Supply chain disruptions push manufacturers to the cloud

Following an extensive early adopter program, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software provider SYSPRO has launched its Cloud ERP deployment option to Australian manufacturers and distributors. The company says that SYSPRO Cloud ERP provides businesses with the agility to meet evolving market demands amid ongoing supply chain disruptions — offering manufacturers the ability to collaborate in real time, the capacity to adopt best industry practice, the proficiency to customise requirements and reduce IT infrastructure, resilience and management costs, as well as the ability to future-proof operations.

Research shows that the vulnerabilities caused by supply chain disruptions have increased focus on resiliency, transparency and visibility. According to a recent SYSPRO global research survey, ‘Realigning the links of the disconnected supply chain’, 70% of manufacturing and distribution businesses experienced supply chain disruptions over the last few years. Added to those pressures, 60% of businesses were unable to engage and collaborate with customers and suppliers in real time. While collaboration and supply chain disruptions have been the biggest areas of impact, only 45% of businesses have the systems in place to address these disruptions and effectively collaborate with external suppliers and customers.

“Manufacturers have come to realise that in order to overcome supply chain disruptions, their business operations need to consider a different approach to ensure supply-chain resiliency,” said Paulo De Matos, Chief Product Officer at SYSPRO. “We are now witnessing a time where manufacturers and distributors are considering the value in the journey towards digital transformation with cloud at the centre of that strategy. With the pandemic, their cautious hesitancy to adopt cloud systems has been largely allayed as they acknowledge that the cloud allows for collaboration, communication and business continuity.”

The SYSPRO research study also revealed that only 20% of manufacturing and distribution businesses have looked at investing in big data analytics in response to ongoing disruptions. Without these data insights in hand, businesses have had no visibility into shifts along the supply chain and they lack the ability to collaborate with customers and suppliers in real time.

“The pandemic showed the importance of connectedness for the industry to engage with all stakeholders (suppliers or customers) in real time. To do this, manufacturers require cloud-enabled business systems underpinned by meaningful data to secure their digital future,” de Matos said. “By integrating operations into a Cloud ERP platform, manufacturers could have real-time access to customer and supplier data as well as tap into emerging technologies with the right capabilities to ensure agility and connectivity with their external eco-system.”

The survey additionally revealed that almost 70% of businesses have opted to focus on a digitalisation strategy to overcome future disruptions. For many businesses, this involves the conversion of business processes over to use digital technologies and a shift away from analog or manual systems.

“For manufacturers considering the benefits of an ERP system to help them on their journey towards digitalisation, it is worthwhile to investigate the multiple benefits of deployment of that system into the cloud,” said Rob Stummer, Asia Pacific CEO at SYSPRO. “Additionally, resilience of IT operations and compliance challenges such as backups, recovery management as well as the ongoing requirement to ensure suitable performance of the ERP solution is also negated.”

Image caption: Rod Stummer, Asia Pacific CEO, SYSPRO.