Get real-time visibility into the financial health of your global business to drive accountability, profitability, and growth using Dynamics 365 for Finance.
How CFO’s can drive growth and profitability using Dynamics 365 for Finance? Read More »
Business Central All in one management software solution for sales, marketing, operations, supply-chain, financials, customer services, HR & Payroll. Business Central is cloud based ERP that unify the capability of CRM & ERP in one centralized solution
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Bel Fuse designs, manufactures, and markets electronic circuits products at 24 manufacturing locations across North America, Europe, and Asia. The company’s existing enterprise resource planning solution was highly customized and expensive to maintain, so it decided to deploy Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management. Bel Fuse unified data and can now more easily manage its supply chain operations and finance processes, gaining more agility to respond quickly to changes in the market or its suppliers. With Dynamics 365, we save nearly USD2 million per year in IT service and support fees compared to our previous, highly customized solution. Mark Hodkinson: Vice President of Finance for the Bel Power Solutions Group Bel Fuse Essential step in the supply chain A typical consumer might interact with Bel Fuse products and not even know it. The manufacturer makes the components that power, protect, and connect electronic circuits in products we use every day. Bel Fuse is usually in the middle of the supply chain, relying on smaller parts from its suppliers before passing components on to the manufacturers that create finished products. Founded in 1949, the company has grown significantly in the last 20 years through acquisitions. It has seven business groups, including Bel Power Solutions, which it acquired in 2014. Bel Power Solutions makes the power conversion products for server and storage networks at large server farms and in industrial products like the power sources in hybrid electric vehicles and trains. To manage its enterprise resource planning (ERP) processes, Bel Power Solutions used a legacy version of Oracle that was highly customized and difficult to update. The version was outdated and the month-to-month costs and support for the solution were expensive. With different business units using different ERP systems, Bel Fuse wanted to find an affordable solution to unify the company’s finance and operations processes, starting with Bel Power Solutions. Bel Fuse also needed a solution that would support its material requirements planning (MRP) process, a production planning, scheduling, and inventory control system to manage its manufacturing processes. “Our MRP processing goes in both directions—we require a full dataset and forecasting of what’s coming to us and what’s going out,” says Scott Hasterlik, Director Global IT at Bel Fuse. “We have power assets with 500 components and 65,000 SKUs, so we needed a robust solution to share nonstandard information quickly.” An integrated solution for finance and operations After careful evaluation, Bel Fuse found that Microsoft Dynamics 365 had the right capabilities at the right price for the company’s needs. With Dynamics 365, Bel Fuse had a single system for the first time, the ability to report globally, and a solution that was intuitive to use and easy to add users. Bel Fuse uses Dynamics 365 Finance to automate its financial operations, monitor performance in real time, predict future outcomes, and make data-driven decisions. For operations, the company deployed Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management, which includes an MRP function and AI to improve visibility across its global supply chain and to improve manufacturing productivity. To aid the quick, seamless deployment process, Bel Fuse worked with Flintfox, a Gold competency member of the Microsoft Partner Network. “Flintfox jumped in, understood what we wanted to accomplish, and helped us move forward on budget,” says Hasterlik. “Flintfox has been a fantastic partner and is still our partner of record.” A wide range of Bel Power Solutions employees now rely on the Finance and Supply Chain Management business applications. Users include staff in customer service, quality assurance, demand and product returns, manufacturing and supply chain ordering, accounts payable, accounts receivable, and engineering. “From decision makers to factory floor managers, everyone is working in Dynamics 365, staying connected and accessing valuable data,” says Stefan Naude, General Manager, Slovakia, at Bel Fuse. Reduced costs, disparate systems eliminated Bel Fuse accomplished its central goal—to reduce the high costs of its previous ERP system while bringing data together in one solution. The company built the capacity it needed without a lot of customizations, helping ensure that the solution would stay flexible in the future. “With Dynamics 365, we save nearly USD2 million per year in IT service and support fees compared to our previous, highly customized solution,” says Mark Hodkinson, Vice President of Finance for the Bel Power Solutions Group at Bel Fuse. Bel Fuse also reduced costs because it now has the tools to fulfill more of its own finance needs internally. For example, a Bel Fuse engineering and distribution site in Italy previously paid an outside firm to do its accounting. “It was easy to move the Italy site into Dynamics 365 and transfer all that work internally to our team in Slovakia,” says Hodkinson. “Now our own team manages the facility’s day-to-day finances even though they aren’t located in Italy. With a common system, we have better access to our own internal talent.” Increased visibility and agility With Dynamics 365, Bel Fuse gained a more global view of financial data and can perform more accurate forecasting. “I always view orders and revenue from a global perspective because the locations are all connected and have so many intercompany transactions,” says Hodkinson. “I rely on Dynamics 365 to help me make sense of complex financial histories to stay on top of complicated billing and payment processes at multiple sites.” With ERP data now centralized and easy to access in the cloud, Bel Fuse can respond with more agility to complex, changing circumstances. When employees in Italy, China, and other countries needed to work from home during the COVID-19 crisis, the company was able to effectively run remote finance and supply chain operations. “We kept all our finance functions moving forward even though we don’t have anyone physically in the office,” says Hodkinson. “We were impressed that our team was able to get everything done while working from home for the first time, and I think that speaks to how intuitive Dynamics 365 Finance was for our team.” As a mid-chain supplier, Bel Fuse is committed to continuing its operations on
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is an all-in-one business management solution that helps businesses manage financials, sales, service and operations easier and faster from day one. This e-book explores how the solution integrates with Office 365 to connect business processes and personal productivity like never before, bringing insight and efficiency to your daily tasks[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
Reinvent business productivity with Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Microsoft Office 365 Read More »
Toyota Industries Corporation improves service operations to maximize uptime for their customers Toyota Industries Corporation (“Toyota Industries”) is Toyota group’s head company, with 90-plus years of history, and offers products that account for the world’s largest shares of the following three fields: forklifts, compressors for auto air conditioners, and air-jet looms. Toyota L&F Company, which develops, manufactures, sells, and after-sales services forklifts, plans to improve the quality of their after-sales services by leveraging telematics and IoT for visualizing service operations. The company promotes the project and the introduction of Global Mobile Service Solutions (GMSS), together with Microsoft Enterprise Services. GMSS uses Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Service, and with telematics linked to Microsoft Azure to improve preventive maintenance and move further towards predicting failures. We strive to provide uniform, quality after-sales services in a global partnership with Microsoft. Going forward, I want to create a mechanism to collect forklift data by using IoT and telematics to prevent failures. Mr. Michio Yonezawa: General Manager, Services Department Toyota Industries Corporation Maximize Uptime by Leveraging Forklift Data Toyota Industries aims for further growth in the business of industrial vehicles that have grown into a business that accounts for 60% of the company’s. Mr. Michio Yonezawa, General Manager, Service Department, spoke of the significance of maximizing forklift utilization by offering after-sales services that meet the business needs of their forklift customers. “The mission of the Service Department is to improve our after-sales services and establish strong relationships with our customers, so that we can receive additional orders from them. We think that offering satisfying after-sales service ultimately contributes increase sales.” The company wanted to offer high quality services globally, and decided to introduce Dynamics 365 for Field Service as the primary tool for managing the after-sales service skills and operations for those distributors offering services to forklift customers all over the world. They wanted to improve their operational management accuracy, shift to a paperless process, reduce man-hours, and increase efficiency. They would do this by visualizing business KPIs in digital form, and laying out a framework to help boost their strengths and compensate for any weaknesses in various regions. Mr. Yonezawa explained the reasons for selecting Microsoft Enterprise Services as their partner in achieving their objectives, as follows. “Microsoft has many great accomplishments as a global IT company, and, above all, Microsoft Enterprise Services made an achievement to implement our systems to our European sites. In addition, Microsoft Enterprise Services not only understands the latest technologies, but they also develop systems based upon our after-sales service operations, and they provide global assistance. They will help us achieve our goal of global expansion.” Further, Toyota Industries plans to perform maintenance prior to the occurrence of failures, which also necessitates linkage technologies between the Microsoft cloud and IoT. The company uses Azure to collect machine information of their forklifts in operation. Linking information related to after-sales service from GMSS to the machine information in the cloud is expected to assist the Service Department in performing the right maintenance at the right time, preventing forklift failures from occurring at minimal cost. “Sudden failures greatly hinder the customer’s business activities, and generate extra-budgetary expenses. Previously, we conducted regular inspections in accordance with the guidelines based on how long the machines had been operating. By leveraging the machine information collected via telematics, inspections can be carried out in response to the customer’s usage, thereby reducing their burden,” explained Mr. Yonezawa. Visualization of Business Operations, Improvement in Productivity, and a Shift to a Paperless Process with GMSS Toyota Industries chose Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Service – which is already in worldwide use, cooperates with the latest technologies including IoT, AI, and machine learning, and enables practical applications – to visualize and improve after-sales service operations for GMSS development. Mr. Senichiro Kondo, who directs the global expansion of GMSS as the General Manager, Overseas Service Operation, Service Department, stated the reasons for selecting a cloud-based system for improving their after-sales service operations. “Since we manage operations in countries except for Europe and North America, the cloud enables us to facilitate management in a unified manner, and lay out a framework that helps provide the same services world-wide. In addition, Toyota could differentiate itself from its competitors by being first to introduce IoT to the service operations. Our competitors have not done this yet. The Microsoft cloud meets our security guidelines and we did not hesitate at all to use the cloud.” India was selected to be the first country for the deployment of GMSS, which occurred in February, 2018. “One reason we chose to deploy GMSS to India first is that we directly manage the distributors with standard service operations and it would allow us to examine their cost-effectiveness in detail. Another reason is that, if it is proven cost-effective in India, where wages are low, we could promote the deployment of GMSS to distributors in other countries,” said Mr. Kondo. In India, approximately 80 field service technicians had been receiving instructions on after-sales service operations in written form or manually. Technicians’ visit plans had been written on white boards, and material preparation before the visits was time-consuming. “The introduction of GMSS based on Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Services enabled the dispatchers to prepare and allocate instructions to give to the technicians. A mobile device app scheduled customer visits, periodical inspections and repair work for the technicians. Service reports can now be displayed on a screen, explained to the customer, signed by the customer, and submitted to the technician’s superior in a paperless stream, resulting in a significant improvement in work efficiency,” said Mr. Ryo Makino, a core member in charge of GMSS deployment in India, and Group Manager, Planning Group, Overseas Service Operation, Service Department. Various materials, including service materials, check sheet for maintenances, and visit histories that were used to previously store in separate locations can all be accessed from mobile devices, helping reduce the time taken to prepare them before paying the customer a visit.
Case Study on Microsoft Dynamic 365 from Leading Automotive Industry Read More »
Replacing your accounting software is easier and more affordable than you may think. Use this guide to learn about the benefits of a modern technology platform, better understand the advantages of a cloud-based solution, and know what questions to ask when evaluating your options.
Whitepaper: The business owner’s guide for replacing accounting software Read More »
4 ways technology can help businesses thrive in a digital world. The good news is that the tools that help businesses capitalize on this digital transformation are more accessible than ever before. The cloud is removing barriers like high up-front costs, ongoing maintenance, and IT dependency.
Whitepaper : Four technology trends helping businesses thrive in a digital world Read More »
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] Dynamics 365 Business Central Dynamics 365 Business Central Modernize your business operations across finance, manufacturing, and supply chain to drive new growth. Dynamics 365 Business Central is designed for businesses looking for an all-in-one business management solution that’s easy to use and adapt. Connect your finances, sales, service, and operations to streamline business processes, improve customer interactions, and enable growth. An all-in-one business management solution An evolution of Dynamics NAV An intelligent and unified solution A member of the Dynamics family An application and a platform [/vc_column_text][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/2″][vc_column_text] Financial Management Make Informed Decisions Connect data across accounting, sales, purchasing, inventory, and customer interactions to get an end-to-end view of your business. Chart financial performance in real time with built-in Power BI dashboards. Accelerate Financial Close and Reporting Streamline accounts receivables and payables, and automatically reconcile accounts to close and report on financials quickly and accurately, while maintaining compliance. Improve Forecast Accuracy Refine financial forecasts by modeling and analyzing data across multiple dimensions. Customize reports using seamless Microsoft Excel integration. Basic General Ledger Set up a company and start posting to the general ledger, chart of accounts, general journals, VAT facilities, recurring journals, and source codes. Budgets Work with budgets in general ledger accounts. Deferrals Set up deferral templates that automate the process of deferring revenues and expenses over a pre-defined schedule. Basic Fixed Assets Keep track of fixed assets and related transactions such as acquisitions, depreciations, write-downs, appreciations, and disposals. Basic Receivables Post sales transactions in journals and manage receivables; register customers and manage receivables using general journals. Dimensions Add unlimited dimensions to any ledger for advanced transaction analyses. Audit Trails The system automatically assigns audit trails and posting descriptions to every transaction. In addition, users can define reason codes to create complementary audit trails. Bank Account Management Create, operate, and manage multiple bank accounts for catering to your diverse business needs and across different currencies. Reconciliation Reconcile your bank statement data automatically to open bank account ledger entries end to keep track of all your bank statements. Currencies Manage multiple currencies throughout the system, including payables and receivables, general ledger reports, resource and inventory items, and bank accounts. [/vc_column_text][vc_column_text] Human Resource Employees Group and track employee information and organize employee data according to different types of information, such as experience, skills, education, training, and union membership. Expense Management Post expenses against employee cards to track and reimburse their expenses.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text] Project Management Stay on Budget Create, manage, and track customer projects using timesheets along with advanced job costing and reporting capabilities. Develop, modify, and control budgets to ensure project profitability. Plan with Precision Manage resource levels by planning capacity and sales. Track invoicing for customers against planned costs on orders and quotes. Analyze Project Performance Make effective decisions with real-time insight on project status, profitability, and resource-usage metrics. Resources Register and sell resources, combine related resources into one resource group or track individual resources. Estimates Monitor resource usage and get a complete overview of your capacity for each resource with information about availability and planned costs on orders and quotes. Jobs Keep track of usage on jobs and data for invoicing the customer. Manage both fixed-price jobs and time-and-materials jobs. Timesheets Timesheets are a simple and flexible solution for time registration with manager approval and integrate with Service, Jobs, and Basic Resources. Multiple Languages Switch languages on the client in real time provided that the desired language is available. Reason Codes Define a set of reason codes that can be assigned to individual transactions throughout the system, providing user-defined audit trails. Extended Text Set up an unlimited number of lines to describe inventory items, resources, and general ledger accounts. Intrastat Reporting Automatically retrieve the necessary data to report Intrastat information to statistics authorities. Local customs authorities can inform you whether your company is obligated to file such a report. Outlook Integration Synchronize your to-do items and your contacts with your meetings, tasks, and contacts in Outlook. [/vc_column_text][vc_column_text] Empower Everyone with Ictionable insight with Power BI Make Data Driven Decisions See all your data through a single pane of glass. Live Power BI dashboards and reports include visualizations and KPIs from your data in the cloud and on-premises, offering a consolidated view across your business, regardless of where your data lives. Build Intelligence into your Apps Make all your apps smarter when you collect and infuse all the data captured across your organization. Bring the power of the Business Application Platform, Power BI, and your apps together to deliver actionable insights. Use Common Data Service for Analytics Remove data silos to drive intelligence across your organization by connecting data from Dynamics 365 and your other business apps with Common Data Service for Analytics. Apps that Transform the Way you do Business Create An App for Every Task Build visually stunning apps that take advantage of device capabilities like cameras, GPS, and pen controls, run on any device, and are completely customized for your business requirements. Incorporate Powerful Workflow Automation Integrate Microsoft Flow workflows to automate virtually any process including notifications, data collection, and approval routing—all without writing a single line of code. Use Common Data Service for Apps Consolidate your data in Common Data Service for Apps. It’s the foundation for your apps and includes a set of over 200 standard business entities and relationships. [/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/2″][vc_column_text] Customer Relationship Management Deliver Value at Every Touch Point Prioritize sales leads based on revenue potential. Keep track of all customer interactions and get guidance on best upsell, cross-sell, and renewal opportunities throughout your sales cycle. Boost Sales Productivity Accelerate the quote to cash process. Act quickly on sales-related inquiries, manage service requests, and process payments—all from within Outlook. Maximize Profitability Gain a comprehensive overview of your service tasks, workloads, and employee skills to effectively assign resources and accelerate case resolution. Contacts Maintain an overview of your contacts and record your contact information for all business relationships. Campaigns Organize campaigns based on segments of your contacts that you define. Opportunity Management Keep
Dynamics 365 Business Central – Connect and Grow your Business Read More »
Learn how Singapore’s biggest transportation network operator doubled their productivity and delivers faster, friendlier service. Providing over one billion rail and bus journeys per year, SMRT is Singapore’s biggest transport network operator. In end 2016, the company started using cloud-based Dynamics 365 CRM service management features across its train, bus and taxi services to power new service innovations, and help staff members deliver better customer service. With Dynamics’ inbuilt automation features, SMRT employees are managing 2.3 times more cases than before. And with a cloud-based approach, SMRT can bring innovation projects to life in less than 3 months. Today, SMRT is powerfully equipped to deliver on its core responsibility: world-class transport that is safe, reliable and customer-centric. Every transport network has its challenges, but Singapore‘s SMRT has enormous responsibilities. As provider of the principal public-transport network in Singapore, it is SMRT’s job to sustain Singapore’s world-class reputation for efficiency and customer service. “We have 102 train stations and over 1,400 buses, and deliver over one billion journeys per year,“ says Dave Ong, Head, Passenger Service Department, SMRT. “Our mission is to enhance the lives of Singapore citizens with a transport system that is safe, reliable and customer-centric.“ The Cloud Journey to Better Customer Service and Innovations SMRT is always looking for ways to enhance customer interactions, and in 2016, decided that the Cloud could help. On any given day, more than 1,000 employees are involved in the process of managing customer enquiries, compliments, complaints and feedback. These busy staff also have to pursue hundreds of ‘lost and found‘ cases each month. SMRT wanted to help these employees deliver a faster and friendlier service. “Today, customers contact us through many different ways — emails, calls, faxes, letters, Whatsapp, Facebook and SMS,“ says Mr. Ong. “We need a case-handling system that helps us manage new processes for handling all these interactions, and a reporting system that helps us visualise our performance in real time.“ SMRT also wanted to make it easier to engage and manage external stakeholders on a succession of new initiatives known as innovation projects. Cloud technologies had the potential to help SMRT create, share and secure new business applications without having to purchase additional servers. “When setting up an innovation project, we want a system that would allow us to adapt and be more creative,“ says Mr. Ong. One-Stop Customer Service and Engagement In 2016, SMRT selected the cloud-based customer-relationship management solution, Dynamics CRM Online – which is now part of Dynamics 365 – to manage SMRT customer service and engagements at the enterprise level. The cloud-based solution provided convenience and flexibility to more than 1,000 employees, reduced capital costs and accelerated rollouts. With the help of Customer Capital Consulting, SMRT used Dynamics 365 to create a single, integrated system for managing all customer interactions. The new solution aggregates all feedbacks, regardless of which channel the feedback arrives at and uses automatic workflows to assign the case to the relevant team. SMRT Customer Relations employees use inbuilt features to track progress and turnaround times. System aids, such as reminders, help prompt everyone involved to take action when it‘s required. Checkpoints help employees manage the different types of cases, and see that they are on track. Meanwhile, reporting tools provide accurate updates to managers and external stakeholders. A Force Driving Enterprise Innovations SMRT has also used Dynamics 365 to create new business applications to support their new ‘Adopt-a-Station‘ initiative for school student ambassadors. With cloud-based workflows and document repositories, SMRT staff can centrally manage applications, correspondence, approvals and activities-tracking. Mr. Ong says that moving to the cloud presented no problem for the project, and the new application was put to use according to the planned schedule. “The Customer Capital Consulting team was flexible and accommodated our concerns to the best of their ability,” says Mr. Ong. “They were willing to go the extra mile, including conducting training so that our staff were comfortable with the new systems. They worked collaboratively and closely with the SMRT team to meet deadlines and completed the project on time.” Productivity is More than Doubled with Dynamics 365 With the help of Cloud technologies, SMRT is achieving Enterprise Digital Transformation where it’s vital — Customer Service. Today, more than 1,000 SMRT employees across different locations in Singapore use Dynamics 365 to ensure that customer enquiries and interactions are handled quickly and professionally. With its principal, public-facing systems in the cloud, SMRT can bring new initiatives to life without the cost and delays of investing in new infrastructure. As a result, the service-oriented staff at SMRT are better able to handle more cases. Automated workflows reduce the manual effort of sorting and directing interactions. Meanwhile, dashboard reporting helps the team and the management of SMRT to ensure that customer cases are resolved within prescribed timelines. “Our ability to handle public feedback volume has increased 2.3 times,“ says Mr. Ong. “Dynamics 365 reduces manual effort and frees up customer-service staff to handle cases with a personal touch. This helps us achieve our strategic goal of making all interactions with our contact centre more personal.” Innovations Made Simple With Dynamics 365, SMRT can accelerate the pace of innovation within the organisation. With customer-ready tools – such as workflow engine, standard user-interface design and dashboard tools – SMRT does not have to source, buy, learn and deploy different solutions to get new capabilities up and running. Managers can now build, test and use new applications fast. “Dynamics 365 effectively reduces the time it takes us to evaluate, implement and roll out new innovations,” says Mr Ong. “This means we have a faster time-to-market for new projects. In addition, we save money by leveraging our existing investments.” Innovation Projects Up and Running in Three Months Today, SMRT can quickly build the systems it needs to support a new innovation project. rolling them out in just a few months, which is far faster than before. These new applications are cloud-based, so SMRT does not need to invest in new infrastructure.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Customer Service Read More »
Change across organizations, markets and industries is usually steady and predictable, with occasional jump starts that can spark innovation—typically fueled by the intersection of new technology with market demand. This phenomenon is happening right now in Field Service as competitive pressure forces organizations to rethink how to keep customers satisfied by ensuring 100 percent uptime and hyper-speed service delivery. In the pursuit for exceptional customer experiences, field service has become a frontline for exceptional customer service—the direct link for competitive differentiation across nearly every industry, from retail to telecommunications, manufacturing to utilities. And that means a rapid move away from break-fix models to proactive and predictive service; from standard delivery times to express service all the time; and the ability for field staff to have a 360-degree view of customers to help sell the right set of solutions. This new, rapidly-emerging model—connected field service—requires an investment in people and technology. A move from legacy systems to cloud-based services and solutions, Internet of Things (IoT) integration, mobile-connected field teams and Mixed Reality technologies. The question on the minds of many executive leaders is timing and ROI. What is the optimal service model? What technology stack will provide long-term returns? And how soon will the investment pay off? Would you believe that an organization can see a return in as little as four months? That’s the timeframe for MacDonald Miller Facility Solutions, a professional services company revolutionizing facilities management using Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Service, and Microsoft Azure IoT services, By adopting the Microsoft Connected Field Service Solution, MacDonald-Miller Facility Solutions found that by taking a more proactive approach to customer care, they could save time, money, and maintain their status as a high-performing industry leader— despite the complications that naturally arise from juggling multiple interlocking and complicated systems. This adoption would be a different kind of challenge and drastically change how the company tackled maintenance: fully integrating disparate systems into one easily accessible location and CRM for information, diagnostics, and repairs. Now, technicians would be armed with a full history when they were deployed, and with all the necessary tools to make a repair that day— sometimes even before the building maintenance knew it was needed. Integrating this solution of Microsoft Dynamics 365 with Azure IoT Hub into their already tech-savvy workflow allowed them to reduce the time-to-completion for service calls by nearly two weeks, increase profits for their customers, and save even more energy. So far, it’s been a popular change with customers: The average customer sees between 10 and 20 percent energy savings.
Why industry leaders are making the switch to Connected Field Service Read More »
Trident Information Systems, is one of the leading global providers of Information Technology services and business solutions with over with a proven track record of over 24 years. We have been consistently adding value to the business bottom line of our global clientele.
