The last year or so has seen a succession of reports worldwide of earthquakes, floods, fires, volcanic eruptions and tornados, many of them in places where they weren’t expected.

So why don’t so many small-to-medium businesses have Disaster Recovery Plans in place?  My guess is that they either don’t know what to do, or having investigated what to do they find it’s simply too much work to consider in their already busy days.

Google “Disaster Recovery Planning” and you will get pages of templates, methodologies, and questionnaires – and much of it looks like a whole lot of work. I recommend http://www.drj.com/new2dr/newbies.htm. So what to do?  Like all major tasks, I believe the answer is to break it down into small chunks and complete them in order of those most likely to occur.  The important thing is to document each decision made, along with the detailed “How-to“ instructions.  A really good resource on the above site for this documentation is the 3-part article written by Geoffrey H. Wold, who is the National Director of Information Systems and Technology Consulting for the CPA/Consulting firm of McGladrey & Pullen.  You can find his articles here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.  Lots of questions for you to think about, the answers must come from your own experience and circumstances.

Start with a list of all the major risks you think you could face, put them in order of how likely they are to occur, and start at the top.  Remember such things as: “What happens if the CEO is suddenly taken out of the picture?”; “Should we insist our senior management team never fly in the same aircraft together?”; “What happens if we face a major product recall?  Or if we lose a major customer?”

Some risks can be documented simply – a Service Level Agreement (SLA) may be sufficient to cover you for a major piece of plant equipment that may break down and hold up production, as long as it clearly states response times and replacement if not fixed within a specific period of time.

But what if that equipment is your computer system?  There may be well be many different organizations involved with a complete ERP system: you may have a local company providing IT support for the hardware and operating systems, a local Reseller responsible for the implementation of the ERP system itself, but both requiring the backup support of large, sometimes multi-national, ERP solution and operating system providers.  Another name for Disaster Recovery Planning is ‘Business Continuity Planning’, and this really needs to be the focus.  It’s too late to think about what should be done when the computer system has been down for hours, there is a line of trucks waiting to load product that has been made but can’t be released because there is no alternative to the computerized QC release and invoicing.

There are two types of problem that can occur with a computer system: those that prevent data being accessed or programs to work on a system which is otherwise available; and those which prevent access to the computer hardware itself.

The first of these can be caused by something as simple as a recent software update preventing things from working properly, and that update could be an automatic update from the operating system provider, a new piece of software loaded unrelated to either the operating system or the ERP software, or an update to the ERP software itself.

The second could be part of a much more major event – a natural disaster affecting the whole plant, fire, or a major equipment failure or power outage.

The approach to dealing with each of these two types of events is a little different.

Taking a back-up of your data is a start, but many companies never check to see if they can actually restore the backup in the event it is needed.

BatchMaster writer, Sakshi Tanwani, has some important, specific thoughts on protecting your data in case of disaster.  Read her article here.

There is no time like the present to start acting on this!

Yours in preparedness,

John Houltham

Director of Marketing

When American Coatings, a leading interior & exterior coatings manufacturer, suffered a spectacular 16-hour long fire at their premise, they lost their entire building, equipment (including their computers), plant and physical records – fortunately, without any human casualty. The next big concern after human life was data – all they had was an off-site backup. What was left was knowledge in the minds of the people working there and a desire to get working again.

Fire, natural disaster, act of terrorism – data loss can come from any number of causes and as a result, the severity of the harm varies.  A short-circuit leading to fire in a company may result in major loss of important data, software or hardware, while an epidemic may leave the entire staff unable to work.

A Disaster Recovery Plan should cover every aspect of risk to your business, but what we will cover here is specific to the life-blood of your business – your data, and the systems it is stored on.  Your company needs to be prepared for all kinds of losses – business, data and human. The best approach to survive such disasters is to be prepared for them i.e. better safe than sorry.

Over the last last few decades IT dependency has increased tremendously, not just for the  mundane task of maintaining data but to manage and analyze data, streamline workflows and processes to accelerate growth and enhance communication. Organizations invest a lot of money and take great care in selecting the appropriate IT system. Therefore, a disaster recovery plan that focuses on the IT or technology systems that support business functions is crucial. That’s why more and more companies are now allocating 3%-4% of their IT budget towards disaster recovery.

A Data Recovery Plan is considered the most important and integral process of ERP implementation to avoid your valuable data from being wiped out or corrupted. The Data Recovery Plan at all times should be made with two basic objectives in mind – Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and Recovery Time Objective (RTO). These parameters aim to define the amount of bearable loss and the duration before the loss can be recovered, respectively. The objectives should be well calculated before mapping to the corresponding IT systems for the purpose of documenting a Data Recovery Plan that will be effective and operative without bankrupting the business.

Actually, the disaster recovery plan should target preventive, detective and corrective measures to prevent, detect and correct any unwanted events. Preventive measures require organizations to have local mirror systems, surge protectors, UPS, back-up generators, anti-virus software, fire-extinguishers etc.

The perfect solution to protect data is to keep it at two different locations – offsite as well as onsite. Offsite backups, or ‘cloud’ storage services, reflects disaster recovery best practices. Even if the data at your local network gets corrupted, one can restore the entire data from offsite location. Simply taking daily backups does not make the grade in defining a good disaster recovery plan. Regular testing and monitoring of servers as well is an important part of the whole process. Moreover, the disaster recovery plan should also be tested regularly and should be well documented too.

Businesses can’t meet the expense of data loss but they can invest in the finest protection.

Find out how BatchMaster supports you in hard times like these.

Sakshi Tanwani

Staff Writer, BatchMaster Software, Inc.

Back home, I mourn, as do many others, the demise of the local butchery.  With the proliferation of supermarkets with their huge meat sections, the independent butcher has all but disappeared, along with their personal service and unique sense of humour.

Imagine, then, my delight at discovering a Halal butcher had opened not far from my home to service our growing population of immigrants from Islamic countries.  The quantum leap in quality more than justifies the modest premium on supermarket prices.  The owner and his staff are friendly and more than ready to give great advice on the best cuts and how to cook them.  Run out of stir-fry beef?  No problem, give me five minutes and I will prepare some for you.  Now listed in the ‘Top-10’ ethnic food stores in my city, my wife and I hope “our” butcher shop doesn’t become too popular.

There is, however, a serious side to the production of Halal-certified products.  I well remember visiting a food manufacturer in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta when the police descended on the adjoining business and arrested the owner and production manager.  The problem?  A minute quantity of pork gelatine had been discovered in one of their products, and this was clearly against the law for Halal-certified products.

Every single ingredient in Halal products must adhere to the standards.  Many of BatchMaster’s customers manufacture Halal-certified products, and BatchMaster provides them with the functionality to ensure their full compliance.

It starts with an expanded ‘Physical Property’ function which allows ingredients to be classified as ‘Halal’, ‘Kosher’, ‘Organic’, ‘NFI’ and more.  It extends to specific ‘Lot Features’ recorded on receipt of ingredients.

BatchMaster’s multi-level Ingredient Statement report accurately reflects the status of all ingredients, ensuring there is no contamination from non-Halal items.

When it comes to production, BatchMaster can provide advanced tools for scheduling like products together to avoid cross-contamination and minimize wash-downs.

If you are manufacturing Certified-Halal products, BatchMaster is the obvious choice to manage your processes and compliance.  Click the links above to learn more.  My own experiences with such products lead me to encourage your success!

BatchMaster Manufacturing for Microsoft Dynamics GP is now "CERTIFIED for MICROSOFT DYNAMICS”

Solutions that are Certified for Microsoft Dynamics have demonstrated development quality and compatibility with the Microsoft Dynamics product on which they run by passing rigorous software testing for Microsoft Dynamics performed by VeriTest (a service of Lionbridge). In addition, the Microsoft Dynamics partner must have customers who are successfully using the certified solution and are willing to recommend it and be a Gold Certified Partner in the Microsoft Partner Program.

For customers, Certified for Microsoft Dynamics helps identify Microsoft Dynamics solutions that have been tested for compatibility, meet high quality standards, and are successfully used by existing customers. This certification represents a significant step in elevating the standard for partner-developed software solutions for industry-specific business applications. By highlighting these solutions, Microsoft also creates new opportunities for partners to expand their reseller channel and to better promote their packaged Microsoft Dynamics solution for customers.

“The manufacturing world is evolving, and businesses need technology solutions that are flexible and robust enough to adjust with the changing environment,” said David Telford, director, Microsoft Dynamics Worldwide Manufacturing. “BatchMaster Software is helping today’s manufacturers meet that need by introducing innovative solutions with Microsoft Dynamics that have met our highest standard of testing.”

BatchMaster Manufacturing is completely ‘In-Built’ to Microsoft Dynamics GP, offering a single login, single database, single interface solution that brings all the required process manufacturing functionality inside Microsoft Dynamics GP. ‘BatchMaster Manufacturing for Microsoft Dynamics GP’ adds R&D, Formulation, Quality Control, Production Planning and Scheduling, and full Compliance support for this industry sector. You can read more about ‘BatchMaster Manufacturing for Microsoft Dynamics GP’ in the Microsoft Dynamics Solution Finder.

Yes, Microsoft Dynamics GP is supported for USA, Canada (including French speaking/writing Montreal/Quebec), Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, all English Speaking Africa: Nigeria, etc., South East Asia: Philippines, Singapore, Thailand. MS Dynamics GP support will be phased out for Europe: France, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Germany and Poland.

Does BatchMaster adopt a ‘Best Practices’ for implementation?

Yes, we have standard practice for Implementation and support services as per client requirements.  Check out our Implementation services here.

How can we receive support quickly?

With Remote Desktop Support, we can immediately take control of your PC or server to see what the problem is and work to quickly resolve issues.

Do I need to purchase separate licenses for the BMM application?

Yes, you have to purchase separate license for BMM users.

Is Microsoft Dynamics GP and BatchMaster Software fully integrated?

Microsoft Dynamics GP and BatchMaster Software are fully integrated with ease of use throughout the system. Using your business process, we integrate with financial management, supply chain management, human resource and payroll management, BatchMaster manufacturing  and project management.

Is BatchMaster Manufacturing for Microsoft Dynamics GP a true single-database ERP system?

Yes, all BatchMaster Manufacturing database tables are incorporated into the Dynamics GP database.

Can you calculate unit of measure conversions because we purchase in pounds, produce in kilograms and ship in gallons?

Yes we have various units of measure conversions. Purchasing, producing and selling can all be different units of measures which are converted by mathematical equations within the system.

Can we Implement BMM on exiting GP environment?

Yes, we can Implement BMM on an existing GP environment. Client has only to purchase and Implement the BMM application.

What type of industries does BatchMaster Dynamics GP work best with?

Process manufacturing industries such as Food, Beverage, Chemicals, Coatings, Nutraceutical, Cosmetic & Personal Care, Pharmaceutical & Life Science industries are ideal for BatchMaster Dynamics GP.

The short answer is YES, however there are a number of things you should keep in mind.

There are two ways in which support is required:

– Translation of all the screen information and field labels.

– Entry and display of actual data in Chinese

BatchMaster has a number of customers in both Hong Kong and mainland China, some of whom use Chinese characters for either or both of the requirements above.

What do we mean by “Chinese language support”?

BatchMaster has two Chinese translations available:

1. Simplified Chinese 简体中文 suitable for Mainland China using standard Mandarin 普通话 words.
2. Traditional Chinese suitable for Hong Kong using standard Cantonese words.

BatchMaster ERP versions such as Accpac BatchMaster, and BatchMaster Manufacturing for SAP Business One both use Microsoft SQL for their database, so both support double-byte characters.  This means you can enter data in Chinese characters, store it with confidence, and print on documents.

More information is available in the document Chinese Translation and Data Entry in BatchMaster ERP, and a brochure in Simplified Chinese is also available.

A very important point to remember:  In the document mentioned above, it is suggested that “Key Fields” are entered in ‘Roman’ characters.

There is a simple reason for this.  Each Chinese character is made of two bytes of data (that is why it is called ‘double-byte’), and there are thousands of Chinese characters.  The database manager has great difficulty “Indexing” a list of customers, for example, as each Customer may start with a different character, and the characters may not lend themselves to anything like an ‘alphabetical index’.

Roman characters (basically the English alphabet, but called ‘Roman’ because they can be used for many different languages) number only 26 and DO easily allow for alphabetical indexing.

BatchMaster Manufacturing for SAP Business One extends the reach of vital information for sales and customer service employees into the plant itself, offering visibility into the manufacturing plan and the current progress of batches.

The SAP article offers seven indicators SAP executives and their implementation partners find when they go on a “silo hunt” in companies like yours.  Let’s take a look at how BatchMaster Manufacturing adds to the SAP Business One experience for sales and customer service personnel.

• The inability to provide customers with the answer they need, NOW

The question “Can you deliver today?” is easily answered right in the Sales Order entry screen with an inventory lookup. However, without a completely integrated process ERP solution, answering the question “When can I have it” requires a visit to the production office to see if it’s being made, then to the production planner if there is no current batch in progress.  BatchMaster Manufacturing’s MPS (Master Production Scheduling) Planning Worksheet gives complete visibility into the “Availability to Promise” of all saleable items, as well as what batches are confirmed or planned for future production. The Production Scheduling Workbench gives a visual view of all batches and their scheduling, whether confirmed or planned, and allows for collaborative adjustment to the schedule for urgent orders.

• Customer complaints are handled on an ad-hoc basis, and not resolved in a timely manner

The maxim “Prevention is better than a cure” is nowhere more true than in process manufacturing.  In BatchMaster Manufacturing, the prevention starts with effective quality testing of ingredients and batches as they are made, and continues with accurate traceability of all lots used and produced. One of the biggest causes of complaints and returns in process manufacturing is product being delivered with insufficient days remaining until expiry (shelf life).  BatchMaster manufacturing lets you enter your owns rules to determine which stock should be picked first for delivery, but it goes further by performing a calculation to make sure that any lots with insufficient shelf life cannot be picked for delivery at all, and it will even warn you which lots are getting too close to expiry to ship.

• You’re taking orders you can’t fill

OTIF (On time, in full) delivery is a lot tougher to achieve when you are making products for sale where your customer expects a 24-48 hour delivery, and where some of your raw materials and packaging have to be ordered 6-12 months ahead.  Combined with accurate forecasting (see below), MPS tells you exactly what needs to made, and planned to be made, and when it should be made.  Material Requirements Planning (MRP) takes that information and tells you what materials and packaging needs to be ordered, and when it needs to be ordered in order to fulfil your expected and forecasted customer demand.

Another critical aspect of fulfilling customer demand is maximizing the efficiency of your plant.  BatchMaster Manufacturing helps in two ways:

• By tracking such properties as colour, allergens, kosher, halal and more, production scheduling will allow you to schedule like batches together on one process cell to minimize wash-downs and maximize machinery up-time. The true ‘drag & drop’ allows for immediate adjustment to cope with the unexpected urgent orders, or material shortages.
• Advanced Planning & Scheduling goes even further, providing automated finite scheduling to create realistic schedules that take all capacity constraints (machines, labor, and tooling) and raw material availability into account.  It offers multi-factor optimization around multiple key business drivers such as revenue, maximizing utilization, minimizing cost, etc., including ‘what-if’ scenarios.

• Inadequate visibility into historical sales trends

Analyzing past performance is quick and easy with inherent dashboards that let you analyze all sales over any defined period.  Couple that with your manufacturing history, and you start to build a picture of which products are the most profitable, which can be replaced, and which can be modified.
By analyzing past material shortages, you can see which product sales were affected, and whether an improvement in the ordering could have resulted in higher sales.

• Forecasting sales is a challenge

Some process manufacturers have great planners on-staff who know how to use Statistical Forecasting tools and assist with the forecasting of sales, and subsequently of what purchasing needs to be planned to meet those forecasts.  Many process manufacturers do not have such skills on staff, and that is why BatchMaster’s Demand Forecasting application serves both models.  If you understand how Statistical Forecasting works, you can select your own models and perform the analysis.  If you have absolutely no idea how to use such tools, BatchMaster’s Demand Forecasting lets you import your sales and forecast data and will go ahead and find the appropriate analysis models to perform the task for you.  Yes, you have to take it on trust, but it’s way better than relying on ‘best guess’ from your salespeople and optimistic forecasts from your customers (assuming you can get them to provide with a forecast at all).

• You don’t know who your best customers are

SAP Business One’s CRM Sales Dashboards will instantly give you a visual view of your top 10 customers, or rank them all by value or profitability.  This is a good place to start when deciding which customers have priority for your attention.  Because SAP Business One CRM is totally integrated, you can manage opportunities, process orders, and much more.  Bring the personal touch back to your customer service by always knowing about your customer’s purchasing history than they do.

• You do know your best customers, but don’t know what to repeat-sell, cross-sell and up-sell

Temporary material shortages or other constraints can strain the loyalty of even your most loyal customers.  Knowing who regularly purchases a constrained item, and having all the customer details at the fingertips of your sales personnel, allows you to be proactive.  You can easily contact them, discuss the situation, and agree alternative supply arrangements or products.  That’s the negative side.
On the positive side, it becomes very easy to analyze the business of your best customers, to see what they are buying, and take that model to other customers.  Of cause, your best customers offer the best opportunity for revenue growth, so having notes about their operations ‘front and center’ affords the opportunity to contact those customers when you have developed new products that would meet their needs in areas where you are not currently their preferred supplier, or where a new product could significantly assist them in reducing costs.

Taking the Next Step, with BatchMaster Manufacturing for SAP Business One
It is no accident that BatchMaster Manufacturing offers so much to assist process manufacturers in their sales efforts – we have been listening to our own customers for 25 years, and designing software that meets their needs. No wonder our customers find that BatchMaster Manufacturing for SAP Business One works the way they work, thinks the way they think.

To find out how you can eliminate your ‘silos of information’, talk to our SAP Practice Team here.

Karen Hughes will be working on both the Financial implementation side, as well as assisting with the implementation of BatchMaster Manufacturing for Microsoft Dynamics GP.  Karen has an MBA in finance and carries a wealth of experience from having her own consultancy business and working at various companies, including a bakery that is currently using GP.  She was part of their internal implementation team that worked closely with their Channel Partner to implement GP and train their employees.

BatchMaster Manufacturing for Microsoft Dynamics GP is completely “In-Built”, providing a complete process ERP solution entirely within Dynamics GP. It utilizes the Dynamics GP Inventory, Sales Order Processing and Purchasing to maximize your Microsoft investment, and there is no duplication of data.

Please join me and other members of the BatchMaster team to connect with your peers, discover new ideas, and exceed your expectations for the year ahead.

If you would like to reserve some of my time at Convergence, simply give me a call on 949-583-1646 x 226, or email me at tsingleton@batchmaster.com.

See you at Convergence!

You can Register for Convergence Here.

Tony Singleton

Channel Manager, Dynamics Practice

BatchMaster Software

At the SAP Partner Summit this week, the SAP Business One ‘Partner of the Year’ for the USA was named as Vision33, and the SAP Business One ‘Partner of the Year’ for Canada was named as Forgestik.

Vision33 joined the BatchMaster Manufacturing Reseller Community in May, 2010.  They have a mature and dedicated team of business consultants and technologists working out of ten (10) SAP certified offices located in Irvine, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, California; Portland, Oregon; Seattle, Washington; Salt Lake City, Utah; Fort Lauderdale, Florida; and Austin, Dallas, and Houston, Texas.

With Offices in Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary, as well as across the border in Delaware and Illinois, Forgestik has a 20-year history of providing solutions, and is the biggest SAP Business One reseller in Canada.

Both Vision33 and Forgestik find BatchMaster Manufacturing to be a valuable addition to their offerings to potential clients.

We congratulate both companies, and their excellent teams!