Review of Exact SoftwareBy Michael Burns published
in the CAmagazine
August 2005
Exact Software is a leading player in the European mid-market
for enterprise resource planning systems, and has recently been gaining momentum
in North America. It entered the market with the purchase of a number of ERP systems,
including Macola, JobBOSS, MAX, and Alliance/MFG. Headquartered in the Netherlands,
it operates in more than 60 countries and has more than 180,000 customers and
2,000-plus employees worldwide, including about 450 across North America. The
company has offices in both and Montreal and Cambridge, Ont. Exact took
a different approach than many of its competitors with the release of e-Synergy
a couple of years ago. This Web-based product runs on Microsoft Internet Explorer
and includes customer relationship management, e-commerce and portals, as well
as project, human resource, workflow, event and document/ knowledge management.
These are often called front-office applications, while financials, distribution
and production are considered back office. What makes e-Synergy so interesting
is that it is a powerful CRM system in its own right, and is tightly integrated
with Exact's back-office systems. Since the front and back offices share one database
(Microsoft SQL Server), you have no integration issues and all of your information
is kept up to the second — in real time. When prospects respond to
an e-mail and enter their personal information, the system automatically updates
the contact database. You can check for duplicates and add or merge the information.
A workflow request is sent to the appropriate people for follow-up. When a customer
places an order, the pricing used in the back-office system also appears on the
website. The system offers a centralized view of all customers and their activities
(workflow, financial transactions, support issues) from anywhere, anytime. Customers,
suppliers and partners can also manage their accounts through secure portals. With
about 300 customers in North America, e-Synergy is starting to make a name for
itself here. North American sales for the product nearly doubled in 2004, the
second year on the market. That growth is likely to continue, since Exact has
a good story to tell and is investing marketing dollars in both Canada and the
US. Exact offers several choices for the back office, including Exact Globe
Enterprise, Macola ES, JobBOSS, MAX and Alliance/MFG. The company is making the
biggest investment in Globe, which is just being introduced to the North American
market. It has only about 100 customers in North America, with fewer than 15 in
Canada. But Globe has extensive functionality, including financials, distribution,
light manufacturing, MRP, a configurator and project management. Target
market
Exact is targeted to small and medium-sized businesses with from
$10 million to $50 million in revenue, as well as manufacturing and distribution
companies and divisions of multinationals — a great potential market. Parent
companies likely use one of the Tier One products such as SAP, PeopleSoft or Oracle.
But these systems are often too much for the various divisions. Globe was built
to integrate with other systems using eXtended markup language (XML), which has
become the standard for integration. Cost
The Globe product,
including e-Synergy, general ledger, accounts receivable, accounts payable, distribution,
order processing, inventory control and purchasing costs $25,000 plus $1,500 per
named user (i.e., any employee who would access the system). Production costs
another $25,000. You could also buy e-Synergy as a standalone system for $10,000,
plus $1,500 per named user. Analysis
| Assets |
Liabilities | |
Unified database. e-Synergy shares the same database as its back-office
systems. | e-Synergy does not share the same
user interface as the back-office systems. There are also different levels of
integration with the various back-office systems, with the Globe product having
the tightest integration. | | Web-based.
You can access the e-Synergy system over the Internet, or over your intranet
with Microsoft Internet Explorer. | At present,
only e-Synergy is Web-based. | | Costs.
Exact will offer a competitive price, and
there is no charge for your customers, suppliers or business partners to access
e-Synergy. | Exact
charges use of the system on a named- user basis rather than a concurrent-user
basis. This means you pay a licence fee for every user, no matter how much time
they are on the system. | | Canadian
content. e-Synergy and Globe Enterprise are both available in several languages,
including French. | Canadian payroll is not
available now, but is scheduled for the end of 2005. | |
Work flow. Work flow is built right into e-Synergy and includes rules
for routing transactions. Alerts are also available with Exact Event Manager. |
| | Business intelligence.
e-Synergy comes with pivot tables for analysis of multiple dimensions from
sales, customer service, marketing, etc. | The
pivot tables are not built using online analytical processing (OLAP) cubes. OLAP
has become the industry standard for slicing and dicing across multiple dimensions. |
| Projects. e-Synergy includes tools for
managing projects, tracking time and approving expenses. |
There is no weekly view to enter time across multiple clients and projects.
However, a professional services automation (PSA) template can be purchased as
an add-on. It includes a weekly timesheet. Expenses are not integrated with accounts
payable. | | Outlook integration.
e-Synergy will synchronize calendars and contacts. You can also have e-mails
sent to contacts attached to the e-Synergy contact database. |
| | Document management.
Document management includes version control, security for levels of access, mail
merge, etc. | | Bottom
line
The e-Synergy product does not make a lot of sense as a standalone
solution unless your organization is focused on services and has no need for an
ERP system. For manufacturers and distributors, the biggest advantage lies in
the sharing of one database with the back-office system. But if you are looking
for a tightly integrated back office or are currently using one of Exact's ERP
systems, e-Synergy just might be your ticket.
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