Authored by Dr. Andrew Sknar. D365 National Practice Lead, Associate Director, Velrada.
In the contemporary world of ERP solutions, it is no longer just financial focus (hence ERP implementations have broader benefits compared to the obsolete positioning of FMIS). When we see the market opportunity for the new ERP project, it is typically not about technology but about the Business Benefits that companies or organisations expect to receive as a result of implementation.
Depending on the scale of implementation it may be a Program of Work or an isolated Project. Angles of application, while not just Finance (as a backbone), can either be Externally Margin-focused: Supply Chain, Sales optimization or Internally Efficiency-focused: Resource / Asset management. From what we have experienced recently – there is a growing demand in the Asset-Intense industries for optimisation solutions. It includes service industries where the aim is to combine both aspects of the business: Utilisation and Profitability. In that sense, Assets are much broader than Fixed Assets (though can be linked to them in some specific cases).
To make that work, there are multiple options. To find the optimal one is a challenge. With the structured scientific approach, we solved the equation. 😊
As published, we partner with Dynaway to expand our Asset Management solutions within ERP, offering even greater scalability and capability. Read more about Velrada’s partnership with Dynaway here. With our certified consultants already skilled in the platform, we’re actively bringing it to market to help asset-intensive industries optimise their operations. From full lifecycle support to scheduled maintenance and streamlined workflows, this partnership ensures organisations have the right tools to maximise efficiency and performance. But what are the broader options? We are positioning it in the diagram below:
In implementations we are positioning either D365 BC with Dynaway (that has strength in Asset-centric view, financial foundation, advanced Project/ Job Costing) as a stand-alone easy-to-manage solution (that can be deployed even just in a couple of weeks), or also adding it with additional capabilities from our own IP (such as vBulk and PowerWorker for Assets). It is important to mention that this solution works not only for own assets but also covering Client Assets (where Technicians provide Services, but those are not treated as own Fixed Assets).
With our Extended Dataverse integration there is an additional layer of benefits provided by D365 CE / Field Service – it brings more operational flexibility, advanced allocation of the Work Orders to Technicians, Rostering and Routing. Key reasons for using Dataverse integration table mappings (though Extended and optimised by our IP) are:
- Coupling entities via Dataverse for enhanced control and query capabilities (Account in CE is directly Coupled with Customer in BC) that allows opening one from another in one click.
- Using established framework with Job Queues, Error handling, Syncronisation Log and achieving near-real-time integration with accurate, real-time data.
In the more complex manufacturing projects of a scale there is an option to use Finance and Operations (FnO) where Asset Management is embedded as a module, that is also connected to D365 CE/FS via Dual Writes and extended with our PowerWorker for Assets. This is typically a longer cycle of implementation and enterprise level of functional complexity of modules. Key elements of comparison (similarity) and strength are shown below:
