Many people equate Lean manufacturing with the use of kanbans: physical or visual signals that trigger replenishment. While kanban use is indeed a part of many Lean programs, it is not the only solution for triggering the movement of material. Kanban has its place, but there are more appropriate alternative approaches in situations where kanban is not a good fit.
Provided by: Consona

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a relatively new precept for business. Conceptually, CSR holds organizations to a higher moral and ethical standard considering the overall interests of society in the operations of its day-to-day business. Under this utilitarian view, businesses would need to take responsibility for the impact of their activities on all parties that they would affect-customers, shareholders, surrounding communities, and the environment-in all aspects of their operations. Ultimately, companies will look to IT and software solutions to help them find opportunities to be better stewards of the environment and extend the tangible benefits of corporate social responsibility from the business through the extended supply chain.
Provided by: Epicor

This report focuses on the decision-making process in SMB manufacturing companies to install and/or upgrade ERP software and ways to maximize return on investment in those systems.
Provided by: Consona

Manufacturers that continue to embrace the status quo run the risk of eroding profits and market share. As economic conditions decline, they are under pressure to identify new approaches that will differentiate them from larger, more recognized brands while deepening their relationships with distributors, wholesalers and retailers.
Provided by: CDC Software

Small and mid-sized pharmaceutical manufacturers are struggling to manage large group purchase organization (GPO) contracts, process heavy volumes of chargeback submissions and ensure pricing policies are fully compliant with regulatory requirements.
Provided by: CDC Software

In response to the many highly publicized large scale food recalls that have occurred over the last few years and diminishing consumer confidence, both regulators and the industry are responding with stricter guidelines and policies to ensure the safety of the U.S. food supply. As a result of this increasing scrutiny, along with the growing complexity of the food supply chain, many food company executives are re-examining their ability to ensure the safety and quality of their products. With even greater emphasis being placed on prevention, food company executives need to assess their intervention methods to minimize the exposure of a food safety incident, if not prevent them entirely.
Provided by: CDC Software

Today's business applications are not flexible enough to keep pace with the businesses they support. Users must figure out where to find information, located in isolated silos, that supports their tasks; the IT costs of keeping up with evolving business requirements remain high. Adding collaborative Web 2.0 technologies, such as enterprise search, presence, and mashups to business applications is increasingly seen as a way to address these challenges both for business users and IT alike. Yet while many business users are familiar with these technologies through personal use, they remain uncertain about how these new capabilities can support their business strategies. This white paper details how Web 2.0 technologies support business strategies by improving efficiency and productivity as well as harnessing knowledge through collaboration. They also reduce IT costs by simplifying integration and improving IT administration and maintenance.
Provided by: Epicor

Now more than ever, organizations of all sizes and descriptions are struggling to comply with regulations and manage the risks and penalties of failing to operate within the rules. Establishing, maintaining and proving compliance requires both money and time that executives and shareholders would rather invest in top-line growth.
Provided by: Epicor

Today's manufacturing enterprise is challenged by rising material costs, increasing competition, and ever-changing customer requirements. If a manufacturer's Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solution is not up to par, these companies are faced with dizzying levels of complexity, duplication of effort, and in the worse cases, poor quality and customer service. This paper describes the warning signs that an ERP system is killing a business, and suggests how companies can thrive with a new approach to business systems.
Provided by: Plex Systems

It's hard to miss: the term Software as a Service (SaaS) is everywhere, garnering headlines in the technology press, leading to hot IPO's raved about in the financial press, and generally being described as the future of software technology. With this kind of press, virtually every major software vendor is touting some version of SaaS, leading to confusion about the solution model and its advantages. This paper attempts to clear this haze by clearly defining the term, and describing the short-term and long-term benefits of the solution model and its variants.
Provided by: Plex Systems

Plex Systems suggests that many manufacturers are focusing on the wrong issues when considering ERP solutions. The ERP industry has earned such a poor reputation for delivery in the last 20 years that users have learned to live within a very narrow set of constraints - and those constraints have been in place for so long that the questions we hear are built with those constraints already assumed. Now is the time to break free of this mind-set and ask the more important questions.
Provided by: Plex Systems

Identify and discuss the unique and critical business issues with which an Engineer-To-Order (ETO) or project-oriented manufacturer must contend. Also, outline the newly formed body of good business practice that resolves these issues. This new body of knowledge is a logical fusion of formerly disparate approaches to: business acquisition, configuration management, project scheduling, detailed scheduling and control, project accounting and revenue recognition into a cohesive business system. This paper follows the lifecycle of a project.
Provided by: Consona

Becoming Lean has been a goal of most companies over the last few years. Why is Lean so popular? Lean delivers what companies really need in today's highly competitive world - shorter lead times, improved quality, reduced cost, increased profit, improved productivity and better customer service.
Provided by: Epicor

Lean manufacturing is a management philosophy, enabled and supported by various techniques, to eliminate any form of non-value adding activity. With terms like "lot size of one", "continuous flow", and "pull production", lean manufacturing has primarily been associated with the factory floors of short run, repetitive manufacturers. In an Aerospace and Defense (A&D), government regulations often impose very different business practices than those followed in the commercial sector.
Provided by: Consona