1.

Latest Trends in ERP Market with Special Focus on Fashion & Lifestyle
Industry
Over the last decade, the ERP market has fast evolved with vendors offering enterprise
wide solutions that have a wide range of functionality, can be integrated to other business
solutions, and are scalable to growing business needs. The market in the next decade will
see paradigm shift driven by wide changes being witnessed in pricing models,
deployment methods, and vertical market adaptations. In addition, advancement in
technologies, vendors are offering intuitive, user-friendly, and customized solutions.
Different cloud deployment models such as SaaS is generating huge buzz among
enterprises. The pay-as-per usage pricing model has made it largely popular with
organizations looking to replace significant capital expenditures with a monthly
subscription cost. Coupled with this, anytime-anywhere access has made the ERP cloud
technology nearly ubiquitous.
User-friendly ERP Systems
What makes any ERP the most successful? The number of users who start using it, and
hence adoptability is the key. ERP vendors will focus towards making user-interface
more friendly and intuitive. Attractive dashboard, easy-to-use ERP features and mobility
are key factors that will motivate next generation workforce to adopt ERP solutions.
Mobility
Mobility—anytime and anywhere access on any mobile device—will be no more fad but
a fixture. The complete back office and front office operation will be available on
smartphones and tablets. Managers, executives, and workers can seamlessly manage key
business operations on-the-go. Mobile ERP will render unparalleled flexibility to
organizations. Mobile-first or mobile-only approach will be a key feature of post-modern
ERP solution.
Integrated ERP
One of the prominent emerging trends driving the ERP market growth is the demand for
seamless integration—across several applications and platforms. For instance, ERP
integration with CRM will be hassle-free and automated, offering a host of benefits, such
as access to real time data and tracking of customer orders. Furthermore, the integration
with existing or new modules can lead to significant reduction of hardware and software
costs.
Demand for Cloud-based Solutions
Over the next decade, many emerging vendors will offer tough competition to IT
stalwarts such as Oracle and SAP by launching out-of-box cloud-based ERP solutions.
The prominence of SaaS solutions will be driven by numerous benefits: automatic
updates, patch management, universal accessibility, and heightened security. In addition,
demand for multi-tenant version of the ERP software will offer momentum to the market
growth. Cloud-based models will be particularly useful to SMEs with constrained budget
as they can reap the benefits of enterprise-wide ERP solutions without making significant
IT spending.
Internet of Things
Internet of things (IoT) provides seamless network connectivity to all the connected
physical devices or sensors and enables these devices to exchange data over a specified
network without human intervention. Adoption of IoT along with ERP will open up vistas
of possibilities which will make ERP solution intelligent, real-time, and flexible. For
instance, manufactures can collect, analyse and process volumes of data from sensors,
helping companies to offer new services. This will result in more customer-centric
strategies for businesses.

BENEFITS OF ERP IN APPAREL INDUSTRY

Reduction in cycle time:

As of now, allocation of material to specific customer order is not possible with the
current system. Such allocations are useful for making deliveries as planned, as there is
no possibility of the material, which is required by one order, getting consumed for
different order. In such cases earlier order would get delayed if material were not
available in the stock while production time is spent on other order, which could have
waited without causing any problem.

Cost savings:
Company losses 2% of its sales value in discounts, which are the result of surplus
production, implementing quality management system can help to bring down excess
production, as management will be assured of the quality right from the raw material
itself. Supplier developer module would be useful in proper selection of suppliers, which
can focus on quality, cost and delivery aspects of supplier.

Reduction in machinery downtime:

5 % machinery downtime is attributed to non-availability of raw material in the stores.
This is due to absence of proper planning system and due to communication delays at
every place because of information recompiling. Prompt communication coupled with
effective supplier selection module and planning system would be useful in bringing
down the machinery downtime.

Improvement in sales:
75 % customers place repeat orders. Three factors-price, order and delivery affect orders.
Integrated system will definitely be useful on this account. Price is one of the causes of
losing customers; there is ample scope for cost reduction and therefore company can offer
lower prices and incentives to attract customers through integrated information
management solution.

Customer satisfaction:
Current system is ineffective in tracking problems related to customers. The response
regarding effectiveness falls in unsatisfactory category. Capacity planning for received
order also falls in average category. Efficient capacity management system can bring
down the delivery time for execution of the order and improve customer satisfaction. This
 management scheme can be very useful in maintaining better customer relations with
prompt response and by knowing their past history. Well formulated procedures for
customer dialog will be useful in having better customer relations. It takes approximately
3 days to answer any of customers queries. This period can be brought down to a day,
which will have very good impact on customers perception of the organisation.

Thus, due to the globalisation information Technology has become a very important asset
to the textile industry. With the development of the data management system for
production and on-line data monitoring systems on the latest machines, the textile
industry will flourish with all the glory to it.

2. Difference Between How Past and Present Trend Have Changed in ERP

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems have been widely applied across a range of
industries. An ERP system is a complete, enterprise-wide, business solution consisting of
software modules for various business functions (finance, sales, operations, etc.) with an
integrated centralised database. Previous research suggests that the fashion industry is
characterised by very specific and complex issues which make implementation of generic
ERP systems in fashion businesses problematic. For example, a fashion style is not a
single product, there are many variations in size, colour and fabrics for each style, so any
system must be able to manage the very wide range of products being designed,
manufactured and sold. For this reason, ERP implementation in fashion businesses
usually involves significant customisation or the use of a vertical solution. Vertical
solutions are standardised pre-configured systems tailored to a specific sector, with “add-
ons” to match the sector’s requirements.
In a progressively IT driven global economic environment, it is indeed a very important
and necessary to promote and facilitate adoption of IT in the textile industry and trade
also to help this industry to remain in the national/international competitive market. Some
of the Indian Textile Mills has started using an Information Technology for over the last
10 years in specific areas of service functions like payroll, purchase, store, accounting,
establishment etc. Later on, the use of information technology has been extended to other
fields in textile industry like development of data management system for production on-
line data monitoring system provided on different control/monitoring systems on latest
machines. For a most modern textile mills, one can think of application of information
technology which can be used right from the purchase of cotton from the fields as per
specifications, fibres from factories, hire the places equipped with the machinery’s as per
the requirements, plan the production of different items as per schedule, maintain the
quality of output product and lastly helps in selling the end product through internet.
For many of today’s established organizations, the path to success and the evolution of
business management technology are closely interwoven. The advancement and
diversification of enterprise resource planning (ERP) software have enabled businesses to
integrate new technologies into their supply chain processes to drive forward their
performance, leading to a variety of benefits.
The last half-decade has seen ERP solutions evolve into versatile and multi-faceted tools
that help small, medium and large organizations run their business. However, ERP
technically has a long history that can be traced back to the 1960s, when early software
systems were based on automation for individual functions, such as inventory
management.
This began with Material Requirement Planning (MRP) in the 1970s and 1980s. MRP
further evolved and was called MRP II. While MRP was primarily concerned with
materials, MRP II was concerned with the integration of all aspects of the manufacturing
process, including materials, finance, and human relations.
The term “Enterprise Resource Planning” was only coined in the 1990s by The Gartner
Group to describe the next generation of MRP software. The purpose was to integrate all
facets of the business enterprise under one suite of software applications. The definition
of ERP would be broadened to include almost any type of large integrated software
package.
During this time the basic models that are the mainstay of ERP software were introduced
and firmly embedded into the design. These included the now-familiar system
architecture in which the client’s computers are wholly separate from the server. This
allows hosting of resources such as databases, in central locations and distributing
resources, like user interface and reporting services, to other locations.
Digital ERP Revolution
In the 2000s ERP II was established as new, internet software gave real-time access to
ERP solutions. With this new software came access to other functionality outside of the
business, such as customer relationship management (CRM) and supply chain
management (SCM). In addition, the continuing digital revolution and increasingly
affordable computer processing power have brought changes to virtually every area of
business operation.
In 2010 the evolution of Internet technologies and programming languages has finally
reached the cloud, where businesses can operate efficiently and have entire infrastructure
moved into it. This was perhaps the biggest boost to the expansion and evolution of ERP
software capabilities and driven by the universal availability of the Internet and the
simultaneous development of web-based technologies. This allowed the possibilities of
having data stored, managed, and accessed from anywhere with an Internet connection.
This solution brings the benefits of full functionality that ERP Software has to
offer without purchasing and maintaining an entire IT infrastructure. The systems offer a
high degree of flexibility that allows the users to manage their businesses anytime and
anywhere.
Many organizations are either already in the cloud or have plans to migrate their ERP in
the near future. While on-premise applications are by no means dead, there will likely be
a much larger shift in businesses moving to the cloud in the coming decades.
Today’s ERP software barely resembles that of past decades. Businesses of all sizes and
specialties have the ability to tailor these systems to fit their unique needs, improving
efficiencies, production and a long list of other benefits. What has held true throughout its
life span, is that ERP continues to control, monitor, analyse and forecast the health of
every part of the business as a whole.
3. Conclusion

The introduction of a new information system such as an ERP system will definitely
change the way people work. The platform is new, new and different interfaces, data
entry is changed and report formats are different. Users often find these changes
unnecessary and therefore refuse to accept them. One of the ways to address and reduce
the impact of these changes is to encourage user participation in the implementation of
ERP systems.
The past research has focused on ERP adoption, success measurement, success factors
among other technical aspects of ERP implementation. An information system, including
an ERP system, is user-interfaced and designed to provide information processing
capability to support the strategy, operations, management analysis, and decision-making
functions in an organization. The user is at the centre of an information system.
ERP implementations are expensive and complex undertakings, but once they are
successfully implemented, significant improvements can be achieved such as easier
access to reliable information, elimination of redundant data and operations, reduction of
cycle times, increased efficiency hence reducing costs.
The implementation of an ERP system differs from that of any traditional information
system due to its integrated nature which causes dramatic changes on work flow,
organizational structure and on the way people do their jobs; Most ERP systems are not
built but adopted and thus they involve a mix of business process reengineering (BPR)
and package customization; and ERP implementation is not just a technical exercise but it
is a socio-technical challenge as it poses new set of management procedures.
In that sense, it has become clear that ERP implementation differs from traditional
systems development where the key focus has shifted from a heavy emphasis on technical
analysis and programming towards business process design and human elements. Unlike
most home-growth legacy systems that were designed to fit individual working
convention, ERP systems provide best practices, in other words generic processes and
functions at their outset.
Alignment of the standard ERP processes with the organization’s business process has
been considered as an important step in the ERP implementation process. Implementing a
packaged ERP system inevitably changes the way people work. Successful
implementation of an ERP system requires cooperation among different parties and
departments.
In conclusion, that ERP implementation is a complex IT-related social phenomenon. A
substantial number of ERP implementations fail with a number of potential explanations
for these failures presented. These failures, according to literature, may broadly be
classified as human/organizational, technical, and economic. While each of these is
important, there appears to be a growing consensus among researchers that human
factors, more than technical or economic, are critical to the success of ERP projects.