Enterprise resource planning is a term that must have developed with an assured purpose of making the information exchange easy within the organization. Be the enterprise of whatever size either small, micro, medium, or large. Easy access to information makes things easier within a circle. A circle that works with a singular target to achieve with collateral support of each other.
People within an organization are obviously not at the same level but are of different designations and so they have different responsibilities too. In the same way, their access to information also varies accordingly.
However, having access is a subject of confidentiality sometimes but reducing the unnecessary resources required in managing the information is the fundamental approach behind an ERP solution.
An enterprise has not only one field of operation but many like procurement of raw material(s) and its management, the in-house supply section, the manufacturing unit, as well as other multiple production lines for either finishing or value addition to the product, and shipping or logistics department too.
Thus, to keep everything connected within the premises without having required a hefty count of the workforce for just an exchange of information, enterprise software development services are sought.
A3logics an erp solution provider develops custom ERP solutions with adequate scalability so that a business can expand or shrink with no further headaches about the investment they put in. After all, a solution is supposed to cut the cost in overall expenditure.
We here are basically considerate of the contribution of enterprise solutions in the shipping and logistics industry. How the solution works and what are those supporting features and functions it has that can help an organization in better revenue generation at the minimal expense?
Role of ERP solution in Shipping & Logistics
Earlier, at the beginning of ERP’s introduction, it used to be just in the static form. From then to today, it has become completely digital along with potential cloud support in such a way that its capability to share the data has reached a global width.
Now, it can learn the cycle at which it has to operate and memorize the complexities meanwhile the supply route. Keeping that in the system it helps improve the future supply chain cycles with lesser obstructions than ever before. It is called integrated supply chain management by ERP.
Secondly, by the time ERP has become digital or cloud-supported, warehousing and distribution management including transport personnel went burdened for becoming cloud-supported too. If not, there could be no faster exchange of information which we are expecting from the deployment of ERP within the organization.
Thus, it is equally a challenge for supply chain intermediary personnels belonging to warehouses and delivery departments as it is a boon for entire supply chain management but only if supported with cloud services.
ERP got even smarter with AI, ML, & BIG DATA
As mentioned earlier in this article, with the digital transformation of ERP solutions, it can now even memorize the cycle of supply or delivery, if once operated in. Here comes a question: how does this memorizing and complexity removal take place?
Artificial intelligence and machine learning are responsible for the decision making abilities however Big data helps in keeping the obstacles in memory as data stored in the cloud. In combination with all such advanced technologies, ERP manages to help things flow in a pre-defined flowchart with minimal time consumption and maximum efficiency.
Transparency in supply chain
Once the data becomes accessible for everyone, the transparency within the organization becomes an appreciable aspect. It not only has reduced the matter of discrepancies but also has made things clear over the internal demand supply issues that often arise when the system used to be static only.
Building block form
The basic purpose of deploying an ERP system is to build a block of multiple departments working altogether in the form of a singular block. It helps keeping things in a circle with accessible information related to organization anytime. Doing so reduces the cost of management spent on
FUTURE OF ERP
Any industry be it then IT, e-commerce, transportation, or logistics, soon to be going completely digital as per the transformation in generation. The future that ERP has for itself is envisaged to be as AI-powered automated ERP system that could talk to another automated ERP system of the other organization for quickest possible communication and better understanding between managements.
An ERP conclusively not only just a support to an organization but it almost runs the entire system on its own. Click here to learn more. It includes logistics and supply chain management but also covers the following wings of an enterprise industry. It includes logistics and supply chain management but also covers the following wings of an enterprise industry-
- Purchase & Demand orders/supply – By keeping the track of available raw material in advance according to seasonal consumption.
- Inventory storage management- Managing inventory isn’t an easy task as there are multiple inventories including inventory for raw material, inventory for semi-finished products, inventory for completely finished products, inventory for products that went damaged meanwhile production, inventory for emergency, etc.
- Warehousing management- with the help of dispatch softwares and ERP solution, warehouse management becomes easy. It includes keeping the production department as well as the customer end both notified with push notification. Cloud computing services are one of the basic requirements for such arrangements.
- Customer relationship management– CRM based solutions are a part of ERP. To be called as a block building technology, ERP covers not only in-house management to the organization but customers too by keeping coordination with them through customer relationship management solutions.
To reach another level of deliverance along with smarter supply chain management, we need to hire smarter cloud computing providers and get an agile shipping logistics software developed from A3logics that could help manage not only the in-house management but also the field workers which are responsible for feedback from the customers. After all, a delivery person only can ask or request for a quick review for the organization’s services.
Nicola Holder 