In-House, Web-Based or Private Cloud Solutions

by EstesCloud | Jul 7, 2020 | Cloud, Hosting, Managed IT Services, Software

If only purchasing software for business enablement could be as simple as tapping a button in an app — click once for on-premise installation, twice for web-based deployment, thrice for private cloud solutions. When considering software, users normally think about features and capabilities intuitively — making big decisions seem easy at first. This stems from the hope that core data and program logic is consistent across platforms.

Server virtualization, the World Wide Web and cloud computing have changed the dynamics of software development, acquisition, installation and deployment.

However, new technology often becomes a point of stagnancy, or even complacency, for businesses. This can sometimes result from hesitancy, but it’s often caused by oblivion.

How Will You Know What You Don’t Know?

Technology changes quickly, and the evolutions now, more often than not, push web-based and private cloud solutions away from the realm of preference and into the world of necessity. When I first entered the business field in the 90s, I never would have imagined that I could license a software application on a subscription service, much like I do a newspaper or magazine. My mind hadn’t even conceptualized the idea that a software application could be accessed entirely through the World Wide Web. Back in the day, we were just trying to make it through Y2K in one piece. But as the technology advanced, the options and opportunities presented themselves, and now more than two decades later, I increasingly work with companies engaging software in a cloud context.

IT Symbiosis

The industry shift to public and private cloud solutions has not only changed the very way in which applications are deployed, it has also leveled the playing field. Your company can now outsource some or all of your IT needs, allowing for growth within a predictable technology budget. A partnership with a managed services firm provides updates, compliance, security, training — all from a specialized team built specifically to adapt 24/7 to the volatile growth inherent to IT. Companies no longer need to house their own elaborate, expensive IT departments to keep up with the times. In light of recent cybercrime upswings, this is a critical time to focus on the survival of small and midsize businesses, which often face closure upon ransomware or other security breaches.

Since technology evolves on a daily basis, it’s always time for your team to consider new possibilities to protect the future of your business. If your architecture is outdated, or you’re overdue for a security audit, it might be time to get a full analysis of your IT infrastructure. Moving from on-premise servers to hosted, cloud-based environments can be one way to ensure business continuity. That said, “the cloud” might not be the right fit for your business, so let’s look more closely at business enablement through three common deliveries, which can be infinitely customized into hybrid forms.

The Basics

The deployment of an application normally takes on one of the following forms:

On-Premise: In an on-premise installation, the application is installed on an on-premise, in-house server. It can be like having a furnace closet or an underground mad scientist laboratory, depending on the size of the company and the specific technology burden.
Cloud-Hosted: Cloud-hosted applications are installed on a virtual server, which means they are hosted in the cloud. Hosted solutions often replicate an on-premise architecture. Ease of backups, cybersecurity, updates and compliance are common reasons businesses choose cloud-based solutions. This option allows organizations to leverage 100% of the application features that are available in an on-premise install.
Web-Based: A web-based deployment foregoes installation entirely — it’s based on subscribing to an application that is already installed, deployed, and interacting with the application through web-based protocols.

A common trope of cloud computing with regard to on-premise installations has to do with the limits in physical contact that it presents — you can’t go down the hall and hug your servers. I’ve never actually tried to hug a server, but I think it would feel rather strange to do so. This hug-ability factor speaks to the level of control that companies possess when they install an application on their in-house server stack. There might be problems with this approach, but at least the company owns the problems and their resolutions. Moreover, when it comes to hugging, data is a much more recognizable object of affection. I can think of countless times that I have tried to “get my arms around the data” when working on a project. Access to the data layer is often an important feature, especially when performing custom reporting, and in some cases, the abstraction of the data layer present in web-based applications may make it hard to understand just what is happening to the data itself, making reporting a challenge.

Purely web-based versions of an application provide the core capabilities, but the features and functionalities available in a web-based version tend to be limited when compared to their on-premise counterparts. Consider Microsoft’s Office 365 suite. While highly similar to a client install, there are some limitations to the things we can accomplish in the web version of Excel, for instance, when compared to its client-based counterpart. Working with ERP systems, I’ve found this trend to be consistent — if you’re leveraging a web-version of an application, expect to be privy to a subset of the overall functionality available with an on-premise version. And if you’re utilizing a version that is entirely web-based, tailor your expectations accordingly.

Speaking of tailoring, the ability to alter an application to fit your company’s needs also tends to be greatly reduced in web-based applications when compared to on-premise counterparts. By tailoring, I am referring to the ability to insert user-defined data or business logic into your application and have this custom functionality work in conjunction with the application’s standard behavior. In some ways this limitation is a good thing, as I’ve certainly seen companies entangle themselves in their own tailored threads. Conversely, a little tailoring can yield big gains in efficiency and effectiveness. As it is, a company purchasing web-based software out-of-the-box should understand what is in the box and only in the box, and that the box can’t be easily repurposed.

Depending on the application in question and the needs of the business, I‘ve found private cloud solutions to be a nice midpoint between the two poles of on-premise and web-based architectures. Cloud hosting specifically allows companies to possess fully-featured applications in the cloud, avoiding the problems associated with on-premise installations. This affords a measure of control unavailable with pure web-based applications. Moreover, it creates the levels of functionality and customizability that allow companies to do more than the basics. And should the company need assistance in the management of their application stack, we can cleanly pull in additional resources to lend a hand. Hosted applications also offer a variety of administration options — from in-house talent to partnered resources — and can adapt efficiently to new technology.

A security assessment provides a system overview. It allows you to see if your team is overworked or poorly protected. Time to begin? Our team is ready to help, whether you’re on-premise, web-based, or in a private cloud.

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IT Services in a 1 + 1: 4 Signs You Need Managed IT

by EstesCloud | Jun 5, 2020 | Cloud, Hosting, Managed IT Services, Security

The word “outsourced” makes some business owners curious and others nervous when it comes to IT services. “MSP” is another term floating around, and you might also come across “IT-in-a-Box” when you go looking for help with your systems. Managed IT (our favorite code phrase) can mean a lot of things. If you’re a manufacturing or distribution company, then IT services might mean, among other things, industry-specific Cloud or Hosting platforms.

When Nobody Sees the IT Stop Signs

When it comes to your ERP and IT systems, you need effective stop signs that work both internally and externally. Your cybersecurity infrastructure can keep your team safe and productive while also keeping the bad guys out. Cybercrime is a 1 + 1 relationship. If you didn’t have a team to be hacked, then you wouldn’t ever need to worry about adding a hacker to your network.

Stop Sign 1: Your company’s IT services need to ensure that your employees are traveling through safe pathways and that they know when to stop before falling into the webs of ransomware or other destructive malware.
Stop Sign 2: Your team’s mobile devices, laptops and desktops all make friends on a daily basis. This is essential for business growth. Because of this, IT services ideally provide a clear STOP sign for potential trespassers—a bold indication that cyber tricksters will not be tolerated, even on the fringes, and will not be unknowingly welcomed in by your team.

A Wanted Man or a Wanted Spam?

But how do you know if your system has a “Most Wanted” sign that’s attracting criminals rather than telling them you already know they’re the lawbreakers? When it comes to business, you’re continually building relationships, and hopefully these become lifelong friendships. You trust your most valuable data to your IT talent. When it comes to managed IT services, business owners and other decision-makers might squint at the cyber lineup and not know whom or when to choose. Here are 4 signs your staff would benefit from a partnership with a managed IT and cybersecurity firm:

High-value IT projects, best done internally, are distracting your key players or forcing them to work long hours.
IT operations are unpredictable or unreliable, causing project or system failures, yet you don’t want to grow or change your employee pool.
IT costs are variable or steep, and you’d like a more predictable budget.
Security and compliance issues are overwhelming your team.

Every second of the day you rely on experts to protect you. The meteorologists warn you of bad weather. The firefighters alert you when it’s a fire risk to roast a s’more. The doctors warn you of heart attack predisposition. In regard to IT, the challenges you face include ransomware that could destroy the business you’ve worked so hard to build. This holds true whether you’re a DoD manufacturer, a medical clinic, an accounting firm, a lollipop distributor, a small-town bank… the list goes on. Because the hackers are always available to friend you, you’re always risking adding them to your inner circle, making your 1 + 1 relationship one of IT enemies, rather than friends. A 1 (your team) + 1 (EstesGroup Managed IT services team) relationship will keep your IT math simple, your budget profitable, and your company safe.

Are you looking to add a friendly IT expert to your network? Is your IT department working overtime to keep up with security, compliance, updates, backups or other system projects on your company table? Chat with us today!

Private Cloud Owners Regress with Egress Expense

by Brad Feakes | Apr 26, 2020 | Cloud, Hosting, Managed IT Services

Private cloud deployment is changing the way manufacturing and distribution companies install applications and store information. While this is an exciting move for any business, the step from on-premise to cloud infrastructure can come with unexpected costs. Many companies expect, and easily budget for, typical costs associated with the move to private cloud, but hidden expenses often blur into the fine print of the original pricing model. Thus, it’s important for a manufacturing or distribution business to budget wisely when moving from on-premise to private cloud infrastructure.

Cloud costs vary according to several different factors, and data comes into play at all levels. A company is its historical data applied to its future, or potential, data. Private cloud protects the data of a business while also utilizing it in real-time, and this cloud data normally exists in one of three states:

Data moving in. This is data as it moves into the storage location or as it is being uploaded. This process is also known as data ingress.
Data moving out. This is data as it moves out of the storage location or as it is being downloaded. This is sometimes referred to as data egress.
Data “at rest.” This can be data residing in a static manner in the storage location and not in transit on the network.

Data In, Data Out

Not surprisingly, costs are tailored around these types of data. Storage budgets are related to the costs of data that is physically being held at a location. Normally, the storage of “at rest” data receives the most attention, as cloud providers offer various pricing structures based on how much data is stored, where the data is located, how often it needs a backup, how often it tends to be accessed, and how quickly it needs to be retrieved.

Many cloud providers do not charge customers for data upload or ingress, and the reasoning is obvious: the more data you upload, the more you get charged for “data at rest.” But one of the most significant hidden costs of the cloud relates to data egress charges—the charges leveled by your cloud provider for accessing your own data.

Think of your old phone bill before the cell phone revolution—each call outside the local area was billable, and the costs varied according to the duration of the call and the location to which the call was made. Egress charges work similarly and are based primarily on the amount of data transferred. Over time, this becomes a matter of dialing for dollars. Should the data transfer increase, the charges will follow.

At its worst, this could become a situation of data rationing, where users are instructed to minimize their pulls from the data source, to minimize costs. This is akin to a mother in the 1980s locking up her new push button phone, out of fear that her toddler, enamored with the button tones, might mistakenly dial Hawaii.

Data rationing is hardly the outcome that one would expect from a move to the cloud, yet egress pricing models put companies in a precarious position. This poses a challenge for companies new to the cloud. Customers accustomed to comprehensive local area networks do not always realize the amount of data that leaves one area of the network to be consumed by another, and thus may be unaware of their ultimate egress requirements. Also, companies may have difficulty in predicting spikes in usage. Without understanding when data use may increase, manufacturing and distribution companies will have trouble predicting expenses.

Data Grows on Trees

Companies using applications that operate in a client-server manner may be similarly challenged when they choose to host their server in the cloud. The data requirements of private cloud can be as surprising as they are significant. A client-server application like Epicor ERP, for instance, is a rather chatty application, as it frequently performs “get” calls to refresh data, in relation to other transactions. In such a case, each “get” would entail a “give” in the form of cold hard cash. For companies utilizing manufacturing execution systems in which users are routinely downloading work instructions and product schematics, in support of manufacturing operations, the costs would further compound.

The complexity involved in manufacturing and distribution requires the innovation of private cloud technology. To transition from on-premise architecture, Epicor ERP customers looking to host their application in a private cloud need predictable costs and reliable budgets—a pricing model that does not involve surprise charges linked to the amount of data traveling into or out of the cloud hosting environment. Egress can cause a budgetary mess, but you have the option to choose a pricing model that doesn’t watch your every download move. Your company can have the reliability and innovation of private cloud without any of the hidden data egress costs that currently abound in the fine print of the cloud market.

Looking for help moving your business to the cloud? Check out our private cloud environment: EstesCloud Managed Hosting (ECHO). We don’t have ingress or egress charges—your data is your data, and you are entitled to it!

What Are My ERP Private Cloud Options

by Brad Feakes | Feb 10, 2020 | Cloud, Epicor, Epicor 10, ERP Risks and Challenges, ERP Selection, Hosting, Managed IT Services, Prophet 21, Security

Not All Clouds are Created Equal: Reviewing Your ERP Private Cloud Options

It’s no secret that cloud computing has been increasingly finding its way into businesses by providing reliable solutions to increasingly challenging problems. But for ERP customers with complex environment maps, an unmitigated move to the cloud might feel risky. For this reason, some customers look for middle options between full cloud deployments and on-premise installations. Private cloud hosting is one such midpoint, and it’s not uncommon for customers to approach the opportunities of cloud computing in search of a private solution. But will this option leverage the obvious benefits of the cloud, while effectively providing the necessary support for your complex ERP ecosystem?

Your ERP installation is rarely an isolated entity—it is part of an integrated ecosystem of applications and processes, with various third parties, bolt-ons, and in-house applications interacting with the core ERP system. As such, an ERP system is not always easily extracted from its ecosystem, as such an extraction is something akin to major surgery. If you’re looking at handling this complexity with private cloud ERP deployment options, there are basically two management directions you can take. You can build a private cloud using AWS, Azure, or Google, or you can work with an already established team of experts in private cloud hosting. Let’s explore these options in greater detail.

Private Cloud in AWS/Azure/Google

The big players in cloud computing entered the application hosting game a while ago – Amazon, Azure, and now Google. The option here would be to build out your virtual machine architecture within one of these clouds, and install your applications within this architecture, while working in turn to integrate your company-specific application ecosystem with the new ERP infrastructure.

While this eliminates the hardware investment of an on-premise install, you are still responsible for all the administration activities, at the server, application, and database levels. And if your Epicor Admin should win the lottery, you are left scrambling for options. If you lack the internal resources and need to bring in assistance in the administration of the application, you are now adding another party to work within this ecosystem. Moreover, to your monolithic cloud provider, you are still just a number, and the service levels you can expect to receive will indicate as much. Will the hosting company be responsive and listen to your apps and your business needs? Is there a human voice to reach out to when issues occur?

Private Cloud Through the Estes Group’s ECHO Managed Hosting

EstesGroup’s EstesCloud Hosting, or ECHO for short, is our hosting platform. For one monthly price, we include all the functionality and support you need to keep your hosted applications running properly for your business. While providing the access level that companies look for in private cloud solutions, we also provide the support and expertise that a big box store cloud partner can’t provide. One phone call puts you in touch with our support team. Well-versed in Microsoft’s full stack, we cover your servers with 24x7x365 EstesCloud Monitoring. We cover the backups and disaster recovery, and we protect your users with EstesCloud identity management under the security of EstesCloud-managed Firewalls.

We have experience in moving many customers to a private cloud environment, while working with them to integrate their hosted ERP platform with their family of related applications. With this experience comes the knowledge in working with protocols, networks, VPNs, and database connections, and we leverage this knowledge when engaging a customer.

In summary, some of the benefits of the EstesGroup’s ECHO Private Cloud Hosting solution include:

Known monthly expense, with no large capital expenses
Growth with your business supported by continual and customized service
Proven backup and disaster recovery playbooks
Easy, secure access from anywhere you wish
No Server Maintenance
No need to upgrade or repair hardware

When it comes to deploying your ERP architecture, there are clearly a number of different options, and the implications of the decisions made will have a lasting effect on your company’s future. Are you considering spinning up your own private cloud to host your ERP application? Drop us a line first, and let us help you explore your options.

Interested in learning more about Managed Hosting for Epicor ERP or Prophet 21 ERP?

Visit our Managed Epicor ERP Hosting page

Visit our Managed Prophet 21 ERP Hosting page

Epicor MRP Keeps You On-Time and Customers Happy

by Rory Kling | Feb 5, 2020 | Cloud, Epicor, Epicor 10, ERP Risks and Challenges, ERP Selection, Hosting, Managed IT Services, Prophet 21, Security

ERP! ERP! How do I love thee? Let me Count the Ways: A Robust Materials Resource Planning ( MRP ) Engine

One of my favorite movies growing up was The Wizard of Oz. One of my favorite scenes was when the “Wizard” was exposed as the “man behind the curtain,” pulling levers and revealing the secrets of the kingdom. In the business world, this phrase has morphed into meaning a person who elusively controls the intricacies of a large enterprise—and no one really knows the who, what, when, or how of the magic behind the success. MRP (Materials Resource Planning) is like this “man behind the curtain.” Incredibly powerful, MRP manages the forces of supply and demand, keeping everything under control.

There are basically three questions that a manufacturer has, and MRP answers:

What does the customer want?
How many do they want?
When do they want it?

While those three questions seem relatively simple in nature, executing them in an efficient and profitable manner can become an extremely daunting, or even impossible task if you don’t have the correct tools. Fortunately, the Epicor MRP Engine is a highly sophisticated but user-friendly process that can help companies increase on-time performance, lower inventory and improve efficiency. MRP takes all three of these questions and looks at them holistically, to manage all variables that can occur on a shop floor.

What product does the customer want?

To answer this, MRP first looks to see if the part is purchased or manufactured. At the core of the system is the type-attribute of the part. Epicor defines a part in three ways: purchased, manufactured or sales kit. Purchased Parts can have a defined lead-time and are used in determining when product can be available if stock is not available. Manufactured Parts are built-up with routings and bills of materials. MRP will take into account the time it takes for each operation, dependent on the quantity and material availability, to determine when the product will be available to ship, based on capacity on the shop floor. Sales kits can be a combination of purchased and manufactured Parts and will use either or both types of logic to determine availability.

What quantity does the customer need?

Based on demand from forecasts or actual Sales Orders, the system looks at the current inventory level. If there is insufficient inventory, it will suggest to the Purchasing Department to buy some if it’s purchased or will suggest to the Planning Department to create a job to make some, if it’s manufactured.

What is the customer’s timeline?

This is where the Epicor MRP logic will take the first two questions and analyze two things: If we don’t have it in stock, can we buy it in time to deliver it, or do we have enough material and resources available to build how many they want? And it does this by taking into account not just one particular Sales Order, but all of the Sales Orders, and all of the inventory stocking levels and Job demands within a plant. Obviously, this is a very tall order, and in a dynamic manufacturing environment, things are often changing on a daily, if not hourly, basis. Because the MRP process can be such an intensive hardware resource demand, Epicor can be configured to run on a schedule (often times at night), either by looking at net change (to only work on those things that have changed since MRP was last run) or by being regenerative (to recalculate all demand).

Epicor also has the ability to run MRP for a specific part. Have a customer that needs a part ASAP? Now instead of having to wait for MRP to run, management has the ability to see the potential status of a job in a matter of minutes, and not hours, as MRP only has a single part to analyze. The MRP process can also be limited to a plant, product family, or commodity class—reducing the time and resources required to generate the needed supply records. Epicor MRP also supports multi-level pegging, which gives users the ability to trace the supply to each discrete source of demand. This process also drives the projected Sales Order shortages and is an incredibly powerful tool to manage customer satisfaction.

The Epicor ERP system, in conjunction with its versatile and powerful MRP process, allows your organization to “see behind the curtain” at an organizational level, revealing what the current demands for your products are and if you have the necessary supply to meet demand in a timely and profitable fashion.

There are lots of things to love about Epicor’s E10 ERP application.

Want to know a few more? Read our “ERP! How do I love thee?” series and give us a call with any questions you may have.

Announcement: EstesGroup Awarded Epicor Managed Hosting Partner Certification

by Brad Feakes | Sep 16, 2019 | Cloud, Epicor, Epicor 10, Hosting, Prophet 21

We are proud to announce that EstesGroup is an Epicor Software Corporation Certified Managed Hosting Partner. EstesGroup is certified to host Epicor ERP and host Prophet 21 ERP systems.

We are the only Epicor Partner to be Certified for Epicor Hosting, Epicor ERP Sales & Implementations, and Prophet 21 ERP Sales & Implementations.

This accreditation means that EstesGroup has met and exceeded Epicor Software Corporation’s rigid data center and expertise capability requirements for being awarded Certified Hosting Partner status. To learn more about these requirements please contact us.

“We are honored to be an Epicor-Certified Managed Hosting Partner for Epicor Software Corporation, and the only hosting partner to be certified for Epicor ERP and Prophet 21 ERP systems,” said Bruce Grant, CEO of EstesGroup. “Our company has both functional and technical consultants on staff who know Epicor ERP and Prophet 21 systems. This means we not only know Managed IT, but we know the industry’s best-practice business processes and the underlying software as well. We provide a full-service solution to fit our clients’ needs.”

Epicor Software’s Chief Information Officer Rich Murr said, “Epicor and I would like to congratulate EstesGroup for becoming a Certified Epicor Managed Hosting Partner. EstesGroup has a long history in working with Epicor Software Corporation and our clients as a reseller and implementation consulting organization. Last year they became the first and only US Partner to be certified in Epicor ERP and Prophet 21, and now they achieved Hosting Partner for those products as well. EstesGroup continues to provide clients with a solid foundation of experienced consultants and high level hosting standards. We are looking forward to continued growth and excellent service with the EstesGroup team.”

EstesGroup is Certified by Epicor Software Corporation to host and manage clients’ Epicor ERP and Prophet 21 ERP systems. As a Certified Managed Hosting Provider, EstesGroup guarantees better than 99.5% uptime Service Level Agreements (SLAs) for clients’ ERP systems (to see EstesGroup’s 99.7% SLA click here). EstesGroup is also a Microsoft Cloud Services Partner with SQL Administration, Security Administration, O365, MS Exchange, and Disaster & Recovery expertise.

To learn more about EstesGroup’s EstesCloud Epicor Hosting, visit our Epicor ERP Hosting page.

Contact EstesGroup today to learn more about Epicor ERP Hosting or Prophet 21 ERP Hosting.

About EstesGroup

Headquartered in beautiful Loveland Colorado, and established in 2004, EstesGroup (www.estesgrp.com) employees averages 25+ years of discrete manufacturing and distribution industry experience which they leverage to ensure client success. Their employees are spread-out throughout the United States which maximizes talent and local presence for their clients. EstesGroup is a certified reseller, certified implementor, and certified hosting provider for Prophet 21 and Epicor ERP 10. They implement full service cloud, hosted, or on-premise solutions based on client needs and requirements.

About Epicor Software Corporation

Epicor Software Corporation (www.epicor.com) is headquartered in Austin, Texas, and is a manufacturer of Enterprise Resource Planning software solutions. Today, over 20,000 customers in 150 countries around the world rely Epicor’s expertise and solutions to improve performance and profitability.

Epicor and the Epicor logo are trademarks of Epicor Software Corporation, registered in the United States and other countries. Other trademarks used are the property of their respective owners. The product and service offerings depicted in this document are produced by EstesGroup and/or Epicor Software Corporation.