Infosys-Oracle Blog

Guest post by
Hari Ram, Senior Systems Engineer, Infosys

Oracle Hyperion Essbase provides the best of multidimensional database capabilities in terms of performance and features. The Essbase lovers and existing users may believe that Essbase is sufficient enough for their planning, budgeting and forecasting requirements. Hence most planning applications still exist on Hyperion Essbase instead of Hyperion Planning - the centralized MS Excel and Web-based planning, budgeting, and forecasting solution from Oracle's Hyperion Suite of Products.

Continue reading " Thinking beyond Hyperion Essbase for planning (Part 1) " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 2:39 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Guest post by
Amit Tuteja, Senior Consultant, Infosys

Most of us have been part of implementations where CRP (Conference Room Pilot) is undertaken by the client. In most cases CRP is used by the client when they are not familiar with the product and want to see if the ERP package would fulfill most of their needs before they finalize which package to be implemented. In one of the recent projects I got a chance to work on CRP exercise in Oracle Apps for a client where Oracle was already running for more than a decade. Here is a glimpse of the situation which the client faced:

1. Multiple Geographies with different business model. E.g. One Geography was following distributor model. In one of Geography ATO operations formed major portion of their sales.
2. Different Geographies had different Oracle version being used: One Geography had 11.5.9 version of Oracle and others had 11.5.10 version.
3. Local IT teams at each Geographies led to various different customizations across Geographies: The customizations built were also of different nature based on business needs in each geography.

Client engaged Infosys to do a business process re-engineering (standardize Business processes across Geographies) exercise in the first phase and then undertake CRP (showcase the fitment in oracle) in the second phase.

Continue reading " CRP - The Game Changer? " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 1:12 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Guest post by
Vikas Jhamb, Lead Consultant, Infosys

Any Implementation in Oracle ERP world involves a constant effort in re-doing the setups from scratch whenever a new instance is required. Getting a new instance and bringing it to speed with the current setups just can't be avoided or wished away. It has to be done and redone with almost no scope of errors. But anything that is done manually is prone to error and if these errors slip in when we are doing the setups, these will cause a lot of grief and the project team may have to spend a lot of time trying to figure out where there has been slip between the cup and the lip.

Continue reading " iSetup - An Effective and Powerful Tool to Manage Setup Migrations " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 1:44 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Guest post by
Rohit Kaul, Senior Technology Architect, Infosys

I happened to read about a Greek philosopher in my kids school books and it reminded me of my school days where we read about methods of learning via questioning. It must have taken a great deal of courage from that man to question and challenge the existing set ups and systems. As it turns out his methodology is what comes naturally to all of us in IT (constantly questioning and brainstorming on the best solutions).

Continue reading " What to ask about the Exadata machine before the purchase decision? " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 9:50 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

What is perhaps the number one complaint about introduction of JD Edwards ERP or a new functionality in JD Edwards, in an Enterprise?
No one knows how to use it!!

According to one study, effective User Adoption seems to be the absolute best predictor of enterprise software success. More often than not, Enterprises have a lack of focus on faster User Adoption that helps to sustain Oracle -JD Edwards implementations and upgrades throughout its life-cycle. Let's talk about ways of achieving a faster user adoption based upon efficient usage of Oracle's User Productivity Kit (UPK) in an Enterprise.

Continue reading " JD Edwards (ERP) User Adoption made easy with Oracle User Productivity Kit " »

Posted by Shriranjan Gharpure at 7:17 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Guest post by
Umesh Tanna, Senior Technology Architect, Infosys

Oracle E-business suite R12 upgrade is a major project that organization undertakes. Functional, technical and infrastructure administration teams are the primary groups that are involved in upgrade project from IT department.  Oracle Application Database Administration activities are very critical activities in upgrade project that is performed by Oracle Apps DBA. Following are most essential aspects of R12 upgrade project from the standpoint of Oracle Apps DBA.

Continue reading " Database and Application administration essential for Oracle E-Business Suite R12 upgrade " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 9:44 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Continue reading " Power of Empowering - The new perspective of ERP implementations " »

Posted by Murali Krishna Somisetty at 8:58 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Guest post by
Mukesh Nakra, Senior Program Manager and GTM Director-Oracle Fusion Applications, Enterprise Solutions, Infosys Technologies Ltd.

Tough market competition is putting pressure on organizations in terms of process standardization and access to integrated information. With the availability of the internet and all online content adapting to the Web 2.0 standards, employees and organizations are expecting systems that support businesses to adapt to these standards and new technologies. Oracle supports multiple ERP packages like Oracle E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft, JDEdwards and Seibel to name a few. Taking advantage of the evolution and availability of new technology platforms and with a vision to standardize the applications, both from a usability and technological basis, Oracle Fusion Applications were created.

Continue reading " Oracle Fusion Applications - Are you still looking for answers? " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Continue reading " The 10 most challenges in Linear Asset Management and solution options " »

Posted by Murali Krishna Somisetty at 1:48 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Guest post by
Sourish Chatterjee, Lead Consultant, Oracle Practice, Enterprise Solutions, Infosys Technologies Ltd.

In my last blog, Business Intelligence in Oracle's Fusion Applications- Always Available, I had discussed that Fusion application Business Intelligence comprises of the following:

1. Oracle Transactional BI (OTBI) is real time self service reporting directly off Fusion Apps data. It has pre-packaged content covering major Fusion applications.
2. Oracle BI Applications (OBIA) is a prepackaged data warehouse enabling historical analysis and cross domain insight.
3. Specialized Domain specific Analytics include financial statements, sales territory planning and Project Performance built on Essbase technology. White space analysis built on Real Time decisions and Oracle Data Mining Technologies.
4. BI Publisher reports are also available; these are out of box content within Fusion applications to cater to pixel perfect and highly formatted report requirements.

Let's now see how all the BI Content can be accessed within fusion applications.

Continue reading " How to access Business Intelligence in Oracle's Fusion Applications " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 12:47 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Guest post by
Amit Tuteja, Senior Consultant, Oracle Practice, Enterprise Solutions, Infosys Technologies Ltd.

I was lucky to be part of one of the complex Oracle implementations done by Infosys Oracle Practice in Retail industry. During my work with this large retailer I got the opportunity to work on design phase and later got involved in testing phase. Most of us understand and realize the importance of Testing in any implementation but in this blog I would like to emphasize how a well planned Testing phase increased Management/ Stakeholders confidence and paved the way for a successful Implementation.

Continue reading " Role of Testing in successful project implementation " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 1:05 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 1 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Many organizations ask them selves 'how do we design our last chart of Accounts to last for the next 50 years' The fact that it is almost impossible to predict future management and financial reporting over such a long time frame. One approach is too look at pains of the current financial and management reporting system and identify the root cause of the issue. Often times it may be a result of change in business direction that could not be adequately be represented in the chart of Account structure.

Continue reading " Future Segments in a chart of Account are an insurance policy " »

Posted by Sachin Chitlange at 3:21 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 2 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Every country is making its Food and drug administrative control laws more and more stringent. Each country has a different requirement to get the products in specific labels formats, label colors, holograms, compositions etc. Issue is more challenging if item life cycle is short and old SKUs are getting replaced by new SKUs

Continue reading " Exploring Item life cycle management options " »

Posted by Kishor Pawankar at 5:59 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Continue reading " Strategizing and Prioritizing of porting ERPs to Mobile Devices " »

Posted by Srinivas Iyer at 5:21 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 3 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Continue reading " Why ERP Apps Need to Embrace Mobility to Stay Relevant " »

Posted by Srinivas Iyer at 5:08 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

In continuation with my previous blog on use of Oracle Quality to manage business issues, we are now delving deep into our discussions with the next feature of Oracle to help you in managing your intellectual assets as part of our Oracle E+ series of blogs.

This Blog talks about the use of Oracle ERP as a single source of truth to track the cost of Enterprise Biz applications.

Continue reading " Enterprise Biz-Apps Tracker " »

Posted by Murali Krishna Somisetty at 5:14 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Many analysis has been done and many artifacts written about the success of the ERP projects but the question which primarily remains unanswered and less explored is who holds the key to success of the program.

Continue reading " Who holds the key to success in ERP led business transformation programs " »

Posted by Arnab Banerjee at 9:44 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 1 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

In today's scenario, organizations are facing many problems in managing content with nearly 80% of the unstructured information, lots of content duplication and spending around 15-20% of the operating revenue in fixing problems that arouse from inappropriate data.

To maximize content management efficiency, improve security and reduce costs, organizations need a comprehensive enterprise content management solution that fits easily with their business processes. Oracle Enterprise Content Management Suite 11g meets these demands delivering the high performance and scalability required to face the challenging enterprise content management environments.

Continue reading " Looking for the most cost-effective and complete content management platform? Use Oracle Content Management " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 9:52 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

How often do organizations feel that managing change on a single global instance is a nightmare? Although a single global instance has a lot of benefits compared to multi instance installations managing change is probably the biggest challenge on a single instance environment. The complexity of the environment also adds to this challenge.

Continue reading " Managing Change in a Single Instance ERP Environment " »

Posted by Somnath Majumdar at 4:15 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Continue reading " Critical points to be consider while "Asset Group" Design process for Successful eAM implementation " »

Posted by Abhijit Talokar at 6:47 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 2 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Continue reading " Demystifying Legal Entity in Oracle R12 Architecture " »

Posted by Guest Blogger at 9:40 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

LIC - Life Insurance Corporation of India (Govt. owned) is the largest life insurer in India with an asset base of USD 160 billion and insuring 220 million lives over past 50 years.
Recently LIC was denied a license by the Singapore authorities to expand its operations in the country since it was not rated by an International credit rating agency. They have no option now but to get themselves rated by Moody's or S & P

Taking a cue from this incident and considering the changes in emerging markets like India, there may be a day when a ERP implementation or Software service provider may have to be rated by specialized agencies as AAA or at least A+ to qualify or bid for a proposal.

Continue reading " What is the Credit Rating of Your ERP Implementation? " »

Posted by Sachin Chitlange at 4:22 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 1 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

In my professional experience, I encountered quite a few jazzy brand names of large business transformation programs - Ascent, NextGen, Compass, Catalyst Frontier, Leap, Unity, Accelerator, and so on. Earlier, I used to wonder about the need for such branding and whether it is a fad, a marketing gimmick or is really a necessity for large transformation programs? As I encountered these mores, i learnt interesting facts about the association of a Brand to a project, which I am sharing with you in my series of blogs.

How does the business user community relate to the project even before it is implemented? What do the external partners like customers, distributors, and suppliers perceive about the project and its impact on their operations? What do the analysts and share holders think about this multi-year multimillion dollar investment? How does the internal IT team get motivated to be on the driving seat of the large initiative? All these unanswered questions points to common phenomenon 'WIIFM' (What's in it For Me).

Continue reading " Branding of Large Transformation Programs - Fad or Necessity? " »

Posted by Abhishek Sabharwal at 5:25 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

One question that continues to baffle the program management community around Training delivery in large ERP implementation programs is when to deliver end user Training? The answer is probably not as straight as you may expect. Let's first discuss the constraints around this decision:

• Go Live Date: If there is a huge gap between Go Live Date and User Training, the user tends to forget what they learnt as during this period they have to continue using the legacy system and will not be able to unlearn some of the old practices and habits post go-live. On the other hand, if the training continues till the last date, you will not be able to make an apt decision towards user readiness and its implications on implementation Go No Go Decision.
  

Continue reading " When is the right time to conduct End User Training in Oracle implementation? " »

Posted by Nikhil Kumar at 5:55 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Typical implementations would tread the wrong path by training their end users on all the modules/ functionalities being implemented using the traditional system based classroom session training approach, assuming that this will make them ready for the implementation. Some of these organizations, who are more mature, may leverage similar approach, however by grouping their user community by departments and having some amount of hands on training. But the fact is, the both ways lack the vision and approach towards a successful Training Program. Even before any training activity is initiated, it's important to understand the target end user population, their current skill sets, the impact of the system changes on their day to day tasks and job responsibilities, and then only a strategy must be developed around Training.

Continue reading " Training Need Analysis, the first steps towards a successful End User Training for large implementation programs " »

Posted by Abhishek Sabharwal at 9:46 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

In my last blog Still waters run deep - Poor User Adoption may cost you your ERP Implementation.. I discussed at length about the importance of ERP training and the need for organizations to focus more on user adoption.  As ERP Implementations mature and grow, the focus on user training also intensifies. While many organizations have started realizing the benefits of user adoption, they often struggle to determine the right budget and the right approach to achieve it.

Continue reading " Road towards Package Adoption and Learning - Comprehensive Training Strategy is your Precursor to implementation success " »

Posted by Nikhil Kumar at 5:02 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 0 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )

Continue reading " Still waters run deep - Poor User Adoption may cost you your ERP Implementation.. " »

Posted by Nikhil Kumar at 5:29 AM | Permalink | Comments ( 2 ) | TrackBacks ( 0 )