Product and Company Sustainability Assessment
In part 6 of our WMS for SYSPRO series, we will cover the importance of selecting your WMS based on product and company sustainability. This is an often-overlooked factor in the selection process, but choosing the right WMS reseller is just as critical as choosing the right WMS system.
TREAT THE SELECTION LIKE A BUSINESS PARTNERSHIP
The WMS environment is a specialized field. It is more than a software procurement decision. In order to provide strong business support, WMS Resellers should be specialists in both the ERP system and supply chain management. You should see this as a business partnership over the years to come.
We suggest reviewing your potential partner’s financials, company’s premises, goals, and service providers. Here are the following information to look for when evaluating your WMS Resellers:
- Review their last three years’ financials.
- How much of the annual license fee revenue is pumped back into product R&D?
- What strategic modules does the Reseller intend to build into the product over the next 12 months?
- Visit the company’s premises to ascertain the level of professionalism. (Meet the staff; look at the Business Plan for the fiscal; look at the individual staff goals; what is the level of morale?; look at their support department and see how support calls are managed; look at the development department and obtain a broad understanding of the development methodologies, etc.)
- What are the WMS Reseller’s goals for the next five years?
- Is the WMS Reseller a Microsoft Gold Partner, and if so, what system did
- Microsoft audit?
- Look at the Reseller’s DSP (Service Providers) Channel and who the client will be dealing with after Go-Live.
BUILDING A PROFESSIONAL DISTRIBUTION NETWORK
At DATASCOPE , we are committed to building a professional distribution network across the world. This network is known as the DATASCOPE DSP’s – DATASCOPE Solution Partners.
Each partner is very carefully selected by DATASCOPE . They will typically be a smaller team of professional SYSPRO or warehousing experts – often both. DATASCOPE then gives a full commitment to each new partner for one year. During this year we complete two or three implementations with the first implementation being run by DATASCOPE with the new DSP staff doing a lot of the day-to-day work. The second implementation normally sees the DSP taking a lead on the project with DATASCOPE involved heavily in all project meetings and the third project is run by the DSP with some input from DATASCOPE .