Syspro Embodies Concept of Strategic eFulfillment To Help Companies Compete in Internet Time

Business Wire, Dec 4, 2000

Business Editors & High-Tech Writers

COSTA MESA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 4, 2000

Syspro Impact Software Inc. Monday announced a comprehensive solution that enables small- to mid-size manufacturers and distributors to leverage e-business as part of an overall competitive strategy that puts them back in the driver's seat.

Using Syspro's IMPACT Encore as its engine, Strategic (e)Fulfillment is a new approach to supplier competitiveness that enables manufacturers and distributors to identify and maximize growth opportunities.

It provides an operational business infrastructure in which an organization can establish strategic operational guidelines and provide the necessary information that consistently drives fulfillment decisions, making them more effective and efficient.

Strategic (e)Fulfillment encompasses optimal channel and customer relationships, informed online buying and selling, flexible product configuration and order fulfillment and fluid and integrated operational infrastructures.

The concept extends the concentric role of Syspro's IMPACT Encore in enabling suppliers to leverage all the advantages of Enterprise Resource Planning, Customer Relationship Management, Advanced Planning and Scheduling, Warehouse Management and the Internet to gain a competitive edge.

According to Joey Benadretti, vice president, Syspro Impact Software: "We continue to endow IMPACT Encore with new functions and features that make it the leading supporting technology infrastructure for the execution of Strategic (e)Fulfillment.

"IMPACT Encore drives fulfillment decisions from strategically operational objectives inherent in integrated enterprise-wide business logic, whether serving Web-based demand or traditional replenishment and order management functions.

"With IMPACT Encore a supplier gains the essential business data on which to base decisions and the resources, including the Internet, to execute and deploy these decisions in a strategic manner." He defines "suppliers" as manufacturers and distributors since the function of each is to move goods along the supply chain.

"When armed with accurate and reliable data that provides insight into all aspects of the supply chain, management is able to optimize decision making. Decision optimization is the very foundation of Strategic (e)Fulfillment," said Benadretti.

"Manufacturers and distributors, as suppliers, are under enormous pressures to improve fulfillment capabilities," he said. "Strategic (e)Fulfillment takes into account all the available resources and tools that these suppliers can command, including employees, computer software, internal business processes, as well business relationships, the Internet, EDI, e-mail, e-commerce and trading exchanges.

"Strategic (e)Fulfillment helps an enterprise to determine which of these can and should be utilized and in what combination to gain competitive advantages. For example, e-commerce is providing businesses with one of the greatest growth opportunities in decades.

"A business that utilizes e-commerce within the framework of strategic fulfillment, in other words as Strategic (e)Fulfillment, is the one most likely to outrun the competition," said Benadretti.

"Today, suppliers have to be selective, objective and aggressive. This is what Strategic (e)Fulfillment is all about. There is little doubt that Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software has, over the years, contributed to improved business productivity.

"However, the time is ripe for manufacturers and distributors to leverage their ERP software systems and use them as foundations upon which to add new business enablers in an effort to achieve even greater productivity gains.

"One such enabler is `Strategic (e)Fulfillment.' It sits as a layer on top of the Supply Chain and leverages ERP to impact and strengthen every link of the chain," said Benadretti.

Strategic (e)Fulfillment encompasses all aspects of the supply chain and the process of examining each link with the objective of making the supply chain as effective and efficient as possible in order to gain a competitive foothold.

These supply chain "links" include: sales and distribution channels; channel and supplier relationships; customer and sales force relationships. These links must be leveraged and strengthened to achieve business objectives.

"As companies are getting pressured to do more for less, they are being driven to select customers and distribution channels on the basis of profitability, costs, sales analysis, market share, economies of scale and ownership of a market or niche.

"A growing number are selecting and managing channels on the basis of merit and providing associated incentives along with more advanced mechanisms for greater communication and visibility of operations.

"Those companies that focus on strategic objectives and gain insight into and control of the supply chain -- in effect, turning it into a glass tunnel with 360 degree visibility -- are those that will emerge as top tier suppliers in the long run," said Benadretti.