Accelerate to Great
Continued
And Zanett was riding shotgun. Frederick says that Zanett understood the company’s needs, ultimately recommending a combination of JD Edwards EnterpriseOne Financials and a manufacturing solution designed for custom woodworking shops. Linda Stupakiewicz, the account manager on the Zanett team, was able to figure out what Creative needed and worked with the staff there to get the project finished without intruding on their busy schedules. “Having a software person that I could trust, that I knew would be responsive, was key,” Frederick says.
The implementation went smoothly; Frederick says that Stupakiewicz and Creative’s controller were on the same page, and as a result the project ran smoothly. “We probably encountered half the problems that I expected,” he says. Oracle Business Accelerators, which Frederick initially thought was more a marketing gimmick than a real value-add, made a clear difference in the conversion. Frederick says that he and the controller, using Oracle Business Accelerators, spent only about five hours between the two of them setting up the chart of accounts. “I never would have guessed it would be that easy,” he says.
Even better than the fast implementation was the almost immediate ROI. Cash flow improved because the company could better manage receivables, and a clear view of payables improved its supplier relationships. “We were coming from such a poor IT system,” Frederick says. “Having information available to us instantly really helped. It used to take us a month or longer to get it using the previous system.”
Although ROI to date has been impressive, Frederick expects to get even more returns as the staff learns more about the system’s capabilities. Recently, he figured out how to use data to cost out specific products. “One of the beauties of this is that you can export data and play around with stuff,” he says. “That’s how you learn it.”
Value and Velocity
Using Oracle Business Accelerators to configure an ERP system can save significant time and money for midsize companies, while adding best practices to deepen competitive advantage. Creative Cabinet and eZono both found that Oracle’s JD Edwards EnterpriseOne applications helped them increase productivity, generate a rapid ROI, and deliver the service that will help them build market share at a faster rate than their competitors. “We use Oracle Business Accelerators everywhere we can,” says Bob Stroup, managing director of JD Edwards at Zanett. “It’s become part of our standard toolkit.”
“If companies don’t see a solution like Oracle Accelerate as a competitive advantage,” Kroon says, “then they’re not the fast-growing companies that are increasingly defining entrepreneurial success.”
For More Information
Oracle Accelerate
Oracle’s JD Edwards EnterpriseOne
Ann C. Logue is a freelance business and technology writer based in Chicago.
