How To Move from Vantage to Epicor 10
Is your firm considering an upgrade from an Epicor Vantage system to the latest 10 version? Like many others in your industry hoping to decrease costs and increase revenue, this might be a project worth considering in the near future. As a certified Epicor partner and implementation expert, we’re seeing more companies opting to shed their Vantage shell and make the cross over to modern ERP software. So what’s the best way to move from Vantage to Epicor 10?
Why evolution is a good thing
Epicor introduced Vantage over a decade ago, in 2005. Vantage was well received by the midsized market despite a latent economic collapse halting capital spending. It supported enterprises from a purely web-based platform — a very profound way to supply data access to newly formed value chains — to cut costs and optimize efficiency. Epicor’s Vantage model provided a tremendous amount of flexibility for suppliers. Essentially, supply chains could format the system to abide by their data and business models, rather than changing unique processes to fit the format of the software.
Over a decade later, Epicor 10 remains true to that model. For many running the Vantage legacy system, the chance to move to 10 provides the same functionality, but with more versatility, machine learned data analysis, and a whole lot of enterprise transparency. These fundamentals of the Epicor system are critical for any firm seeking to remain competitive in any industry; as Epicor has taken notice to what companies want and need to survive in a highly regulated and increasing global market place. So how should a company start a project of moving from Vantage to Epicor 10?
Making the move from Vantage to Epicor 10
Upgrades can be a tricky process, generally something best left to third party implementation experts whom wholly understand the in’s and out’s of a move from Vantage to Epicor 10. Primarily this is due to the broad differences in modular-structure of Epicor’s Vantage systems and Epicor 10 suites. Modern manufacturing and distribution has become remarkably sophisticated, Epicor has designed specialized drill down capabilities to admit more valuable data, along with many other dynamic optimizations. Some fields have become reconfigured— and even moved to newer modules— reflecting Epicor’s dedicated recognition of industry-specific process evolution and efficiency. Unfortunately, this means a move is not a one-to-one data transfer. Depending on your BPM’s, customizations, and how clean your data is; moves from Vantage to Epicor 10 can vary wildly in complexity and cost.
What to consider
There are three primary valuations of system compatibility the C-Suite often miss in their decision to upgrade from Vantage to Epicor 10, rather than re-implement it. The difference in the process involves how the data will migrate and be rendered compatible from one system to another. Our Founder and CEO, Bryan Sapot, has seventeen years of experience with this and discusses how the look of the data often alters upgrade projects.
- Vantage is a straight forward system and may have worked well at the turn of the millennium. But with 90 percent of consumer, supplier, and regulatory data created in the last 3 years, firms may need numerous customizations, revised BPMs, and agile reporting. Given that, the data saved in the Vantage system is less likely to be compatible with E10s ultra-modern integrated network of suites. Data must be remarkably clean — meaning no duplicate entries, erroneous spreadsheets or irrelevant databases. Often we find re-implementing Epicor can eliminate the complexity in moving unnecessary data to a new system. This saves the buyer a significant amount of time, cost and resources if cleanup is discovered at the onset of a project.
- Unhappy with your data? Consider cleaning it up. Moving to E10 is a great time to do so. During the preliminary project phases, companies have the chance to rethink how to improve data models. This is also the point for companies to express to BPM experts how they’d like to integrate front office applications with E10. Additionaly, this a good time to retrain employees on how to manage the data going forward and definitively standardize required legal data given Epicor’s web-based architecture (SaaS). Firms can reconcile data to display the true value of other assets and projects. And with a re-implementation, reconciliation of data is not go live necessary since it’s stored separately from the new E10 system.
- Epicor 10 is a widely adopted system since its modules play well with industry-specific processes in midsized supply-chains. When data is clean, customizing the upgraded system to align with business processes can be a painful process; butdata is rarely clean. The alternative is re-implementation, which provides a whole lot of functionality and innovation where businesses need it most. Sometimes those particular areas are unseen until BPM maintenance occurs. If there are needed customizations in areas of reporting, BPM and integration, re-implementing Epicor is a better idea. It ensures a clean transfer of only the most critical data, pushes stakeholders to become excited about a whole new system, and allows the firm to move into a tech-dependent market on a fresh, clean slate.
The bottom line
Whether it be the slick new dashboards or the buoyant reporting of E10, moving from Vantage to Epicor 10 indicates that your company is on the brink of innovation. Supporting projects of this magnitude largely involve selecting the correct methodology. An upgrade is only works to provide those companies with highly appropriated IT teams, dedicating the majority of their responsibility to retaining clean databases, a way to move seamlessly onto a new platform. This is highly unlikely for midsized enterprises. In our experience, re-implementation has found to be a more effective use of project dollars. It alleviates chances of unwanted modifications to project scope and allows IT resources to strategize how data will be controlled going forward; eliminating much of the complexity in their role.
Still not sure? We get this questions a lot. Send our experts a message about Epicor software and they can talk you through the process. Datix is an Epicor Gold Partner and has 17+ years of experience helping the mid-market with their enterprise software.