Hey there,

I am currently a student seeking a degree in Business but also understand the importance of technology so I am minoring in Information Technology. I am curious about ERP systems as that is what I am learning about in my Management Information Systems class. ERP systems seem to be the future for business operations and I was wondering if anyone sees them being easier to implement in the future? And if they do become easier, why would that be? I understand now that ERP systems can take a very long time to get working smoothly in some businesses which can lead to loss of money and possibily bankruptcy but I believe they are very beneficial when they do work well. Any insight would be greatly appreciated, THANK YOU!

Currently there are two major drawbacks when it comes to implementing ERP systems. One is the high cost associated with ERP systems. And another is integrating a system to the current processes. I think your question is more related to the integration part.
Some ERP software providers like IFS provides component based systems. So people have th option of buying the base product and the other relevant components. This makes it much easier to implment the system and companies have the ability to try before buying the whole package. I think more ERP providers will switch to this model simply because it become easier to sell.
In general ERP systems are used by larger companies which already uses many systems across multiple sites. Integrating them is the biggest challenge. Some companies I have worked with have 50-60 systems to integrate into one total ERP. Needless to say that this is a very hard task. This is why sometime it can take years to fully integrate an ERP system, another reason for component based ERP systems.

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