2013 19 2 月

PLM vs. ERP: Centric details the investment decision.

Read Centric’s white paper, “PLM vs. ERP: Detailing the Investment Decision.”

Executives at retail, apparel, footwear, consumer goods and luxury goods companies have to make tough technology decisions. When faced with the choice between investing in a new PLM system or upgrading a existing ERP software, Nancy Johnson  founder and CEO of Optimyze, an expert in advising leading global brands, retailers and manufacturers has this to say.

“ERP does nothing to enhance branding. If a company is interested in putting the right products in front of its customers, it starts with development of that product, which calls for PLM. Without management of the product and relevant development processes, ERP is irrelevant.” This graph illustrates her point.

Choosing PLM will deliver a greater financial and strategic impact than ERP. More importantly, investing in PLM gives companies a competitive edge in ways that ERP simply can’t approach. While ERP systems help manage financials, inventory, logisitics, or sales, these actions have low impact on a firm’s brand or revenue. On the other hand, PLM’s abilities in compliance, quality, and design have a high impact on brand and revenue.

While much of the fast-moving consumer goods industry utilizes a mess of spreadsheets and e-mails, or even an outmoded PDM system, it’s not a system that breeds efficiency. Instead, it wastes time, resources, and money. Think of the productivity your business could achieve in the time wasted fumbling for the correct product information across two or three different spreadsheets.

Choosing PLM for retail, apparel, footwear, luxury and consumer goods companies now will help cut through the mess and deliver a “single version of the truth” about a company’s products. To learn more about abandoning those hazardous inefficiencies and choosing tremendous productivity, read more about the PLM vs. ERP debate in Centric’s latest white paper.