFRS wherever it is distributed and Microsoft makes localizations and/or translations for Microsoft Dynamics AX generally available. The map below shows another view with color coding of the adoption status of IFRS where Microsoft Dynamics AX is generally available.

Figure: IFRS Adoption Status by countries where Microsoft Dynamic AX is generally available. Canada and Mexico have adopted the IFRS as published by the IASB. Countries such as USA, India and Indonesia are adopting the IFRS with local convergence of IFRS and local standards such as USA GAAP and India GAAP while other countries such as Australia and South Africa have adopted the IFRS with local adaptations. Most of the European Union (EU) countries have adopted the IFRS as adopted by the EU. Companies that plan to report under IFRS and have not being doing so may have significant work ahead for them. Most significantly there will be impact on the enterprise business systems and financial systems put in place. Companies can expect to need the following - Parallel reporting requirements: This is going to be most commonly required by multi-jurisdiction companies. Companies in the United States with significant EU operations may find themselves reporting under both IFRS and US GAAP. Many ERP and financial systems do not support this. - Consolidation and Reporting changes: Changes will be required in the way companies consolidate their books and present financial statements. As a simple example US companies are used to presenting Operating Income in the form of EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization) while the IFRS standard uses PBT (Profit Before Tax) as its measure of Operating Income. As an example a presentation of a consolidated statement of comprehensive income (Alternative 1 illustrating the classification of expenses by function) is shown below and it reflects a significant difference from the US GAAP presentation of a similar financial statement.

- System Impacts at all levels: AR, AP, Fixed Assets, Invoicing and Revenue Recognition, GL etc.

Figure: Example of a Consolidated Statement of Operations per the IFRS. Note the significant difference in presentation from a US GAAP financial statement. Source is the IFRS Implementation guide for Small to Medium Enterprises. So how does one make this easier? 1. Choose a system that supports parallel reporting standards 2. Get it right the first time. Plan for IFRS as you put in a new financial system 3. Choose a system that is adaptable and flexible: As some of the IRFS standards are not finalized there will still be changes required in areas around leases, financial instruments, consolidation, revenue recognition etc. In addition, if you are in the United States most of the convergence work between the GAAP and IFRS is yet to be published and may require significant changes. You need a system that has flexibility to meet these changes as needed. The table below shows the IASB work plan and the projected timetable as of June 30th, 2011 on the IFRS standard.

IASB work plan projected timetable as of 30 June 2011

Financial Crisis related projects 2011 Q3 2011 Q4 2012 H1 MoU Joint

IFRS 9 : Financial instruments (replacement of IAS 39) Impairment Re-exposure or Review draft

Hedge accounting General hedge accounting Ballot (target IFRS Q4) Publish ED Ballot Publish ED

Macro hedge accounting

Asset and liability offsetting Consolidation - Investment companies [1]

[1] The IASB will have completed formal voting requirements by 30 June 2011. However, the exposure draft will be published in July so that it can be published on the same day as the equivalent FASB proposal. Memorandum of Understanding projects Leases 2011 Q3 Reexposure or Review draft Reexposure 2011 Q4 2012 H1 Target IFRS MoU Joint

Revenue recognition

Target IFRS

Other Projects

2011 Q3

2011 Q4 Reexposure or Review draft

2012 H1 Target IFRS

MoU

Joint

Insurance contracts

Annual improvements 2009-2011 [ED, comments due 21 October 2011]

Comment period

Agenda consultation

2011 Q3 Publish RV

2011 Q4

2012 H1

MoU

Joint

Three-yearly public consultation

Essentially this can create the need for reconfiguration, recalculation of many algorithms, implementation of new functionality and possibility significant modifications to a system that doesnt have rich IFRS support. The transitional period from now till the time we have full adoption of IFRS will require many businesses to maintain parallel accounting and management will have to review to assess whether they will have parallel accounting done at local subsidiaries or at the consolidated level and who will perform the parallel accounting local finance teams or the corporate finance teams. In addition there will be retroactive adjustments required to be able to do year on year comparison and whether organizations will do full restatements or just post adjustments. In addition, will your financial system support real-time parallel posting practice (least pain and most automated) or just retrospective adjustments for the period (more manual work). Finally when businesses cut over to the new standard they will have to finalize a cut over approach and load opening balances adjustments for IFRS if they have not adopted automated parallel accounting before the cut over. IAS 1 requires companies transitioning to IFRS to present one comparative year. However the SEC has indicated it may require 2 comparative years and that means significant restatement unless you start automated parallel accounting early. Microsoft Dynamics AX provides comprehensive support for IFRS including Parallel Accounting, First Time Adoption of IFRS; Presentation of Financial Statements; Consolidation; Changes in Foreign Exchange Accounts; Property, Plant and Equipment; and XBRL and IFRS standard XBRL (iXBRL) support. Lets deep dive into these areas a little bit Native Support for Parallel Accounting for transition to IFRS Microsoft Dynamics AX have posting layers in the General Ledger and for consolidation that allow it to be one of the unique ERPs that allow for parallel accounting that is needed as part of a transition to IFRS. Microsoft Dynamics AX has 3 layers one primary and two adjustment layers. The layers are Current, Operations and Tax. For example, the diagram below represents a USA public company listed in the United States that has a public holding company in Europe and needs to report in 3 formats: Tax for the IRS, US GAAP for the SEC and public filings in the United States and IFRS as adopted by the EU for group external reporting. Layer 1 is the Current Layer in Microsoft Dynamics AX holds the US GAAP postings. Layer 2 is the Operations Layer and has any IFRS Delta postings. Fixed Asset can be posted in full for all layers so those do not require any deltas as they can automatically post into multiple layers by setting up a dependency through Value models. Effectively this allows the Fixed Asset Sub Ledger to have a full US GAAP, IFRS and Tax set of books in it. Any Tax adjustments or other Tax posting are made in the Tax Layer e.g. Section 179 accelerated depreciation for qualifying assets.

Figure: Microsoft Dynamics AX provides support for multiple posting layers such as current, operations and tax that provide it with unique capability to have native support for parallel accounting. Source of this screen shot is Microsoft Corporation. Microsoft Dynamics AX has the ability to have different journals post to different layers. For example, I can have a regular GL Journal that posts to the Current (US GAAP layer in our example) and an IFRS General Ledger Journal that posts to the Operations (IFRS Layer in our example)

Figure: Microsoft Dynamics AX support the transition to IFRS with ability to support parallel accounting with different posting layers. In this screenshot, the IFRS GL Journal is posting to the Operations Layer for any IFRS Delta postings The reporting structure in Microsoft Dynamics AX then allows you to define on the report where you would like the numbers to come from. We can setup a report for US GAAP by choosing the layer as Current and then we can use the same report or a copy of it by setting the source posting layer as Operations plus current and it would show us the IFRS numbers.

Figure: Cash Flow report in Microsoft Dynamics AX showing that the posting layer can be selected on the report definition allowing the same report definition to be used to get numbers in different accounting standards such as US GAAP, IFRS and Tax thus simplifying accounting and reporting greatly. First Time adoption of IFRS (IAS 1) IAS 1 requires that businesses adopting IFRS maintain a comparative year and also requires that an ERP system should be able to load or post manual adjustments for the IFRS opening balance in either the last period before the transition date and then roll-forward the IFRS opening balance or in the period of the transition date with a specific identifier in order to track and distinguish the opening balance adjustments for IFRS from regular transactions. From a Financial system stand-point this requires the following - Recording of opening balances - Multiple year over year reporting required

- Adjusting of opening balances under IFRS - Ability to separately identify normal accounting transactions from those for IFRS adjustments In Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012, the opening transactions can be posted to a unique period (the opening period) of the fiscal year through import of transactions of by transferring prior year ending balances. Prior year ending balances are transferred to the opening period. The opening period is a special period compared with the normal transaction periods. The opening period is usually the first period of a new fiscal year (for example,it covers only the first day). Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 alsohas a closing periodwhere the closing transactions can be posted. A closing sheet can be created to create closing transactions. When creating the closing sheet, manual adjustments can be created and posted. Multiple closing sheets can be created for different purposes, and each can be uniquely identified. E.g. you can have a regular closing sheet and then another one to record the IFRS transition adjustments. For example, the screen shot below shows that the GAAP Closing sheet is posted in the current layer while the IFRS Closing sheet with relevant adjustments is posting to the Operations Layer.

Figure: The Closing Sheet in Microsoft Dynamics AX can post to different layers to record adjusting transactions for the IFRS and be able to identify them separately In addition IAS1 specifies the need for two statements of comprehensive income, two separate income statements, two statements of cash flows, two statements of changes in equity, related notes, including comparative information. All of this is achieved by having the different layers and

running reports either via Management Reporter or the Dynamics AX Financial Statements and selecting the appropriate layer or combination of layers as illustrated in the Cash flow example above. XBRL Support: The IFRS has adopted the XBRL Taxonomy as its standard for electronic exchange of financial data prepared in accordance with the IFRSs. The IFRS Foundation XBRL Team is responsible for developing and maintaining the XBRL representation of the IFRSs, known as the IFRS Taxonomy. Both IFRSs and XBRL are intended to standardize financial reporting in order to promote transparency and to improve the quality and comparability of business information, therefore the two form a perfect partnership. As shown in the screen shot below, Microsoft Dynamics AX has native support for XBRL with the ability to natively to import an XBRL taxonomy and use it very quickly. The IFRS in March 2011 published 12 sample XBRL samples including Statements of Financial Position,Comprehensive Income, andChanges in Equity, Statement of Cash Flows, Employee benefits obligations, Consolidated and separate Statements of Financial Position. Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 can very quickly allow you to take these examples and start reporting in XBRL.

Figure: Microsoft Dynamics AX provides native support for XBRL In addition Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 provides support for drag and drop type editors for the presentation of reports, calculations, labels etc. that make XBRL a fairly straight forward process.

Figure: XBRL Taxonomy details for the Presentation of Financial Statements in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012

Figure: Formulas in XBRL Taxonomy for Calculation for Financial Statements in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 The imported XBRL Taxonomy works with the Microsoft Dynamics AX Reports Structure Designer and the Management Reporter Tool that can be used to generated reports. The screen shot below shows the native structure designer with the XBRL Income Statement.

Figure: Microsoft Dynamics AX Report Row Structure Designer showing the XBRL Taxonomy that was imported from the xbrl.org. The first screen shot shows the row definition and the second one show the simulation with the row labels (notice the simulate check box is checked which forces it to simulate the structure of a published report) For more information on how Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 can help you with your financial reporting, performance management and IFRS adoption please email us at dynamics@ignify.com

Sandeep Walia is CEO of Ignify. Ignify is a leading provider of Microsoft Dynamics ERP solutions to mid-market and Enterprise businesses. Ignify has been ranked as Microsoft Partner of the Year Winner in 2011 and 2010 and in the Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle, Microsoft Dynamics Presidents Club in 2009. Ignify has offices and team members in Southern California, Northern California, Arizona, Tennessee, Illinois, Washington, Canada, Malaysia, India, Philippines.
Categories: Dynamics AX Tags: IFRS ERP, IFRS GAAP, IFRS support in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012, IFRSS, iXBRL, taxonomy XBRL

Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Whats new in Item and Product Information Management?
July 5th, 2011 Eric Shuss No comments

With the upcoming release of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012, Microsoft has truly delivered on the promise to create a tier one ERP solution that will be the Oracle and SAP killer. With improvements in virtually every functional area of the system and an architecture that can scale from start-ups to multi-billion dollar enterprises, Dynamics AX 2012 is the product the market has been waiting for. As a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner that was ranked as Microsoft Partner of the year in 2011, our team has been working with the new version for over a year and to say we are impressed would be an understatement. In this next series of blogs I will discuss what we have learned about the new version and where we see real opportunity for existing customers looking to the future, as well as the top reasons why new customers should select Dynamics AX as their next ERP system. One new feature that we applaud is the entirely new Product Information Management (PIM) Module. In previous versions of Dynamics AX the management and control of new items and SKUs was done in the Inventory module. In Dynamics AX 2012 these functions and more have been separated into the new PIM module to allow for better control of the entire product lifecycle management process. Products can now go through more formal workflow and release cycles that can be extremely useful in organizations that have many departments involved in the creation of new items, BOMS and SKUs. In Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012, new products can be defined and released to individual companies and the Product Master data is now shared across companies. Also, an item is now always based on a product definition. This product definition level is added as a mandatory step in the item creation process, and all items are associated with a product definition and can be managed by workflow for internal processes like Engineering Change Notices and Orders. In Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009, items could be created without using a formalized definition process. Now items can be restricted in their use by using the new Product Release functionality. These changes mean we need to learn some new terminology, so some definitions to make this clearer are below: New AX 2012 Term Product Distinct product Definition

An item, service, or right that results from an economic activity. A uniquely identifiable product. It serves as a core product that does not vary and therefore no product dimensions can be associated with the definition

Product master

A standard or functional product representation that is the basis for configuring product variants. The variations are configured by selecting a configuration technology, which can be either a set of predefined product dimensions or configurators in sales scenarios. A product variant is the configuration of a product master. Based on the choice of the configuration technology, the variant can be either predefined by using the product dimensions of its master or configured by using a configurator tool.

Product variant

In Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012, the creation of new items are based on product definitions, which now allow items to be restricted in their use by using the new Product Release functionality. All items are associated with a definition and can be managed by workflow for internal processes. The new module also includes the Product Builder module that was in its own module in AX 2009 and before. The original Product Builder is still there for this release for existing customers but has been augmented with more configuration abilities with the enhanced constraint-based configurator. There is a tool to convert the original Product Builder models to the new Product Configurator for those who are looking to maximize their investment in their current product models. The new configurator is said to have better performance and be more scalable than the previous Product Builder. I will devote a future blog to the impact of this change and our impressions. Another great new feature is the ability to have virtually unlimited item dimensions and/or variations. This means that products can have company defined attributes to describe a product. For example, an item may come in many combinations of color, fabric and sizes, another may have different lengths, widths and depths, another product may be an electronics part with different power requirements. All of these combinations can co-exist in the same item master across companies and be priced and costed based on the various combinations. The ability to add product attributes has also been greatly enhanced and allows for extensive custom product information details without having to add fields or tables.

Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Product Information Management and Item Master has unlimited item attributes and support for Item images. In this example, the Monitor has multiple variants depending on the size, color and configuration attributes e.g. a High Definition 42 inch Black monitor and a LCD 30 inch Silver monitor are variants of the base Monitor item here. The new Product Information Management module is a great enhancement that will certainly be well received by new customers as well as customers who are upgrading. We are excited about this new release and we will continue to share what we find, and we would love to hear your impressions and questions on Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012. Email us at dynamics@ignify.com for more information. Eric Shuss is the President of the ERP Division of Ignify. Ignify is a technology provider of ERP, POS, CRM, and eCommerce software solutions to mid-market and enterprise businesses and public sector organizations. Ignify is a Top-tier Microsoft Gold Certified partner and the winner of the Microsoft Partner of the Year in 2011 and 2010 and both the Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle and the Microsoft Dynamics Presidents Club in 2009. Ignify has been included as the fastest growing business in North America for 4 years in a row by Deloitte, Inc Magazine and Entrepreneur Magazine. Ignify has employees in Los Angeles, Silicon Valley, Phoenix, Nashville, Chicago, Toronto, Manila, Pune Bangalore, and Hyderabad.
Categories: Dynamics AX Tags: Dynamics AX 2012, Dynamics AX 2012 Item Management, Dynamics AX 2012 Product Information Management

Be Dynamic: Steve Ballmer announces Dynamics AX 2012 at Convergence

April 11th, 2011 Sandeep Walia No comments

Steve Ballmer today announced the formal launch time frame of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012. The Public Beta of Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 is already out. The General Availability (GA) is expected in August 2011. Im excited about the launch as it brings to the table several new features that I will go into detail in a few. Some key ones that were shown at the Keynote speech by Lachlan Cash at Convergence include: Organizational structure: The organizational structure which was already powerful and a visual tool now has the ability to be connected to the underlying financial dimension structure. Those with appropriate security privileges can in the organizational visual editor tool of Dynamics AX 2012 cut and paste and move around the organizational structure with all associated individuals and transactions related to the structure also being updated.

Vendor portal enhanced with RFQ bid: The vendor portal has been enhanced to tie to the Purchase Requisitions and RFQ functionality. When RFQs are sent to vendors they can login into a vendor portal and place their be

Shop floor manufacturing enhancements: Visualization of the shop floor with Microsoft Dynamics AX showing routes, capacity and choke points.

Lachlan also showed the ability to control Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 without touching the screen or the computer with Kinect for scenarios such as complex or hazardous manufacturing scenarios where the users cannot touch the computer. It is nice to see all the Microsoft Technologies come together.

Figure. Picture of Lachlan Cash using hand movements to control Dynamics AX 2012 without touching the screen, mouse or a keyboard. Done with Kinect. Sorry for the not go great picture taken at Convergence today on my Windows Phone 7 camera Finally Lachlan showed the ability to access Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 on a table device in a very seamless fashion. More detail to come later. If you are at Convergence stop by the Ignify booth #501 and say hi. I will be the Ignify booth for most of the expo hours today, tomorrow and Wednesday. Sandeep Walia is the Chief Executive Officer of Ignify. Ignify is a technology provider of ERP, POS , CRM , and eCommerce software solutions to mid-market and enterprise businesses and public

sector organizations. Ignify is a Top-tier Microsoft Gold Certified partner ranked in the Microsoft Partner of the Year for Retail in 2010 and both the Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle and the Microsoft Dynamics Presidents Club in 2009 . Ignify offers Microsoft Dynamics AX, Dynamics AX for Retail POS and the Dynamics CRM Loyalty Management solution for retailers and to several other businesses. Ignify has been included as the fastest growing business in North America for 4 years in a row by Deloitte, Inc Magazine and Entrepreneur Magazine. Sandeep was ranked in 2010 in the Microsoft Dynamics Top 100 Most Influential People List by DynamicsWorld. Ignify has employees in Los Angeles, Silicon Valley, Phoenix, Nashville, Chicago, Toronto, Manila, Pune and Bangalore.
Categories: CEO, Dynamics AX Tags: AX 2012, Convergence, Microsoft Dynamics AX, Organizational structure, Shop floor manufacturing enhancements, Vendor portal enhanced

Electronic Banking Managing Customer Payments and Vendor Remittances in Dynamics AX

September 14th, 2010 Akshay Ramgopal No comments

BACK IN THE DAY. I remember the time when I was working in accounting, our team spent significant hours to prepare and get the checks approved for approval and released to various suppliers. It was even more inconvenient when check preparations fell on month end close that our financial accountant needed to spend overtime to get these done. We were using Microsoft Dynamics AX version 3.0 back then but we had not automated our manual process of cutting checks which just didn't make any sense. As an Accountant, it is not fun of managing vendor payments because the process is straightforward and repetitive and easily automated with an electronic interface to a bank. INNOVATING PAYMENTS THRU ELECTRONIC PAYMENT EXCHANGES Banks have evolved from financial institutions into service bureaus. In the internet age, they redefined the medium of exchange thru electronic payment exchanges to serve their customers faster and introduce their product offerings. They are innovating the service by doing not only the payment exchange service but also helping their customers in recording their payments. HOW ELECTRONIC PAYMENTS WORK IN DYNAMICS AX Microsoft Dynamics AX, a robust ERP platform for the midmarket and enterprise customers, added electronic banking management to the bank management module as a solution to managing vendor and customer payments. The concept of electronic banking in Dynamics AX is managing the customer and vendor payments thru payment remittance with the bank. Electronic Banking in Microsoft Dynamics AX supports the import and export of payment files from and to financial institutions in several countries. Recording Customer Payments

Microsoft Dynamics AX provides the capability to import payments from customers. A remittance file sent by the bank is used to import payments and is ready to apply against outstanding invoices from the customer.

Paying Vendors Electronically Microsoft Dynamics AX provides functionality to record payments to vendors by sending payment information electronically to the bank

Bank Reports for Remittances made.

Microsoft Dynamics AX provides summary and detailed level reporting of remittance made electronically

Bank Account Inquiry for Remittance files.

THE BENEFITS OF USING ELECTRONIC BANKING MANAGEMENT

1. Improve Efficiency: Eliminate time-consuming manual processes. The amount of time to process checks until it is paid to vendor and apply to the outstanding invoices takes time. Dynamics AX supports the export and import formats for handling electronic payments. By handling incoming and outgoing payments electronically, it is easier to manage customer and vendor payments.

a.

Increase Accuracy: Reduce the chance of human error by automation. When an outside entity is doing payment processing, theres implied check and balance and guaranty for error fix when banks commit errors.

Akshay Ramgopal is an Assistant Manager in the Microsoft Dynamics AX practice at Ignify. Ignify is a Global Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle Partner with offices in Los Angeles, Silicon Valley California, Phoenix Arizona specializing in Dynamics AX for Retail, Distribution, Manufacturing, Sea Port and Chemicals verticals. For help on Microsoft Dynamics ERP email us at dynamics@ignify.com
Categories: Dynamics AX Tags: Automate Vendor Remittances, Dynamics AX Electronic Banking, Electronic Payments to Vendors

Fast ROI for manufacturing companies and distributors from your ERP
February 17th, 2010 Sandeep Walia No comments

I was recently interviewed by a reporter from Search Manufacturing ERP on how manufacturers can get quick ROI in today's market. I've worked with quite a few manufacturing companies both in my past life at Deloitte and at Ignify. ERP, in general, is not a fast ROI project I believe there are certainly some things that a manufacturer can do to get Quick ROI. First of all, the manufacturing paradigm in North America has changed. With a few exceptions, Manufacturers in North America are no longer doing heavy manufacturing. Most of the manufacturing work is now done with subcontract vendors in China, SE Asia etc. So the manufacturing challenge is less about managing the shop floor but more about managing the supply chain and optimizing inventory either in the warehouse, with the vendor, on the water. This is, in fact, really important because the new paradigm means that lead times have shifted and become longer with a 60- 90 day lead time to get product not uncommon. That requires better forecasting, demand planning, purchase planning and better tracking of critical inventory items. Not surprisingly, manufacturers have not yet made that paradigm shift completely. When I do a site visit at a manufacturing site I find the focus still very much production planning and shop floor control even though now the manufacturer is just doing warehousing and light manufacturing at best. There is very little focus on the planning, forecasting, warehouse management and supply chain management aspects which burden the cost significantly. As an example of a cost burden, I surveyed a manufacturer that builds heavy engineering product often finding themselves with gating parts i.e. parts that are not available and hold up the completion of the item. The net effect was about 6 weeks added to the production cycle. Doesn't seem expensive? Check out the math below. Average sales price of item: $2 million (this is a complex end product) Cost of capital to manufacturer: 10% Cost of 6 weeks of capital: $23,000 (2 million * 6 weeks/ 52 weeks * 10%) Cost of delay on 100 shipments: $2,300,000 $2.3 million dollars in cost of gating parts! Now this is a $200 million manufacturer that has a net profit of $2.5 million (which by the way is a pretty good number for most manufacturers). The net impact of eliminating the gating with better inventory optimization would be to double the manufacturer's net profit. Before you say this is not me because you don't do $2 million type products change the numbers a bit. It could be 10,000 shipments of $20,000 type product going out or 100,000 shipments of $2,000 type product etc and you'd still have the same cost of capital of $2+ million dollars. Even if you can only shave off a couple weeks and not 6 weeks and if your volume is lower remember that you are still talking at least hundreds of thousands of dollars if not

millions in savings by optimizing your inventory and supply chain with better planning. No small change by any standards. The reality for manufacturers is that the management now has to be on the supply chain and inventory optimization and not just production planning and shop floor control. So how can you do this? Fortunately most of the newer generation ERPs provide functionality to do this out of the box. I'm going to take the example of Microsoft Dynamics AX a next generation ERP from Microsoft as a solution to this and show some quick and easy things to enable functionality that can help you get there. One of the more important things to do in getting to a stable replenishment mode is to use automated replenishment to the extent possible: Dynamics AX has the ability to automatically spit out planned purchase orders by looking at a variety of things Safety Stock levels Forecast Sales Orders Purchase Order Inventory that is Available to Promise Vendor Lead times

y y y y y y

For a human being, to take into account all of these parameters and provide a planned purchase forecast manually is just impossible even if you just have under 200 Finished good SKUs. If anyone tells you otherwise they are kidding you or pulling wool over your eyes. No individual buyer or group of buyers is going to be able to do a multi-parametric calculation that involves six parameters and create a planned timeline for all your SKUs for each vendor without doing some rough (and dirty) ballparks. You need a fairly sophisticated automated process to do this right. And why shouldn't you you will cut labor costs, you will reduce your inventory stocks outs as well as lower your cost of carrying inventory. And you should leverage the ERP to do that. How do you do a forecast for that you can use a demand forecasting system if you have a complex web of customers with changing patterns or you can get quite basic and track it in excel as a starting point and improve from there on. Dynamics AX provides you the ability to load forecasts by customers, customer group or at a total level.

The above figure for example shows the forecast in Dynamics AX by different customer groups. For example, the first line shows the forecast of 5000 units for all major customers and 6,000 units for a particular item for Retail customers. Dynamics AX splits them out based on an Item allocation key based on month (or any other time period relevant to you). By defining such item allocation keys you can take into account seasonality or business cycles. Loading a forecast is however, optional. You can run planning just based on current open transactions including sales orders, purchase orders and inventory. The figure below shows planned purchase orders and planned production orders created using the MRP functionality for multiple release dates for multiple items with the quantity to be ordered and the desired delivery date. The delivery date ties to your need of the product and the order date factors in the vendor lead time.

The end result is a stable automated planned cycle that happens every day, week or month depending on the frequency of inventory churn and volume of orders in your business. Now should you do this for every single SKU in your item master or just for some SKUs. My answer is your top % of SKUs by some measure. This measure could be sales quantity, Sales $, and most typically for manufacturers inventory carrying cost (which is determined by inventory value). Typically you would classify your items as ABCs and plan for the As and Bs and just ensure the Cs are always there and typically overstocked since they have a low inventory carrying cost. The ideal way to do it is again to have the ERP actually calculate the ABC classification for you. For example, in the example shown below I asked Dynamics AX to rank the top 25% of items by revenue as an A, Next 30% as a B and the rest as Cs. I may choose to do now do weekly planning on my As, monthly on my Bs and do no planning and use an auto-fill mechanism on my Cs.

This is simplifying it a bit but the point is that I don't need to go through a lot of grunt work to get this done. The system will do 90% of my work of loading forecasts, generating purchased orders and even deciding which items get planned for with the appropriate configuration. The end-result you've saved yourself a boat load of work and enough dollars to make this a high and fast ROI project. Want more email us at dynamics@ignify.com to get on our email list for valuable tips or to ask us any questions in general. Sandeep Walia is the President & CEO of Ignify. Ignify is a technology provider of ERP, CRM, and eCommerce software solutions to businesses and public sector organizations. Ignify is a Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle Partner and ranked in the top 18 Microsoft Dynamics partners. Ignify has been included as the fastest growing business in North America for 3 years in a row by Deloitte, Inc Magazine and Entrepreneur Magazine.

Dynamics AX Warehousing Capabilities

April 28th, 2010 richard.baginski No comments

Retail, Distribution and Manufacturing organizations can differentiate themselves from their competition by providing exceptional customer service by ensuring they have the right items in stock and that they can fulfill orders accurately and on time. For any organization to achieve this goal, it is vital to have a warehouse management system that will promote a high level of inventory record accuracy and optimization of inventory. Dynamics AX provides advanced Warehouse Management capabilities that can accommodate the organizations financial goals by reducing inventory and still maintain a high standard of customer service. Dynamics AX Warehouse management comes in two flavors Standard and Advanced.

Standard & Advanced Warehouse Applications Differences

The main differences between the standard Dynamics AX Warehouse functionality and Advanced Warehouse Management Applications are: In the standard warehouse management application, the organization can breakdown their warehouse at the aisle and location level. Due to this level of segregation, the organization is able to gain efficient inventory control and accuracy. In addition to these features, the Dynamics AX Advanced Warehouse Management Application will provide the user with the ability to segregate their inventory at the Storage Area and Zone levels. This feature will also inform the user where the item should be stored upon receipt, and if the item is readily available for shipment. Pallet Control is also available within the Advanced Warehouse Management Application. With Pallet Control the organization can achieve detailed inventory control, and traceability of their on-hand and consigned inventories

Summary of Functionalities
Standard AX Warehouse Features Warehouse Aisle Location Advanced AX Warehouse Features Warehouse Aisle Location Storage Areas Zones Pallet Control

The purpose of the Store Area is to provide the organization the ability to define the physical layout of their warehouses. Once the warehouse storage areas are defined, the organization will be able to achieve optimal efficiencies for inventory transactions such as material put away, good housekeeping, picking and quarantine management.

Figure 1 Store Area in Dynamics AX helps define the layout of warehouses The Store Area form (shown above), is integrated with the Dynamics AX Location. Within the Location, the organization can setup the location type (picking, bulk etc), view the maximum number of pallets that can be stored at a specific location, the number of pallets that are placed at the location, and the number of pallets that are available to satisfy the customers demand (shown below).

Figure 2. Dynamics AX Warehouse Locations record the type of location and the pallets in the location The location file will also contain the Pallet Type Group parameter. This parameter dictates the Pallet Types that can be stored at any given location.

Figure 3. Pallet Type Groups in Dynamics AX Warehouse It is within the Pallet Type Group and Pallet Type files, the organization can become very creative in maintaining their inventory flows. As an example, a Pallet Type Group can be created for items that have outside processed operations. Once the pallet identification number is created (Pallet ID) and the items are staged in the Outbound location, the Pallet Transport Handling program will transfer the items to the Outside Process warehouse.

Figure 4 Dynamics Ax supports Pallets of different sizes Within the contents of this program, the organization will have the ability to view their inventory levels, and the transactions that occurred. By having this stock status information readily available, the organization will be in a better position to plan their material requirements in a timely and accurate manner.

System Integration

Dynamics AX integrates the Warehouse management module with the following applications: Accounts payable application Accounts receivable application Inventory management application Master planning application

y y y y

When creating a purchase order line in the Accounts payable module, the user can register the receipt of the items in the Warehouse management module and attached the receipt to a specific purchase. When production orders are finished, the items are stored in the warehouse using the Warehouse Management Application. The Accounts receivable application handles the picking and shipping of items to satisfy customer demand. Once the items are picked and shipped, the reduction of the inventory level is recorded in the Inventory Management Application. All of these transactions are utilized to create the material plan of the organization.

Conclusion
The Warehouse Management Application can significantly help your organization to optimize your inventory flow, optimize inventory levels and ensure accuracy. Through the Dynamics AX Advanced Warehouse Management Application, the organization will be able to view the current position of their inventory levels, and to make sound business decisions which will lead to improved financial performance while maintaining a high degree of customer service. This post is written by Richard Baginski. Richard is a Senior Business Analyst in the Microsoft Dynamics AX Practice at Ignify . Ignify is a Global Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle Partner specializing in Dynamics AX for Retail, Distribution, Manufacturing and Chemicals verticals. For help on Microsoft Dynamics ERP email us at dynamics@ignify.com

Five Reasons Why Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step Will Help Your ERP Implementation
May 23rd, 2011 Sandeep Walia No comments

ERP software is considered an indispensable resource in running and managing the business operations for companies of all shapes and sizes, Although most business persons at a middle management level or higher have gone through at least one ERP implementation and the software itself is mature there are not many implementation frameworks available Examples of common questions that you and your employees may have are how will this software impact my company? Which ERP solution will best fit the needs and requirements of my business? What is the process for running and managing these programs after installation? Understanding the need to provide a comprehensive framework that addresses all of the questions and issues concerning ERP solution implementation, Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step offers a systematic, standardized methodology that contains all of the tools, templates, and best practices needed for each step of the implementation process. With Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step, customers can experience the increased efficiency, enhanced productivity, and minimization of risk that following specific standards and procedures in the ERP implementation. Here are five important reasons why Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step should be used in conjunction with your ERP implementation. 1. Consistent, repeatable model of implementation. By providing an implementation model that enables you to follow a series of the same implementation methods applied for businesses of all shapes and sizes, Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step provides a system that promotes consistent implementation quality and success at all stages of the process. Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step offers a clear, understandable services delivery approach that can easily be learned and adopted by all members involved in an implementation project. 2. Step-by-step guidance of the implementation process. The Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step system offers a step-by-step implementation approach that incorporates visual elements such as process flow diagrams and charts along with detailed descriptions of each implementation stage. By using the available tools, templates, and resources that the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step methodology provides, a customer gains an in-depth knowledge of solution implementation and a familiarity with the processes involved in implementation.

Figure. General Ledger Approval Journal Process flow that comes out of the box with Microsoft Dynamics AX. Example of standard best practice business process flows that help stream line the ERP Implementation Six phases are contained within the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step methodology: Diagnostic, Analysis, Design, Development, Deployment, and Operation. In the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step program, all six phases offer detailed explanations that each phase serves and the important milestones and deliverables that are expected to be achieved during the phases completion.

Figure: Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step reducing risk from your ERP implementation by providing clear phases such as Diagnostic, Analysis, Design, Development, Deployment and Operation. Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step, however, doesnt provide a cookie-cutter approach. Based on the type of the implementation it has the capability to serve up different templates and deliverables. For example, it provides the following project templates based on your needs: Standard Implementation: Typically used as a lean approach to implement an ERP at a single site with moderate complexity Enterprise Implementation: Typically used where a standardized approach for implementing an ERP in either a complex single-site environment or in a global/ multi-site organization where country specific solutions have to be factored on top of a core solution. Agile Implementation: Uses an iterative, incremental process for developing and implementing the ERP. This project gives customer greater control over the final solution because customers can quickly change the direction of the solution from one sprint cycle to

next. Typically used at a single site requiring specific features and moderate to complex customizations. Rapid Implementation: an accelerated approach for implementing an ERP with minimal or no customizations. This can be used in situations characterized by a limited scope where the basic application features are desired, and/or where the large majority of the customers business processes are not considered as complex. Upgrade: Used for ERP Upgrades from one major version to another. This can be for simple technical upgrades or include upgrades with configuration of new functionality. With support for different project types that allow detailed information on the diverse selection of implementation processes that fit the needs of a wide variety of businesses and industries you can feel confident in taking a confident step towards your ERP implementation. 3. Minimization of implementation risk through optimization offerings. Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step offers seven optimization offerings that provide guidance for both technical and functional designs and review the performance and operations of your ERP system. These offerings are particularly helpful for large, complex implementations because they effectively and proactively organize the management of project quality from the first phase to the last. Through the seven optimization offerings Architecture Review, Design Review, Customization Review, Performance Review, Health Check, Upgrade Review, and Project Governance and Delivery Review an exhaustive, independent review of the software implementation is performed to ensure that within each phase the solutions meet the customers needs and requirements, as well as offering descriptions on the impact that the various components of the implemented solution will have on the customers business operations, and identifying and presenting any potential problems or issues to the customer. Each optimization offering is described below with examples of how Ignify typically delivers these to customers Architecture Review: With this Optimization Offering, Ignify reviews the overall architecture, reporting strategy, and infrastructure to meet the customers business requirements, which includes operational and delivery review activities that may be initiated and executed throughout the ERP implementation. Through this review, Ignify offers advice to the customer on detecting any operational risks and addressing potential problems before they occur. Design Review: We pride ourselves in being able to leverage standard functionality and using creative configuration Vs. customizing the application where possible. Our design review is typically lead by a lead functional consultant to review that standard functionality is used to the extent possible to meet business requirements. In addition the design review

is helpful to identify current business pain points that can be met with standard functionality in the ERP that can help increase use of the system and increase the ROI on your ERP implementation. Customization Review: Ignify will typically get involved in reviewing modification made to your ERP and evaluate them multiple things including whether the code meets best practices, and whether the code has been customized or can be eliminated since there is already standard functionality in the current version or future version of your ERP. For example, in one implementation that we evaluated we found that a customer had built out a custom Bill of Materials (BOM) not realizing that their ERP already provided native BOM functionality out of the box. Performance Review: Typically we get involved in analyzing the performance of your application by using performance review tools including logging, database monitoring, hardware monitoring to identify choke points that are causing issues in delivering optimal performance. Recommendations may include increasing hardware size, re-indexing the database on a regular basis, improving your database log clean-up or setting up an data archival/ purge process on a periodic basis. Health Check: With a Health Check, Ignify identifies any problems with the ERP deployment, and offers ways that those issues can be resolved. With the Health Check, a report is provided to the customer that details the data that was gathered and analyzed during the review process, offers implementation scorecards, and then gives the customer recommendations on how to address or fix any possible issues that were identified during the review. With this Optimization Offering, the performance of the ERP implementation is fine-tuned to make sure that the software fulfills all of your business needs and requirements. Upgrade Review: During an upgrade very often implementers and customers will focus on just upgrading to the latest version and do just a technical upgrade. Ignify uses the upgrade review as a tool to evaluate if new functionality in the new version is applicable to solve business problems for you and also whether customizations that were upgraded can be replaced with standard functionality. This then allows the path for a functional upgrade and allows you to get the true business benefits of the new version. Project Governance: Both during and at the end of the implementation project, this Optimization Offering evaluates how the ERP implementation delivered against its initial vision and performed against schedule and quality, as well as providing phase-by phase recommendations and project health dashboards. With Project Governance, Ignify regularly assesses the ERP implementation and continues to offer findings and recommendations to the customer, ensuring that the customer continues to receive full, proactive support after implementation. Delivery Review: With the Delivery Review, the review team works with you after the ERP implementation in order to ensure continued successful outcomes from the ERP software.

The review team assesses the overall implementation, analyzing the project delivery process, lessons learned from each stage of the implementation, and offers the customer recommendations for the future based on their resulting findings. Each optimization offering provides a report to the customer containing the findings and recommendations of the review team, with the customer then deciding whether to adhere to all the recommendations or a subset of them. 4. Increased management oversight with Project Management disciplines and processes. Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step provides best practices management activities and tasks throughout phase implementation to ensure that all pieces of the integration process knowledge, resources, procedures, schedules, communications, and so on are completely tied and connected together into a cohesive, operational whole. Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step breaks down these management activities into different disciplines and offers in-depth information on the activities and tasks that comprise each of these disciplines.

Figure. Complete ERP Project Management offering if available in the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step with 3 distinct phases including Project Initiation and Planning, Project Execution & Monitoring and Project Closing. Through the Risk, Scope, Issue, Time and Cost, Resource, Communication, Quality, Procurement, and Sales Management disciplines, you are able to fully organize, coordinate, and oversee all aspects of an implementation project, starting from the projects initiation and planning process, then progressing to its execution and monitoring, and finally ending with the projects closure. By providing detailed guidelines for project management disciplines and processes, Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step allows managers to identify and assign the specific tasks and activities necessary for each part of the implementation process, thus enhancing the projects efficiency by determining the tasks to be accomplished and assigning them to appropriate team members, and also increasing the chances of an overall successful ERP software implementation. 5. Defines the roles and responsibilities for stakeholder involved in the implementation process. Because the implementation of an ERP solution involves many people from different areas, determining the roles of each individual within the project and their associated responsibilities can sometimes be a difficult and confusing process. Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step solves this by offering a clear-cut determination of the individual roles who comprise the implementation process and providing them guidance and direction on the implementation phases, tasks, and activities that they are accountable for performing or overseeing. By offering clearly defined roles, project communication is enriched by eliminating misunderstandings about project ownership and assignments and establishing expectations on what the each persons involvement in the project will be. Another advantage to the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step role definition process is that it can support the implementation needs of customer organizations of all sizes. For example, in a smaller organization multiple roles are assigned to one individual. By offering a scalable solution, Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step covers the functional requirements of all businesses, large and small. Conclusion An ERP Implementation is akin to a heart transplant and can be scary and intimidating. However, by putting a sound methodology in place and working hand-in-glove with a capable partner, you can de-risk the implementation and lay the foundation for a successful implementation. Microsoft provides a very feature-rich and flexible ERP solution for countless companies around the globe and it backs this up with Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step to streamline implementation processes from beginning to end and enhance overall productivity while meeting customer needs. Ignifys RAPID framework built on Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step offers pre-built deliverables that can help accelerate your implementation and lower cost of an implementation. The combination of

SureStep for a streamlined implementation with RAPID for lowered cost and efficiency can guarantee an on-time and in-budget implementation. For more best practice guidance email us at dynamics@ignify.com Authored by Ashley Harbaugh and Sandeep Walia. Ashley is a Technical Writer at Ignify and Sandeep Walia is CEO of Ignify. Ignify is a leading provider of Microsoft Dynamics ERP solutions to mid-market and Enterprise businesses. Ignify has been ranked in the Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle, Microsoft Dynamics Presidents Club and was selected as the Finalist for Microsoft Partner of the Year in 2010. Ignify has offices and team members in Southern California, Northern California, Arizona, Tennessee, Illinois, Washington, Canada, Malaysia, India, Philippines.
Categories: CEO, ERP Tags: ERP Implementation best practices, Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step

Optimizing your Supply Chain and Warehousing with Microsoft Dynamics AX

April 19th, 2011 Eric Shuss No comments

Last week Ignify had presented a paper at the Dynamics Academic Alliance proceeding in the Microsoft Convergence conference. This blog is a summary of the paper. Microsoft Dynamics AX presents the most powerful ERP product as validated by Gartner and other analyst firms. It provides enterprise coverage for the business but especially shines in optimization of supply chain, MRP, warehousing, and inventory management. The traditional model of produce/ buy, stock and sell has been turned on its head. Just because you are able to make enough of an item and stock it it doesnt mean you are going to be able to sell it. The supply chain has to be very nimble and responsive to the shifting demand patterns. Demand is not only different by items, assortments and item categories but also can be very different by channel, geography and customer type. For example one of our customers sells to big box retailers with EDI orders as the sales channel, sells direct to consumer through its ecommerce sites and then to academia through a network of sales professionals and inside customer service team members. The big box retailers hit their peak in September and October when they stock up for the holiday season while the ecommerce site hit its peak in November and December and the schools typically buy in June and July before the schools open. While there is overlap in what each customer buyer segment buys there are differences too. So the customer has the challenge of aggregating the demand across all the different channels and customer types and combining into an overall business demand forecast and ensuring the supply chain stays in tune with the demand pattern as there are always changes due to a multitude of factors.

Figure. The Traditional Linear Supply Chain is becoming more Demand Driven. Microsoft Dynamics AX provides native functionality for a demand driven supply chain with MRP, Production planning, Purchase Planning and Vendor Portals Microsoft Dynamics AX offers rich functionality for helping Improve Customer Service, Lower Inventory Carrying Costs, and Increase Visibility through the supply chain.: a. Powerful MRP and Master Planning functionality: Dynamics AX has the ability to take in a sale or demand forecast (or multiple forecasts for different geographies, customer groups, item groups/ item categories) and automatically create recommended purchase orders with purchases dates and recommended production orders for manufacturers. Master Planning automates purchasing and production planning. b. Safety Stock Recommendation: A tool that automatically recommends safety stock for items based on past sales order volume and desired fill rate. c. Vendor Portal: For vendors to be able to login and see their purchase orders and if you desire also your inventory so you can move to a Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) model. d. Supplier collaboration tools: A services oriented architecture with the Application Integration Framework (AIF) that makes integrating with suppliers and customers straightforward with the use of web services. e. Operational dashboards and Native BI: While most systems provide management dashboards Dynamics AX provides operational dashboards and role centers that improve

insight at the guts of the organization. For example out of the box role centers exist for Warehouse Managers, Accounts Payable Clerk, Controller in addition to the Executive dashboards for a CEO, CFO and other CxO roles. This helps ensure that users at all levels are empowered with the correct information to make intelligent and informed decisions. Most importantly Dynamics AX can be a single integrated system that captures all important data and provides a single version of truth for users across the organization.

Figure. Microsoft Dynamics AX provides information at all levels in the organization with operational, tactical and executive dashboards thus allowing for informed decision making across the organization. As an example, Ellison had seen a significant shift in its business model from a manufacturing company to a distribution business. It had also morphed from a single channel to a multichannel business. It also needed to optimize its supply chain to be able to more tightly integrate its supply with its demand and reduce on-hand inventory with automated planned purchasing. Ellison implemented Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009 that helped it a. Automate the warehouse with RF using native Dynamics AX integration though AIF to the RF hardware. Dynamics AX provided the ability to do directed pick and directed put-away using the location control in Microsoft Dynamics AX b. Used Master planning to automate the purchasing process and reduce inventory carrying costs. c. Integrate natively to customers to receive orders via EDI and process ASNs thus increasing visibility to demand and lowering order processing costs Ram Kanagala, Director IT at Ellison susms this up well "This project is a showcase example of a client-partner relationship at the highest quality, delivering the project on time and on budget, with improved business processes and seamless information flow across systems, resulting in operational cost efficiencies and improved sales forecasts." If you need more information on optimizing your supply chain email us at dynamics@ignify.com Eric Shuss is the President of the ERP Division of Ignify. Ignify is a technology provider of ERP, POS , CRM , and eCommerce software solutions to mid-market and enterprise businesses and public

sector organizations. Ignify is a Top-tier Microsoft Gold Certified partner ranked in the Microsoft Partner of the Year for Retail in 2010 and both the Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle and the Microsoft Dynamics Presidents Club in 2009. Ignify has been included as the fastest growing business in North America for 4 years in a row by Deloitte, Inc Magazine and Entrepreneur Magazine. Ignify has employees in Los Angeles, Silicon Valley, Phoenix, Nashville, Chicago, Toronto, Manila, Pune and Bangalore.
Categories: Distribution, ERP Tags: Dynamics AX Supply Chain, Master Planning, MRP, Supply Chain Optimization

Finding the Best ERP and Accounting System for your Business
January 3rd, 2011 Sandeep Walia No comments

For someone looking to find the best ERP System for your business this is never an easy process. The selection process involves listing out your functional requirements, understanding the ERP landscape and then evaluating the leading products to see which one fits best from a functional, budget and industry perspective for your business. This can be extremely tedious and can easily take over 6 months. Fortunately there are decisions accelerators out there that help you short-list down to the top 2-3 solutions so you dont have to start by looking at over 15 ERP solutions. Every year Gartner studies the ERP market landscape and published the magic quadrant that lists out the ERP players. The Magic Quadrant segments players into four quadrants - Leaders: The players considered the best with both the vision and ability to execute. Typically these players have newer technology, the vision to invest in the product and take it in the right direction as well as the full breadth of features required.

- Challengers: ERP Software vendors that often compete and have the ability to execute but not the vision. These players typically have older technologies and lack a unified vision but have a complete set of features as they have been in that market for some time.

- Visionaries: Players that do not have the feature capability today but are investing in the product and have the vision to take it in the right direction.

- Niche Players: Point solutions that may work for some segments but generally have very little investment behind them and also do not have a rich set of features.

Having been in the ERP segment for nearly 20 years Im not surprised to see Microsoft Dynamics AX be in the leader quadrant for the second year in a row. Microsoft Dynamics AX is a newer player to the ERP market compared to SAP and Oracle but has taken the segment by storm due to heavy investments by Microsoft into the product as well as newer technology that makes it more agile and flexible to adapt to a business. Per the study, Gartner sees this (ERP) market as undergoing a major modernization, by which established systems with deep functionality on older technology are being displaced by more modern and agile systems. These new systems enable users to be more agile in their responses to changing market conditions and to grasp new business opportunities faster. Microsoft Dynamics AX definitely reflects the new breed of players that have displaced the old guard by bringing both breadth of functionality, new technology, intuitive user interfaces as

well as the vision to provide solutions that place a premium on usability that increases customer satisfaction with dashboards/ role centers and specialized industry solutions.

Figure 1. Example of the Role Center in Microsoft Dynamics AX that serves as a home page for users and helps focus on usability. While I certainly have a bias to Microsoft Dynamics it is because of the power and flexibility of the solution. Ive worked with both Oracle and SAP and have been disappointed by the lack of flexibility and the cost to implement even a simple configuration. Based on my experience, changes that could take a week in SAP we are able to do in less than 2 hours in Microsoft Dynamics AX.

Figure 2. Gartner Magic Quadrant for ERP for Mid-Market companies with annual revenues between $50 million to $1 billion According to Gartner, Microsoft Dynamics AX is specifically targeted at midmarket organizations. It offers broad and robust functionality, and delivers low TCO through integration with other Microsoft products and technologies. Microsofts industry strategy for AX results in strong functionality, which is built by Microsofts internal resources or acquired from proven partners. Gartner points to interesting key trends in this study. Key among them are listed below Service-oriented architecture (SOA) and BPM prove their value in packaged applications for the midmarket: A combination of SOAs and BPM concepts allow for an unprecedented level of flexibility and adaptability.

New user interfaces make ERP adoption and collaboration easier: Ease of use and rich user interfaces help users to find their way through the functionally comprehensive ERP packages. Built-in search capabilities help users to identify and locate the business objects that need their attention, and the role-based concept of roles helps them to select the appropriate action to take. Personalization lets users define the way that objects are presented and can be acted upon, and saves them from having to go through complicated screen sequences to complete a required business activity. This is especially important for users that only occasionally have to access an ERP solution. Built-in collaboration features help these users to easily get in touch with contacts inside or outside their own enterprises, which is extremely useful in midmarket companies that rely more heavily on the flexible, ad hoc cooperation of their workforce in areas with less well-defined business processes.

The most commonly used technology for extracting and analyzing data in midmarket companies is Microsoft Excel: The following are the criteria used by Gartner to select qualifying software vendors. An ERP suite must fulfill all of these criteria to be included Geography: The vendor must serve at least two of the following three global regions (North America; Europe, the Middle East and Africa [EMEA]; and Asia/Pacific). The product must have a minimum of 20% of new customer entities in at least two of these three geographies.

Installed base: The vendor must have at least 1,000 customers in a products installed base to qualify, and the installed base distribution must be at least 20% in two of the three geographies.

New license sales: Of quarterly license revenue per product submitted, 10% must come from net-new customers. Also, two of the three geographies must contribute at least 20% of new license sales each.

Viability: The offering must be a viable and supported offering at the time of publication of the Magic Quadrant.

Application functionality: The functionality provided by the vendor in the application must contain the systems of records for G/L and product master, plus at least four of the following systems of record: order data, customer master, employee master, vendor and supplier master, purchasing, contracts, assets, pricing, cost, quality and planning.

Architecture: The majority of an application must be in one architecture and data model (application platform), or the vendor must have a credible vision for accomplishing this.

As you evaluate the best ERP for your organization, use this and other studies like this to shorten your fact finding cycle and reduce your cost to identify the best solution. If you need any additional information on ERP selection please email us at erp@ignify.com. Sandeep Walia is the President & CEO of Ignify. Ignify is a technology provider of ERP, CRM, and eCommerce software solutions to businesses and public sector organizations. Ignify is a Microsoft Dynamics Inner Circle Partner and ranked in the top 18 Microsoft Dynamics partners. Ignify has been included as the fastest growing business in North America for 4 years in a row by Deloitte, Inc Magazine and Entrepreneur Magazine. Sandeep was ranked in 2010 in the Microsoft Dynamics Top 100 Most Influential People List by Dynamics World