ERP stands for enterprise resource planning. ERP is a system which integrates management of a business as a whole, for effective use of management resources, and to improve the efficiency of an enterprise. Initially, ERP was targeted for manufacturing industry mainly for planning and managing core business like production and financial market. As the growth and merits of ERP package ERP software is designed for basic process of a company from manufacturing to small shops with a target of integrating information across the company. Now a days organization are considering ERP system as their backbone and a vital organizational tool.
In today’s market there are different ERP products like SAP, BAAN, JD Edwards, Oracle Financials, Siebel and PeopleSoft etc. Among all the ERP’s most of the companies implemented or trying to implement SAP because of the flexibility and number of advantages aver other ERP packages.
SAP is the name of a company founded in 1972 under the German name (Systems, Applications, and Products in Data Processing) is the leading ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) software package. There are number of companies planning to implement SAP or are already implemented SAP. It’s highly configurable, highly secure data handling, minimum data redundancy, max data consistency; you can capitalize on economics of sales like purchasing, tight integration-cross function.
As per the recent market share update of 2012, SAP has a 25% market share in comparison to 13% of oracle and 6% of sage. And the Software as a service is expected to grow at 12% year on year. There are companies who provide SAP Consultancy services by implementing SAP into your business or providing maintenance services on a yearly basis. SAP also provides its support services to customer.
The major advantage of implementing SAP ERP package to your business is its functionality, user friendliness, flexible structure and real-time integration etc.
The application area of a SAP ERP package is called functional modules and followings are top 10 major modules;
- Sales and Distribution
- Financial Accounting
- Controlling
- Human resource management
- Production planning
- Material Management
- Work Flow
- Plant Maintenance
- Project System
- Quality Management