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Prophet 21 Event: Servers, Financials & Supply Chains

Prophet 21 Event: Servers, Financials & Supply Chains

by | Jun 14, 2021 | Cloud, Distribution, Epicor, ERP, Hosting, Prophet 21

With summer in full swing, distributors are on the move, crossing docks, splitting shipments, and delivering goods by the truckload to a diverse array of customers. It is a time for expansion—of old trade routes of supply chains and of new opportunities as our reopening country rediscovers its possibilities.

Female Attending a Virtual Epicor Prophet 21 Event

Attend a 2021 Prophet 21 event in person or online

With user conferences back in the schedule for 2021, P21 users are highly anticipating the Prophet 21 user conference P21WWUG CONNECT in mid-August. This event serves as a focal point for the P21 user community and as a bookend for a busy summer. At the onset of the summer season, we thought it would be helpful to host our P21 summer summit as a prelude to the larger Prophet 21 community event. This also gives you the opportunity to open the summer with some new ideas for using your P21 application to its fullest capabilities.

Events like this are a great opportunity to review your application’s capabilities and find ways to improve internal processes, discover ways to reduce costs, and reveal methods to improve information flow and presentation. You’ll also surface steps you can take to better integrate Prophet 21 with suppliers and customers.

Our summer 2021 Prophet 21® event takes place on June 24, from 10:00 AM to 1:30 PM (Central Time). Three panelists will discuss topics pertinent to the P21® user community. The event is free, and all are welcome! This summit will also provide an insider’s view of the Epicor Prophet 21® solution for any distributor who is looking for growth opportunities that only a new software can provide.

Prophet 21 Event Itinerary

Server Best Practices for the Epicor P21 Environment

10 AM – 11 AM (CST)

Daryl Sirota, Executive Director of Technical Services at EstesGroup, will discuss server best practices for P21. Understanding the optimal means for deploying the Prophet 21 application has never been more important, especially with Epicor’s move to a new client-server architecture. Daryl will discuss some of the key considerations when deploying and maintaining your server stack. Daryl leverages 35+ years of IT experience to help customers develop server and cloud architectures that are robust, flexible and reliable. A veteran systems engineer and Microsoft expert, Daryl provides the stable technical foundations that allow customers to focus on their business. Attend this Prophet 21 event if you’d like to know how to create a private cloud for your ERP software.

Creating Financial Statements Using Financial Line Express

11 AM – Noon (CST)

Terri Gage, Senior Consultant at EstesGroup, will discuss the creation of Financial Statements. P21 customers express frustration in successfully creating financial statements, but the often forgotten Financial Line Express can bring ample help to your financial reporting needs. A longtime project manager, implementation consultant, and Prophet 21 specialist, Terri works with organizations to help them successfully implement and fully benefit from the P21 application, actualizing their goals of sustained profitability and business excellence.

Bridging the Gap Between Epicor and Suppliers for Distribution Companies

12:00 PM – 1:00 PM (CST)

Jim Frye, Enterprise Sales Director at SourceDay, will discuss how distribution companies bridge the gap between their Prophet 21 system and their supply chains. Distributors need to do many things to help secure their supply chains as the ground shifts beneath them, automating the mundane and improving collaboration, visibility, and accountability between them and their varied suppliers. Jim leverages 30+ years of experience working with Global Manufacturing Companies, big and small. His passion is to help organizations facilitate growth, reduce operating costs, and increase profitability through supply chain efficiency.

Our event concludes with an open Q&A session, allowing users to raise questions regarding the sessions themselves and the Prophet 21 application in general. Operations management strategies. Cloud server integration steps. Cloud hosting service risks. Prophet 21 cloud platform options. Global supply chain trends. Operation system updates. Dedicated servers, multiple servers, SaaS… from Prophet 21 consulting to server hosting, we have answers to your P21 ERP and IT questions.

Do you have questions you’ve been meaning to ask a consultant, but haven’t wanted to shell out the cash? 

Now is your chance to do it–on our time and our dime!

Register for the P21® SUMMIT now

Epicor’s Prophet 21 user community is founded on collaboration.

Come collaborate with us on June 24.

This event can also help distributors who are considering a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) software.

Cyber Security

Are you considering ERP hosting solutions?

Learn more about our cloud hosting plans for Prophet 21.

Understanding the New Client Architecture of Prophet 21

Understanding the New Client Architecture of Prophet 21

by | May 19, 2021 | Cloud, ERP, ERP Implementation, Prophet 21, Software

Software development never stands still. I remember a time where I felt like I had finally come to understand DataSets, DataTables, DataRows and DataViews, only to have a much more experienced developer inform me that the System.Data namespace was old, antiquated, and no longer used in the development of cutting-edge applications. I had walked the prescribed trail, only to realize that it dead-ended in a software swamp.

Epicor Prophet 21 Warehouse Worker

The implications of such rapid movements in application development are significant, as software vendors often find themselves down similar dead ends and are forced to backtrack their way out of them. I liken software applications to my great-grandaddy’s venerable old axe: two new heads and seven new handles later, yet still seen by everyone in the family as the same axe.

Like the axe, Epicor’s Prophet 21 ERP application has been refitted over time. P21 helps distribution companies with a variety of features and capabilities. But like many such applications, the vendor found that over time, there was a need to reshape the application as to better position it for future use. Limitations to the existing architecture could not support the long-term needs of the industry. For that reason, Epicor has been reworking and fine-tuning its P21 architecture, moving towards a more scalable, interoperable and accessible application. Understanding where P21 has been and where it’s going can be of great use for customers, as to help them chart a course for the future. 

The Old Prophet 21

Epicor’s E10 application followed an infrastructure that separated the user client, the application server, and the database itself. For someone coming from Epicor 10, P21’s original architecture might look a little strange. Traditionally, P21 employed a fat client architecture, in which a large amount of business logic was housed in the 32-bit client itself, and this client communicated with the database. A liability of this approach was the difficulty in deploying a full API that could be accessed externally. Also, this model created natural limits to the number of clients that could share a single terminal server, due to the size and scope of the fat client.

The New Epicor Model

As Epicor sought to develop a more robust and accessible platform, changes were made both to the client and the overall architecture. Epicor’s updated architecture inserted a new layer, referred to as the “Middleware Server,” that serves as an intermediary between the client and the database, and provides the foundation for API-level interactions. 

Logic that had previously resided in the “fat client” desktop version was moved into the middleware layer. This architecture more closely resembles Epicor’s E10 application server-based architecture. Communication with the middleware server occurs using Secure Socket Layer (SSL) protocol. This allows you to connect without the need for direct access to the network or a VPN connection. A web connection and an SSL certificate are all you need.

Beyond the API benefits, another benefit of this approach comes from performance, as the middleware server supports as much as twice as many clients as can be supported by a terminal server with the traditional fat client. For customers with high user counts, Prophet 21’s new architecture supports multiple load-balanced middleware servers.

Client Types: Understanding Your New P21 Options

From a client interaction perspective, two new options were developed to support the new architecture:

  • Web Client: The web client is a browser-based capability, allowing customers to access their system from a PC, a tablet or a mobile device.
  • Hybrid Client: The hybrid client meets the needs of customers who like the look and feel of a traditional desktop application, but wish to leverage the capabilities and features of the updated web client. The hybrid client installs like a normal Windows application, and connects directly to the middleware server, without the use of a browser.

Desktop Client – A Line in the Sand

Initially, Epicor’s web client lacked some of the functionality available with the traditional client, making things like DynaChange screen modifications difficult to accomplish without a traditional client. But as Epicor ramped up the capabilities of the web client, these differences have fallen off, such that as of spring of 2021, new P21 features will be available only in the web and hybrid clients. 

Epicor will slowly migrate away from traditional desktop application. By the fall 0f 2021, Epicor will no longer develop and release new versions of the desktop client. By the end of the year, Epicor will no longer release fixes for the desktop client. For P21 customers, this will require all users to migrate to the new architecture, both to retain support and to capitalize on the benefits of the newer releases.

The bottom line for P21 customers is clear: they can migrate to the new architecture or else work on the legacy platform, in an unimproved and unsupported state. In making this move, there are a few additional considerations to be made relative to the Prophet 21 deployment options available.

SaaS or Private Cloud Hosting for Epicor P21 Applications

Customers may opt to choose Epicor’s SaaS solution and place their application under Epicor’s control. This amounts to making two significant shifts, and many customers may not be sufficiently confident in Epicor’s SaaS solution to make the move. For customers suspect of SaaS, but looking for cloud options to host their new P21 architecture, private cloud hosting for ERP combines the new architecture with P21’s full functionality, without the hardware investments that come with an on-premise install.

Do you need help understanding your P21 deployment options? Do you need help migrating your existing architecture to take advantage of Epicor’s new features and capabilities? Give us a call — we are the #1 Prophet 21 consultancy in the nation, and we’d love to make you our “client”!

Warehouse & Inventory Management

Are you a wholesale distributor and planning for new P21 features and capabilities? Please take our survey as a step towards understanding the new client architecture of Prophet 21 and how it relates to your future!

Take the Prophet 21 Survey Now!

COVID-19 Remote Work Support: Message from CEO Bruce Grant

COVID-19 Remote Work Support: Message from CEO Bruce Grant

by | Mar 18, 2020 | Business Direction, Epicor 10, ERP, Managed IT Services, Prophet 21

COVID-19 Remote Work Support: Message From EstesGroup

Dear Clients, Partners & Friends– 

I wanted to share an update on what EstesGroup is doing today to keep our community safe and our delivery services moving forward, as well as specific steps we are taking to continue to deliver the solutions your business relies on.  I encourage you to regularly check our website, which contains the latest operational updates and links to additional information on specific events.  We will also be reaching out individually to clients and partners over the next several days.

 

EstesGroup Continuity and Wellness Activities Update

 

Remote Work Tests
As part of our ongoing preparedness with respect to the COVID-19 spread, we are activating business continuity plans to continually test various teams’ remote work capabilities. This is done to ensure we maintain service levels and resolution times, regardless of where our teams are physically located.  We were founded as a remote-work company, and we have refined our tools and procedures over the past 16 years of operations.  As such, we feel confident that we can continue to deliver the exceptional remote service you have come to depend on from EstesGroup.

 

Limited Travel
In line with CDC recommendations, we have decided to limit much of our team’s travel schedules. Our teams are ready and able to conduct most of our delivery work virtually, as they have for many years. While we’ll miss our face time, we feel this is the right choice to support the health of everyone.

 

Remote Delivery Enablement
Some of our clients have asked for assistance in preparing their teams for better remote and home-based work, including security, access, backup, and remote connectivity.  We welcome any questions you may have or assistance you may require in helping to make your remote working environments as efficient and effective as possible.

 

Health and Safety
Finally, the health and safety of our colleagues, their families, and our communities are the highest priority. We continue to encourage everyone to follow the preventive measures recommended by the CDC to stay healthy and slow the spread of the virus, including:

  • Clean your hands frequently
  • Avoid touching your face
  • Stay home if you feel ill

EstesGroup is well-positioned and prepared to work through this pandemic. Although we feel our plan is good for our partners, our colleagues, and our community, confusion may arise as we move through this situation. We ask for your patience as the situation progresses.  Please feel free to reach out at any time with questions or concerns.

 

As always, stay safe and healthy, 

Bruce Grant / CEO
970.372.4526 office
703.624.2759 mobile
[email protected]   
www.estesgrp.com

Prophet 21 Rebate Management is Right On the Money

Prophet 21 Rebate Management is Right On the Money

by | Feb 24, 2020 | ERP Benefits & Features, Prophet 21

Right on the Money: Epicor Prophet 21 for Rebate Management 

 

Achieving profitability through distribution management software has never been easier.  With the technology available in Epicor’s Prophet 21, automation can quickly optimize workflow across the distribution spectrum.  In the critical area of rebate management, Prophet 21 rebate management modernizes supplier administration by streamlining the process of tracking and collecting.  This, in turn, minimizes administrative costs and maximizes overall profitability for your business. 

 

Prophet 21 Leaves No Money on the Table 

 

With Mardi Gras upon us, if you were a Mississippi gambler playing your odds on one of the French Quarter’s finest felts, you’d want to maximize whatever deals were available—without showing your cards prematurely or leaving any money on the table.  In a similar shake, the key to successful rebate management lies in the ability to define a robust set of conditions based on varying supplier parameters.  This allows for automated downstream processing and transactional accuracy.  This minimizes the internal costs of administering rebates, while maximizing those available.  Prophet 21’s vendor rebates support a similar strategy of capitalizing on what’s available, leaving no money on the vendor’s proverbial felt. 

 

mardi gras retail store discount management

 

Prophet 21 Makes Payables Playable  

 

Because Prophet 21 is a highly configurable application, it can meet the needs of a variety of different vendor scenarios.  Setup for rebates begins with the overall system settings.  The System Settings form allows users to configure enhanced rebate functionality.  Under the general settings within the Account Payable business area, “Enhanced rebate functionality” can be enabled.  This sets the stage for further downstream system configuration. 

 

Financial settings are made at the company level, where default general ledger accounts for rebates and rebate allowances are defined.  Subsequent settings occur at the vendor and customer levels.  Prophet 21 rebate tracking can be enabled for individual vendors—and this allows P-21 users to differentiate between rebate-applicable and non-rebate-applicable suppliers.  Further settings at vendor level enable the user to override the rebate and the rebate allowance accounts defined at the company.  At the vendor level, rebate variance-handling settings can also be defined.  At the customer level, the default rebate location can be optionally defined.  

 

The jackpot of P-21’s automated rebate functionality resides within the Sales Pricing pages.  A number of possible rebate methods can be defined within these screens, including the following: 

 

  • The Value Method: This specifies a cost-after-rebate value, which is subsequently compared to the base cost at the time of invoicing to determine a rebate amount. 
  • The Multiplier Method: This allows you to specify your costs as a percentage of the primary supplier cost, with the remaining value at time of invoicing resulting in your rebate.
  • The Flat Method: This allows for a flat rebate amount to be placed against the supplier cost.

 

When automated rebate capture is not possible, you can determine manual rebates through Prophet 21’s Manual Rebate Entry screen.  For payments, P21 supports check and debit memos, which are applied with the AP module as if they were cash receipts.  Beyond automated and manual rebates, Prophet 21’s EDI solution supports outgoing rebate requests to vendors and incoming rebate payments from them.  And in the event that a rebate needs to be reversed, the Rebate Reversals screen allows you to completely reverse the original posting. 

 

Prophet 21 Means You Don’t Have to Gamble to Grow   

 

Epicor Software Corporation has a strong reputation for providing powerful functionality for the distribution industry.  With real-time tracking and optimal automation, Prophet 21 immediately boosts profitability and enables further success by bringing cloud and e-commerce technology to any distributor looking to grow or transform business.  With fast implementation at minimal investment, Prophet 21 ERP allows you to keep your purse strings tight and leave no money on the table, especially when deployed through P21 managed hosting in EstesCloud. 

 

 

Want to learn more about Prophet 21’s distribution features? Read our blog on Prophet 21 Rental Management.

What Are My ERP Private Cloud Options

What Are My ERP Private Cloud Options

by | 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

Epicor MRP Keeps You On-Time and Customers Happy

by | 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.