\\\ Manufacturing \\\ Success story
Permastore reduces time and builds platform for growth with Epicor 9
U
K company Permastore is one of the world's leading tank and silo manufacturers, and has supplied more than 90,000 structures in over 110 countries. With a history
going back to 1959, it has substantial experience in engineering and manufacturing bolted modular structures to international standards, designing customised products from standard parts.
In its long history the company has always invested in technology to give its customers the best products and run the business as efficiently as possible. The company first started using Epicor’s Vantage product in 2004, which reportedly revolutionised all areas of the business with a quote-
“
to-order-to-cash solution. Through its continued use of technology Permastore, using the same level of resources, is now processing three times the order value compared to five years ago. The company believes that its technology infrastructure has been a significant contributor to this success.
wanted, take advantage of new technology, and integrate our ERP system with plant machinery; we would have to upgrade our systems. We wanted to remove any technology limitations, and get a platform in place that would support the future of the business.”
Epicor 9 is a very flexible system. We can connect to factory machines, other software, and work in real-time with it using the DMT and Epicor Service Connect. Upgrades take time, but with careful planning and tools such as the data migration tool, you can reach go live quicker than you would expect.”
– Simon Stevens, Permastore. Time to upgrade
However in late 2008, Permastore decided that it was time to upgrade to Epicor’s next-generation ERP solution, Epicor 9, as its use of Vantage had reached a point where the company felt no more could be achieved from the system in its current form. “Vantage had served us well and made a huge difference to the business,” said Simon Stevens, business systems and development manager at Permastore. “But we had reached a point in 2008 where we knew that to get the features we
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MANUFACTURING &LOGISTICS
IT March 2011 Challenges
The plan to upgrade was conceived at the end of 2008 and work began in 2009 on the upgrade to Epicor 9. Permastore’s aim was to maintain the investment already made in Epicor software and the extensive knowledge base within the company. Epicor 9 was perceived to provide a platform where the system would easily adapt and grow with the
changing business processes, continue to provide a tool to improve efficiency and enable the use of newly established technologies, such as RFID (radio frequency identification).
The team decided at the planning stages that it wanted to create a clean deployment of Epicor 9 and migrate the data across rather than simply applying a software update to Vantage. This created its own set of challenges and would normally be expected to extend the life of a project substantially. The main reason for taking this approach was that the existing solution had collected a great
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