For industries in regulated environments, validation of processes and systems is a required part of business. The goal of the validation process is to provide confidence in a process or system by demonstrating consistent and repeatable results through documented evidence. This article provides an overview of a validation for a computer software system, for compliance with US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations.
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Today’s distributors have an opportunity to drive performance to new levels by investing in advanced inventory management. These companies can expect to increase inventory visibility while driving down inventory costs. Learn how these kinds of inventory management initiatives can help your company strengthen customer relationships, bargain for better terms with suppliers, and generate more profitable growth.
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In a challenging economy, many companies focus cost-cutting on direct materials and capital spending rather than maintenance, repair, and operations (MRO) supplies (also known as indirect materials). But an alternate concept allows you to implement lean processes to create a high-efficiency MRO outsource model. Find out how it offers greater visibility and promotes continuous improvement along the indirect supply chain.
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Today’s technology and application leaders are pressured to deliver functionality that drives efficiency, innovation, and growth—while reducing costs. As a result, technology and application portfolio management (APM) are top business priorities. Learn about a framework for implementing an APM program that can enable your company to monitor and analyze the impact of application changes and reduce portfolio complexity.
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Organizations managing a fleet often operate on razor-thin margins. A recession can further deplete fleet companies’ purses, resulting in reduced scale of operations, lower profits, and process inefficiencies. Visibility is key to fleet optimization and can be achieved with a fleet management system. Learn how to maximize the availability of your resources and lower the total cost of ownership (TCO) of your mobile assets.
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Up to 75 percent of a company’s carbon footprint comes from transport and logistics functions, in the context of goods storage and distribution. Today, logistics companies are going green not just out of goodwill or compliance requirements, but also because savings in carbon emissions from green initiatives directly translate into cost savings. Consequently, emissions management and reporting are important. Learn more.
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Acts of cyber aggression could lead to a cyber war or worse. Capitol Hill is giving attention to this security issue, and vendors are creating new offerings and expanding existing programs—creating new opportunities in the defense industry and opening doors for new players. Learn more about the blurring between information security vendors servicing the private sector and those in the defense and intelligence industry.
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Currently, India’s population is approximately 1.0009 billion. The middle class is large and still growing; wages were low, but now are some of the best in various industries; many workers are well educated and speak English; and investors are optimistic and local stocks are up. Despite political turmoil, the country presses on with economic reforms. But for potential investors, there’s still cause for worry—find out why.
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As you streamline your supply chain, don’t forget about the shipping or receiving department. Often, a company aligns its supply and demand but doesn’t provide the key inventory prioritization rules for shipping and receiving—and the right product is delayed from its final end-point. Learn how appointment scheduling can help—meet with your supplier, customer, and carrier to plan an efficient and effective flow of goods.
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Coordinating all shipping processes—from inbound to outbound freight—can be a logistics headache in a global economy—especially if you don’t make the most of all a transportation management system (TMS) has to offer. One director of logistics found that a web-based TMS solution resulted in a 10 percent decrease in the number of carriers, with a 15 percent increase in carrier load factors. Learn more about the benefits.
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While analyzing load statistics with its key carriers, a multinational manufacturer and distributor noticed that deadhead mileage statistics were excessive. Often, inbound trucks delivering goods into its facilities had different dispatchers than those handling outbound loads. The company needed to improve communication with carriers. Learn about the solution that helped save money by reducing deadhead mile charges.
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Due to ever-changing business, market, and economic conditions, shippers cannot afford to rely solely on a certain size of carrier—and often it’s the smaller regional or family-owned carriers that can fill the unique needs of a shipper. But can those smaller carriers provide the level of communication you expect and get from larger carriers? Learn about a solution that offers integrated communication for any size carrier.
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In 2008, a multinational manufacturer and distributor wanted to elevate its load tendering process to a more sophisticated level. To guarantee cost savings, the company wanted to be able to create a batch of tendered loads for a given time period before releasing them to the routing guide tendering logic. Now, it has the capacity to move orders with no increase in costs. Learn about the solution that helped enable this.
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InMotion, with more than 50 stores in 33 airports, delivers portable entertainment to the travelers’ market. InMotion faced inventory control issues due to limited store space, and plans to merge with another airport retailer added to the problem. The merger required InMotion to find a solution that could handle multiple sales channels while providing real-time inventory updates to prevent overstock in stores. Learn more.
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Manufacturers already apply transportation management systems (TMSs) to outbound shipping, but they often overlook the money they could save by using a TMS to control inbound shipping costs as well. Find out how improved inbound transportation practices can help you predict true total delivered costs, get visibility on inbound shipments, enforce routing guides, optimize freight, and minimize accessorial charges.
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For many companies, the second largest cost after people is facilities. Solutions have evolved from traditional out-tasking and outsourcing to the more recent strategy of integrating facilities management and real estate under a single service provider. But first, understand marketplace realities: provider capabilities don’t always line up with buyer expectations. Learn about the challenges of integrating these services.
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At first glance, less-than-truckload (LTL) purchasing seems like a straightforward process. However, purchasing approaches that save you money in the short term also introduce your company to financial and operational risk. A truly successful LTL bidding process is data-driven and has very different financial outcomes for shippers, 3PLs, and their customers. Discover more about this and other LTL best practices.
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A parts distributor had poorly used space and storage media with limited material visibility resulting in frequent stock-outs. To replace its old warehouse management system (WMS), the company decided to redesign its existing storage space and media in order to improve picking and replenishing efficiency and to reduce inventory carrying and material handling costs. Find out how a logistics modeling and design tool helped.
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A manufacturer of multiple electronic goods needed to maximize its available storage. A logistics modeling and design tool can help the company benefit from pull replenishment and focused storage approaches to logistics by enabling users to evaluate different storage options. Find out how the solution can support transition during initial design, including re-engineering of existing process, for continued results.
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Inventory has been—and continues to be—the lifeblood of the distribution marketplace. While many companies are slow to adopt new strategies and technologies, a growing number of distributors are leveraging inventory practices to improve key metrics like customer retention, gross margins, and inventory turns. Read these research survey findings to find out how you can make better inventory management technology decisions.
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In today’s increasingly competitive global economy, manufacturers must find ways to improve quality while maintaining compliance with government and industry mandates. But in the search for a suitable enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution, many are often left with empty promises. Discover why key capabilities such as traceability are vital in an ERP solution—especially for high-precision manufacturers.
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Companies looking to expand their facilities and strategize their way into the marketplace often focus most of their efforts on bottom line results. During the process, they factor in infrastructure costs but often pay little attention on how to control them. Find out how a Web-enabled solution that puts infrastructure management sharply in focus can help you easily access distributed information while helping curb costs.
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While consumer products manufacturers are relatively recent adopters of lean programs, they are already achieving value through a firm commitment to understanding how lean will affect their business processes. Those who are eager to begin the lean journey, however, must learn how to prioritize the metrics that matter, and frequently measure them in order to monitor the effectiveness of the program. Discover why it works.
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This report identifies the major IT issues faced by small to midsized businesses (SMBs), including information silos, lack of IT staff, and outdated business applications. Because they lack the right information to meet customer expectations, SMBs have difficulty reacting quickly to fast-changing market dynamics and growing their revenue. Find out how the elimination of information silos can create a more consistent effective customer experience.
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Industry research shows that one of the most important challenges facing supply chain professionals today is supply chain visibility. As companies scramble to adopt a way to gaining better visibility into their supply chain, they quickly realize that it’s not as simple as it seems. While achieving the right type of visibility is the first step, leveraging it to take quick and effective action is the key to its success.
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For many organizations, undertaking IT and business process outsourcing involves everything from finding and assessing providers, to selecting locations, to determining which services are required. But the hardest part of outsourcing occurs after the deal is done. To help businesses ensure consistency in outsourcing governance, there are nine critical factors to keep in mind that can help guarantee its success.
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A lean supply chain consists of two major components—lean manufacturing and lean distribution—which focus on satisfying customer demand efficiently, at the lowest cost, with the least amount of waste. But what if your replenishment strategy is your distribution center’s weakest link? To improve customer satisfaction and achieve efficiency and balance, your replenishment strategy must consider all the key variables.
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Getting lean is not a simple task; it requires an aggressive, iterative approach to examine complex tradeoffs. And given the number of variables that characterize a distribution center (DC) and its constituent stock keeping units (SKUs), performing this type of analysis without using the right tools can be daunting—if not impossible. Find out how a tool-based approach can make getting lean easier.
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JM Family Enterprises knew there had to be a more efficient way to organize its picking, packing, and tracking systems. Because of the specific nature of its documents, it was vital they arrive at the correct dealership on time. In order to achieve continued growth, it would need an automated system. Since implementing a warehouse management system (WMS), the company has reduced its paper processing by 80 percent.
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International Marketing Group (IMG) was used to tall orders. And although fulfillment mistakes were rare for the third-party logistics company, any errors that did occur were extremely costly. In order to stay competitive, IMG realized that it would need to increase its fulfillment output. With its new warehouse management system (WMS), IMG’s shipping time has gone from several days to mere hours.
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To effectively serve their customers, operations managers need to have visibility as well as control of the delivery and quality of their outsourced components. And because supply chain management is such a critical part of the manufacturing process, it’s important to have the right tools to optimize performance. Find out how real-time collaborative manufacturing is now helping to solve some key manufacturing problems.
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With the number of vehicles worldwide expected to triple in the next few decades, the toll collection market will need to adapt to meet demand. Increasing traffic will make the use of conventional toll plazas unfeasible. Electronic toll collection (ETC) systems can help by supporting multilane, free-flow tolling that can be tailored to specific standards and processes. Find out what you need to know, before ETC passes you by.
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As supply chains continue to grow in size and complexity, companies are focusing more of their energies on managing supply chain risk. While the topic is gaining prominence in boardrooms, many companies do not yet fully comprehend the risks they face. But understanding risk is the first step to managing it—and using the right IT tools can help. Learn what steps you can take to better address your supply chain risks.
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The procure-to-pay (P2P) environment has become a major challenge for companies adopting global sourcing and distribution as a strategic component of their business. And the increase in global trade has shifted their focus from manufacturing efficiency to global supply chain efficiency. Discover what the current P2P gaps in global commerce management solutions are and what can be done to deliver optimal P2P capabilities.
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Lufthansa, one of the world’s leading airlines, wanted to improve the way it trained its Miles & More loyalty program customer service staff. Traditionally, training was a five-day, classroom-based workshop, but the company now wanted more flexibility in its training approach. By moving to a blended learning content management system (LCMS), Lufthansa experienced a 65 percent savings on course development costs.
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Euromadi, una central de compras y servicios y miembro de la Central Europea EMD, buscaba automatizar sus procesos de negocio para aumentar su eficacia, específicamente con proveedores de diferentes partes del mundo, y gestionar las relaciones entre más de 220 empresas asociadas. Para abordar las cuestiones, Polymita sugirió una plataforma integrada de BPM y ECM basada en sus productos.
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Production lines and distribution centers have optimum target levels for leanness, but reaching these levels can be difficult. By implementing LeadTime Technology (LTT), manufacturers benefit from leaner inventories, greater customer service levels, and increased economic profit. Find out what the five most important points on LLT and lean operations are and how applying these tools can work to your advantage.
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For a decade, IndustryWeek and the Manufacturing Performance Institute (MPI) Census of Manufacturers have provided data to US manufacturers. This year, MPI fielded a similar survey in Canada, offering an intriguing look into the differences between the Canadian and US manufacturing landscapes. This executive summary presents combined data from these surveys, aimed at helping manufacturers meet future challenges.
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This second annual survey of the warehousing and distribution industry, conducted by the Manufacturing Performance Institute (MPI) Census of Manufacturers, explores the metrics, management practices, and business concerns of over 200 US warehouse and distribution facilities. This data is presented in easy-to-understand tables and charts, and may be useful for companies currently facing distribution center challenges.
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Globalization, rising costs, and high customer expectations create serious challenges in supply chain management (SCM). Given these factors, transportation management now plays a key, strategic role in driving supply chain value. Learn how moving goods quickly and predictably through the global supply chain can help you achieve consistency and increase visibility—while supporting best practices across the enterprise.
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Manufacturers today face increasing pressures to boost revenues and secure profitability. But for them to realize the full financial value of these initiatives, they must invest in a system that can quickly and easily implement or consolidate core business applications. With QAD on-demand, businesses can reduce IT complexity and costs with simplified deployment options and complete application management alternatives.
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What kind of tangible return on investment (ROI) can you expect from your enterprise resource planning (ERP) software? The answer: a lot more than you might expect. Purchasing ERP software represents a significant financial commitment, but in most cases, the software pays for itself within the first year—and will continue to generate cost savings for many years after. Where do these cost savings come from? Find out here.
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When Naghi Group’s annual revenue began to soar, it realized that running core business operations on multiple systems was no longer feasible; its current solution lacked the integration capabilities necessary to communicate with its distribution and manufacturing departments. After only a few months since integrating VAI’s enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution, Naghi has already realized its many benefits.
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Protecting your company’s data is not only wise, but often legally necessary. In order to beef up their data security programs, more companies are implementing full disk encryption (FDE). In the past, FDE was software based, which left it open to greater security risks. With the advent of new technology, however, it is now possible to migrate from software- to hardware-based FDE while still protecting your existing systems.
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What would you do if a critical error occurred during production—all because the wrong data was input into your enterprise resource planning (ERP) system? You’d probably be asking “how could this happen?” The ability to communicate information between teams can mean the difference between production success and failure. Avoid these snafus with a system that can integrate the data of both the design and ERP systems.
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Worldwide, various standards have been created to provide some form of structure with respect to delivering products and services. Over time, however, the adoption of industry compliance guidelines has seen many pitfalls, specifically with the advent of technology. Developing a sound compliance strategy requires a unified solution—one that includes all the necessary components, but also keeps the business users in mind.
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Reducing inventory and satisfying customer demand are high priorities in manufacturing and distribution. Being able to fill orders on time and satisfy every customer is an integral part of order commitment—and a very attainable goal. Advanced planning and scheduling (APS) can help your company become responsive and accurate—and that’s what counts in today’s “demand and supply” environment.
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For chemical producers Akzo Nobel, managing a complex supply chain producing more than 2,000 chemical products was an extremely complex task. Akzo Nobel decided to implement a multi-user sales and operations planning (S&OP) system that would be available company wide. Increasing its forecast visibility raised awareness of critical issues earlier—thus reducing inventory and increasing productivity on a global scale.
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For thermosetting resins producer Hexion Specialty Chemicals, a portfolio of over 50,000 stock keeping units (SKUs) created unique supply chain efficiency challenges. Hexion needed better supply chain management—the key to sustaining growth and profits. In adopting Zemeter solutions, Hexion reduced inventory by more than 20 percent and increased margins—exactly what Hexion needed to stay competitive on a global scale
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Slowdowns, scalability issues, and security gaps hit Web applications where it hurts. Data center consolidations put distance between application servers and users—producing long round-trips and slow response times. Luckily, there is a solution. Deploying a wire-speed application system—in a unified single-platform design—boosts response times, improves infrastructure scalability, and safeguards against security threats.
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Improving the supply chain is essential for any company that wants to gain or maintain a competitive edge. To do this, companies are adopting sales and operations planning (S&OP) strategies. Years ago—when the pace of market change was slow—S&OP was a nice-to-have; today it’s a business imperative! But it doesn’t have to happen overnight. By taking a five-step approach, companies can implement S&OP at their own pace.
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When it comes to disaster recovery (DR) software, companies should think of it as an insurance policy—not just software that recovers lost data. Being prepared for disaster makes good business sense, but oddly enough, few companies are. Because Linux distributions don’t include DR tools, companies must look to a file-based recovery solution that can recover the entire system and eliminate the need to rebuild.
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As a supplier to Wal-Mart, appliance manufacturer Haier America was required to implement a radio frequency identification (RFID) tagging system. To satisfy this requirement and to keep costs to a minimum, Haier needed a solution that would seamlessly integrate with its current enterprise resource planning (ERP) application. That’s why it turned to a custom-designed modification package. But was it enough for Wal-Mart?
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With data theft on the rise, many companies are forced to improve their network security. And although they spend millions of dollars every year on securing these networks, the focus has largely been on securing the access to the network rather than protecting the information itself. Secure information sharing (SIS) solutions integrate additional intelligence into the process—and protect your data without added overhead.
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Research shows that the occurrence of multivendor Internet protocol telephony (IPT) environments is on the rise. As such, an increasing number of companies are faced with the challenges of using multiple tools to manage these environments. With a single, specialized IPT management solution, companies gain a unified view across the entire voice infrastructure—which can significantly impact total cost of ownership (TCO).
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You can’t pick up a business or IT magazine today without seeing numerous articles about the growth of mobile and wireless technologies. Why are these technologies so trendy? The answer is simple: developments in mobile computing, wireless communication, bar codes, and other data collection and communications technologies help businesses extend visibility and control over the operations that really matter to them.
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It s hard to go anywhere these days and not see ads for mobile wireless carriers. But the technology is so confusing and the choices so overwhelming, it can be impossible to know which solution to choose. Before making the wrong choice, it’s best to have a basic understanding of mobile wireless communication—how it is currently being used in the industry, and how it can benefit your organization in the future.
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How can you establish a priority-based mobile networking system that provides workers access to company and customer records that they can manipulate from the field? By employing a total solution system that provides various methods of transmitting data. While this type of system may be more costly to implement than a stand-alone pager or cell phone, the benefits it offers can directly impact your bottom line.
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When it comes to two-dimensional (2D) symbologies, less is more. While 2D bar code symbols may be less costly to print, they are considerably more expensive to read, because of the complexity of developing decode algorithms. However, with the integration of public domain 2D symbologies into a range of application standards, solutions employing these codes are beginning to reach their full potential.
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How can a budget administrator, burdened with the task of gathering data from hundreds of spreadsheets from all over the organization, manage this monumental undertaking? Additionally, how to avoid using a costly packaged budget application that doesn’t take the organization’s business rules into consideration? The solution: a spreadsheet automation tool that easily adapts to the organization’s unique corporate processes.
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What is compact, lightweight, ergonomic, and power-friendly? A microelectromechanical systems (MEMS)-based scan engine—an innovative scanning technology that provides outstanding reliability and performance. When it comes to supply chain laser scanning, the advantages MEMS scanners have over traditional lasers are unparalleled. While MEMS is not a new technology, it does provide a new option for bar code scanning.
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When it comes to workers’ safety, companies shouldn’t take any chances. The growing safety, security, and regulatory and reporting requirements are forcing many organizations to implement more sophisticated systems to monitor and manage their work environments. To help determine which mobile devices are approved and appropriate to use in your work environments, it’s important to have clear guidelines on what to look for.
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One of the first and seemingly simple questions that companies ask when making IT investments is “how much does it cost?” Many often find themselves wondering why—even after a successful implementation—their costs keep going up. When evaluating a mobile workforce automation project, companies should take the time to conduct a thorough total cost of ownership (TCO) analysis to detect hidden costs—and avoid nasty surprises.
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Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology can provide a strong return on investment (ROI) when combined with improved business processes that reduce labor and prevent errors. But mobile RFID systems, with forklift-mounted readers, can be implemented for a fraction of the cost of traditional infrastructure configurations. They can improve supply chain visibility, reduce capital expenditure, and slash labor costs.
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Scanning technology has changed dramatically over the years with new, more powerful, and reliable imaging scan engines now surpassing the laser scan engines of yesterday. Although both laser and imaging technologies continue to improve, there’s a debate on which technology is superior. When researching data capture equipment, you may be asking yourself, “How do I choose the best scanner for my application?” Here’s how.
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Many companies believe their employees are their most important asset—and spend significant amounts of money every year on their training and development. But how can these companies quantify what this investment will do to their bottom line? With the right tools, decision makers can gain the critical business intelligence they’ll need to confidently invest in their human capital, and measure and report on its impact.
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To play any popular online computer game, all a user needs is a computer and an Internet connection. But there’s a lot more going on behind the scenes than this gamer may realize. In order to interact in a shared virtual environment, the system the user connects to requires technology capable of creating, operating, and modifying persistent, distributed, three-dimensional virtual worlds.
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Carefully tracking components and assemblies throughout the manufacturing process can prevent costly production and sequencing errors, but executing these procedures can be difficult. While bar codes provide accurate, efficient product identification, they are not viable in many common industrial processes. Specialized RFID tags, however, are optimized for use on or around metal, and are an effective and viable alternative.
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Going mobile has become a growing trend, with many businesses reaching well beyond the use of cellular phones as their only lines of communication. Why? Because these businesses realize that linking the mobile workforce with the enterprise and its data resources—using mobile applications—is key to enhancing productivity, profitability, and customer satisfaction. Choosing the right devices, however, can be very challenging.
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Radio frequency identification (RFID) has been around for more than thirty years, and today’s manufacturers are using this technology to help connect trading partners and align supply chains. But just as businesses need to look beyond the manufacturing supply chain to see the benefits of investing in RFID, they need to look beyond the tag to understand how RFID will create value and provide a return on investment (ROI).
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Technology has fundamentally changed the way industrial and manufacturing companies manage their businesses. Sophisticated solutions like warehouse management and enterprise relationship management (ERP) systems—with their advanced data capture and wireless networking tools—enable companies to squeeze more efficiency out of their operations by providing real-time data to all interdependent parts of the supply chain.
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In today’s global market, providing quality products and services is essential for any manufacturer’s continued growth—but maintaining a competitive edge is not always easy. For success, quality awareness must begin at the conception of the product and continue throughout the various stages of its development. To improve in this area, many manufacturers are now adopting the total quality management (TQM) approach.
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When considering any software solution, two things come to mind: flexibility and cost. With virtualization technology, multiple applications can now be hosted safely and securely on a single server, eliminating the overhead of running multiple operating systems (OS) per server. This capability can greatly reduce costs and help organizations deliver consistent service levels despite unpredictable workloads.
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Any organization that deploys multiple same-application servers with regularity could benefit from virtual appliances. Virtualization solutions eliminate the need to copy an operating system (OS) and application into each virtual environment, by creating a single, centrally installed master copy instead. It saves time on installation and enables greater levels of efficiency, manageability, flexibility, and resource use.
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New Star Asset Management was looking to maximize its existing sales channels and drive more information gathering via the Web. In order to achieve its aggressive targets, it needed to find a way to make better use of the Web, while reducing costs. Since integrating a Web content management system, New Star has seen a significant drop in Web-related expenditure—with cost savings of nearly 68 percent in the first year.
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The Web has become a vast potential business asset for many companies today. But while business users have the vision, it’s the IT department that actually creates and deploys the Web application. This often raises the question of Web site ownership. Empowering both parties with the right tools to match their respective skills can help address this question—and many others—for businesses in this confusing situation.
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Traditional business intelligence (BI) solutions are becoming a thing of the past. Companies today are moving toward business solutions that can help maintain a competitive edge while empowering business executives across the enterprise. Operational BI is an approach that incorporates traditional BI best practices with the benefits of real-time information flow, resulting in more user-directed initiatives.
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Point of sale (POS) software was designed to speed up sales checkout processes. However, it has evolved to include many more features, and is now more commonly referred to as retail management systems (RMS). The benefits of implementing RMS are clear—they can help increase profits, improve marketing strategies, automate manual processes, manage inventory, and—most importantly—make the customer experience more memorable.
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Small to medium sized businesses (SMBs) encounter many of the same challenges as larger companies in unlocking information from the data they collect, yet they lack cost-effective solutions. Many must choose between expensive business intelligence solutions or complicated homegrown solutions. With many hosted reporting solutions now available, SMBs have an option that may meet their requirements—at a fraction of the cost.
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SANs, NAS devices, corporate servers, and high-end workstations all suffer the effects of fragmentation because of their multiple physical disk drives. This is attributed to the impact of fragmentation on the logical allocation of files and their physical distribution. The solution to this problem: implementing an automatic defragmentation software solution, together with intricate modern hardware technologies.
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Virtual worlds are created for a range of purposes, including support for various industries and applications. These worlds require a distributed client-server architecture allowing applications to scale from a single-user application to a large-scale environment. However, if your developers are going to concentrate on the application of virtual environments, the hard technology problems need to be solved in advance.
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A customer relationship management (CRM) solution is now a standard business requirement. With origins as a system for sales teams, CRM has clearly evolved into a mandatory tool for providing benefit to the entire organization. However, methodology and training play instrumental roles in successful CRM implementations; if designed well, these critical components will ultimately ensure user buy-in and success.
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Small to medium businesses (SMBs) like yours are the lifeblood of the economy. However, you may feel you need an operational boost—one that transforms your enterprise into a customer-focused business with the ability for future growth. An integrated suite of applications can give your business processes the depth and flexibility to achieve what a collection of stand-alone applications cannot.
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The process of implementing a new enterprise solution is incredibly complex. This process can send your organization down a long road of beneficial—and sometimes painful—change. The good news, though, is that if the implementation is done right the first time, you won’t have to travel that road again. The key question: how do you do it right?
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External forces can knock your business off balance with no warning. Spikes in fuel prices, worker strikes, and shipping delays can significantly stress the supply chains of manufacturers, logistics providers, and retailers. To meet these external challenges, you need the capability to extend supply chain visibility, respond to changes in real time, and improve performance measurement across the entire chain.
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Small to medium businesses (SMBs) need technology to survive in a competitive business environment. However, regardless of the business type, size, or industry, incorporating technology into existing frameworks involves risk—to productivity, customer service, operations, and the bottom line! The key to reducing risk and increasing productivity is thus the selection of technologies that will accommodate change in your business.
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The average personal computer (PC) costs an enterprise $10,000 (USD) per year to own and maintain—five times the purchase price of the hardware and software! Is it possible to reduce the total cost of ownership (TCO) of technology platforms? Voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) manageability can be a crucial step in self-provisioning users and unburdening valuable network professionals.
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Enterprises of all sizes are adopting Internet protocol (IP) telephony for cost savings and productivity gains—but high quality voice service takes more than just buying the latest equipment. Is IP telephony right for your organization and your network? Get the straight facts from an industry leader—along with a 7-step assessment and deployment checklist for a successful implementation.
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Effective communication uses many senses, but visual communication provides huge amounts of information, and can convey all sorts of meanings. Face to face, we can rely on visual cues; however, the amount of information transmitted via distant communication is limited by cost and complexity. And when the costs of transportation rise, broader use of remote visual communications becomes increasingly practical.
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There is a considerable need to understand how technical performance and the problems within the technical infrastructure impact the capabilities of the business itself. The majority of companies can only measure specific asset and application performance, whereas many issues within the infrastructure lie at the transport level, where packet switching can present both great opportunities and major issues.
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Information management, which includes both data and content management, is an essential element of service-oriented architecture (SOA). Taking a service-oriented approach to information data can thus help you achieve greater value from your information assets. Implementing master data management (MDM) services can provide a multiplier effect, by delivering high-value business services over and above information integration services.
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Predictions of the death of software are overstated. In reality, businesses are becoming more reliant on technology, not less. What’s changing, however, is the number of options available for managing, delivering, and paying for software applications. Many independent software vendors recognize the benefits of offering software as a service--a delivery alternative that can present long-term benefits for all parties.
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Domain name system (DNS) best practices are becoming more standardized. However, DNS services are often overlooked simply because they are so commonplace. The result is poorly configured services that are either not fully functional, or easily compromised. To ensure that the Internet remains a reliable medium for information and commerce, further implementation of secure and efficient DNS will be required.
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Small to medium businesses have typically built their own domain name system (DNS) and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) services, used Windows DNS/DHCP, or turned to a hosted service provider for these services. This approach may appear to offer tremendous savings, but contains many hidden costs and risks that are not always apparent until a catastrophic loss of service occurs.
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To understand the power of cache poisoning and pharming, imagine that you’re logging on to your Internet banking service. The page looks a little odd, but the address is correct, and it has the same fields as usual. You might enter your credentials without thinking twice. Unfortunately, you’ve just provided a criminal syndicate with the contents of your bank account.
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There are seven core operational measures that can be leveraged to fine-tune a company’s business processes and achieve a higher return on capital employed (RoCE). Even modest gains in these measurements can spur a significant increase in RoCE. If the level of performance against each core operational measure rises by just one percentage point, for example, RoCE can nearly double.
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Most articles about the pitfalls of software implementation projects highlight the mistakes made during implementation. Examples include poor project management, scope creep, uncommitted users, or lack of an executive sponsor. All of these areas of focus are valid, but often we forget that before starting the implementation, somehow we had to choose a package and sign a contract.
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To respond to the demands of today’s highly competitive global environment, traditional linear supply chains are evolving into complex, global ecosystems. These “pull” (demand-driven) environments working in conjunction with traditional “push” environments are known as adaptive supply chain networks (ASCNs). ASCNs allow all supply chain stakeholders to share knowledge, make collaborative decisions, and sense and respond immediately to changing conditions.
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Data centers are squeezed by a variety of pressures, such as power consumption, heating, ventilating, and air conditioning (HVAC) requirements, new servers, human error, patching, asset tracking, and more. On top of this, you have to keep up with dynamically changing business requirements. One of the key ways you can address these dilemmas, however, is through server consolidation using virtualization.
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Warehousing processes are critical for the success of a distribution business. These processes are highly visible to your customers, and have a direct impact on their opinion of your company. If you cannot get the goods to your customers in the most efficient way, you risk losing their business. Your warehousing and logistics operations must translate into reliability and service.
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Increased global competition, pricing pressure, and the need to rationalize resources have made business and operational measurement vital on all organizational levels. That’s why business intelligence and data warehousing tools are no longer only for the exclusive use of financial controllers. Instead, they are everyday tools across company divisions, giving relevant and efficient information overviews of all areas of responsibility.
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When choosing a payroll software vendor, there are numerous considerations that must be taken into account when narrowing down the choices. Obviously, you have to decide on a software that meets your needs within budget. However, it’s just as important to consider the other factors that can make a huge impact on the overall success of your payroll software selection.
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Veolia Transport required a locally supported yet highly capable financial product that could be tailored to suit its needs. With over 100 years of public transport operations experience in 25 countries, the company quickly understood that Greentree was exactly what they needed to help transform Auckland’s rail system into a modern, efficient, and integrated public transport service.
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Organización Papelera Tauro (OPT) es una organización cuyoprincipal enfoque está basado en cinco líneas de negocio:papelería, consumibles de cómputo, equipo de cómputo, cafetería y limpieza.Sus líneas de negocio han ido creciendo en paralelo al crecimiento de la organización,pero todo esto no hubiera sido posible sin el apoyo tecnológico de Intelisis. A raíz de la implantación de Intelisis ERP, OPT ha visto beneficios tangibles, tanto en su operación como en el mantenimiento de la solución.
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Abrica.net is a "software-as-service" collaboration solution that enables supply chain partners, of all sizes, to quickly, easily and inexpensively exchange business documents. To send a supply chain document, simply "print" it to the Abrica printer.
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Availl, Inc, the leading solution provider of sales, supply chain management, and logistic services for the aviation industry. Learn how it used Click Commerce Service Parts Optimization solutions to extend its inventory planning capabilities, enable comprehensive demand forecasting, and provide Web-based visibility into global inventories.
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Delta is the world’s second largest airline in terms of passengers carried and the leading US carrier across the Atlantic, offering daily flights to 502 destinations in 88 countries. With $1 billion (USD) worth of parts inventory at one time, Delta needed a supply chain system to aid the company’s maintenance, repair, and operations (MRO) activities. Learn how Delta implemented a full MRO technology suite from Click Commerce, that focuses on supply chain management, configuration management, technical documentation, planning, and execution.
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This paper discusses best practices observed from the most successful inbound logistics programs of manufacturing organizations in the automotive industry and among consumer packaged goods manufacturers. It also discusses the role of third-party logistics (3PL) service providers in terms of transportation and warehousing.
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Every corporation needs to make decisions about the selection and implementation if new IT solutions on a regular basis. However, an industrial manufacturer or retailer cannot see this as being one of their core competencies. In most cases such a selection process is seen as a necessary evil rather than a challenge that uncovers new potentials within the company. Only the ones that are able to fully understand and control this process in conjunction with all internally and externally involved parties will be more successful then others. The implementation of new IT solutions can be a chance to increase efficiency, but only if the right goals are defined, the right solutions and partners selected, and results are being monitored on a continual basis. This white paper was designed to deliver you many hints on what to consider and help you reach your goals in your IT selection process faster.
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Extending supply lines overseas brings new commercial and operational challenges that are far more complex than ever before. Enterprises are exposed to an entirely new universe of costs and liabilities, operations, and resource and management needs. Next generation global cost control systems can help organizations overcome these challenges. These systems help enterprises understand the real time cost impacts and financial liabilities of global sourcing initiatives--while protecting profits.
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Tal como sucede con todas las empresas que mantienen una evolución y crecimiento constantes, hace un par de años Spring Air se enfrentaba con el grave problema de que la información se encontraba en diferentes sistemas que, en la mayoría de los casos, no estaban entrelazados
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Metro Canada Logistics, a third party provider of warehousing, transporatation, and related logistics services streamlines accounting processes with the help of Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains.
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Productization of services is accomplished by associating tangible features with intangible service offerings. Tangible features may take the form of personnel, collateral, methodologies, pricing, facilities, or other attributes. Automation tools like enterprise service automation, database, and project management tools serve as enablers to service productization. By associating tangible features with intangible services, the professional services firm can build client confidence.
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Innovative companies improve efficiencies by integrating logistics and transportation functions with critical operating processes. By factoring transportation constraints into the planning and execution of warehousing, production and fulfillment, these companies are outperforming their competition.
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Dynamic efficiencies can help companies combat margin erosion and cope with compressed product lifecycles. By shifting from advanced planning to adaptive planning, enterprises can increase their top and bottom line. Integrating the demand planning network, optimizing the supply chain network, and strengthening execution planning will help this move to adaptive planning and eliminate pockets of waste.
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Simulation can remedy one time and ongoing problems in the warehouse. Learn about the technology of computer stimulation and how it can benefit senior management in the logistics, distribution, and warehousing industries. This paper will describe the benefits of simulation as an analytical tool and the industrial lessons learned from failed simulation projects.
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Wilden began to investigate several customer relationship management (CRM) packages in the market including: Maximizer Enterprise, PeopleSoft, Siebel, Pivotal and Oracle. The Company knew it would require some customization assistance from the vendor but it also wanted the capability to manage the new technology in-house. Maximizer Enterprise was the only one that was flexible enough-it fit their sales channel model and had the knowledgeable Professional Services staff that the Wilden team felt comfortable with - along with the overall package to fit within their budget.
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