Microsoft Great Plains Implementation: Pharmaceutical Corporation Specifics – overview for consultantWritten by Andrew Karasev
Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains serves mid-size and large clients in horizontal and vertical markets. Historically Great Plains Software was encouraging ISV partner to write third party modules and later on – Great Plains Software had a chance to select product for incorporation into their core set of modules: Manufacturing, Project Accounting, Purchase Order Processing, Collection Management, etc. Today we’ll consider Microsoft Great Plains implementation specifics for large pharmaceutical corporation.•Product Research cost. New product research and testing could be grouped into cost center and Microsoft Great Plains offers several Project solutions. The most reliable way is to deploy Great Plains Project Accounting. This module could work in multicurrency environment, when you incur R&D cost in multiple countries. Then in first year of product release you can track P&L by your product. There are certain restrictions, however – you typically have one customer, who pays your Project bills. Obviously it is not case for new product. However you can consider your organization as an association of internal customers •Multinational Payroll. In each country you have to implement Payroll solution. In case of Microsoft Great Plains you can have separate company for each local subsidiary and implement US, Canadian, Brazilian, Middle Eastern Payroll modules as well as Payroll custom solutions for most of Latin American countries, South Africa and Australia
| | Microsoft Great Plains in Aerospace & Defense industries – implementation & customization highlightsWritten by Andrew Karasev
Microsoft Great Plains fits horizontal markets clientele and in case of Aerospace and Defense industry we’ll talk about contractors – parts and subsystems for government contracts. We do not necessarily talk about large corporation, however models described could be implemented for large publicly traded company. As a rule – market is represented by established companies with long history, including long history of its ERP and Computer Business System. It is difficult to stake on computer operating systems future, however you may try to give high level of trust to ERP coming from Microsoft Business Solutions, especially considering fact of acquisition of such market leaders as Great Plains Software and Navision Software. •Service Model. Typically your product has service contract with hourly or annual payments and you track repair and preventive maintenance cases, have a list of replacement parts. Microsoft Great Plains has several options to automate these services. You can use customized version of Inventory Control Module, where you track serial/lot number, locations, item replacements, etc. In Great Plains Dexterity you can write light customization, tracking service cycle. Another way is to deploy Field Service suite, where you have Service Call Management, Contract Administration, Preventive Maintenance, Return Management as well as a set of eXXX modules such as eService Call, eReturn. You usually have to tailor these modules to fit your unique requirements – do it via Dexterity, VBA/Modifier, SQL Stored Procedures or Web Application, working with Inventory and Field Service tables. Assuming your product has serial number – then by looking up serial number you can see all service history.•Bidding. Great Plains Sales Order Processing (SOP) module allows you to have Quotes, Sales Orders, Invoices. You might need bidding and negotiation documentation system. In case of Great Plains best and future-oriented approach is to implement Sales side in Microsoft CRM, integrated with Great Plains via MS CRM-GP integration tool. All calls and emails, plus contracts will be logged and documented in MS CRM and quotes are moved to or from Great Plains
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