Oracle Applications (Oracle E-business Suite) Customizations: What Is It?

Oracle Applications Customizations is a major issue in many companies that have implemented it. Oracle recommends every company that installs Oracle Applications to avoid any customization, but I have not seen any company that utilizes it and have not done any customization.

There are two types of Customizations: Extensions and Modifications.

• Extensions are components developed by customer, using the development features provided by Oracle within the E-business Suite. Oracle has provided guidelines and standards for creating extensions. It is extremely recommended that those are followed; it will certify that the new objects (extensions) are kept separate from standard E-business components.

• Modifications are changes done in the standard E-business suite objects or code. For example, a customer gets a database trigger from Oracle Applications database and makes some changes in the code. When customers follow this approach it is very difficult to identify the changes that have been done in the Oracle Applications, and this will affect future upgrades.

There are some common extensions on Oracle Applications Suite:

• Alert: Oracle Alerts facilitates the flow of information within a customer’s organization. Oracle workflow is used to develop new alerts.

• Database Objects: when the functionality is not available in Oracle Applications, it is possible to create a set of database objects. If the creation is necessary, it has to be done carefully, once it could impact the performance and the integrity of the system.

• File System and Custom Directory: always use the standard Oracle Flexible Architecture (OFA). This helps you to standardize installation and maintenance procedures. Create a new directory ($CUSTOM_TOP) and store all the customization in there.

• Forms: provides a way of populating custom tables. Oracle has provided a guideline for its implementation that must be followed. It has to be coded and tested properly; otherwise it can compromise the data integrity.

• Reports: Oracle provides the most usual reports and every company has to develop to their specific formats. Oracle Reports builder is the tool to be used and there are some risks in case of an upgrade, once that the schema of the objects used by Reports and Oracle eBusiness Suite can be changed in future releases.

Customization is a need at any company that has implemented Oracle Applications. Oracle is frequently advising everyone to avoid any kind customization. I agree in some part with Oracle, I would just change this advice to “Extend but not modify”.

Author: Andrew Karasev

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The Current State of Enterprise Resource Planning

To analyze the future trends of Enterprise Resource Planning, it is first important to look at the current state of this industry. While this tool was originally used for manufacturing and human resources, it is now being used in areas such as customer services, sales automation, and supply chain maintenance. At the moment, it seems that ERP vendors are expanding the capability of their ERP products, and many of them are catering to smaller businesses instead of just Fortune 500 companies.

The advent of the Internet has played an important role in the evolution of Enterprise Resource Planning.
A number of companies are combining their supply chain maintenance functions with the internet so that suppliers can also have easy access to the information. When the supplier is given access to this crucial information, they will be able to understand the needs of their clients. They will have a good understanding of how much they should produce, and they will also become familiar with manufacturing issues. In addition to integrating the processes within a company, ERP vendors are working to merge the collaboration of suppliers, customers, and the companies that work with them. In addition to doing this on a domestic level, these vendors are working on an international level as well.

A number of experts have said that they feel the future of ERP may be in danger. There are a number of reasons why they voice these concerns. First, many ERP vendors have already catered to the needs of large companies. Most, if not all large companies are now using some type of Enterprise Resource Planning system. What this means is that the market for ERP is decreasing with Fortune 500 and 1000 companies. Even though a vendor can expect to make millions off the sale of a system, they will not make any more money beyond this, and once a company has implemented a ERP system, there is little they need from the vendor.

To solve these problems, a number of vendors are focusing on small to medium sized businesses. They are tailoring their products to these companies by reducing the size, cost, and complexity of implementing them. If an ERP vendor wants to survive in this ever changing market, there are a number of things they will need to do. They will first want to pay attention to processes that are not connected to a generic system. They will want to look at things such as customer support and the ability of their clients to make decisions. The last thing they will need to do is target their products towards smaller companies. If an ERP vendor wants to succeed, they must understand the needs of their customers. Their customer service must be superior in quality, and the prices must be decent, especially for small to medium sized businesses.

If a vendor does these things successfully, they can compete in the global market. The business world continues to change, and ERP vendors must be able to adapt to these changes if they wish to remain competitive. As we move further into the 21st century, it will become more important for organizations to integrate both their processes and information. It is critically important for manufacturers and customers to work at a higher level of understanding and coordination. In addition to this, the company must be able to effectively work with suppliers. Overall, ERP is a strategic resource that will allow companies to synchronize processes that would otherwise be disconnected.

Source: www.exforsys.com

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Oracle E-Business Suite – Is It Really Possible To Support It Remotely?

Well, let’s begin from philosophical introduction. It is probably moving into this direction, all the recent talks about offshore development, remote support, customization project outsourcing, BPO (business processes outsourcing). And the final result will be so-called radical compromise, meaning it is not a regular compromise, but rather something we do not know about. In order to predict the future form of Oracle Applications/Fusion support we have to look at the trends.

• Market Trends. When we see that traditional manufacturing is now outsourced to China, India, Brazil, Latin America, Mexico, South East Asia – we should question if traditional ERP support will stay in the local framework and model, when consultants go onsite, sit the day with corporate IT, CEO, Controller and key AR/AP people to design the MRP model. In fact – communication channel advances allow you to be present in the conference virtually and do not feel strong disadvantages of not being able to shake opponent hands. If you are in USA, Europe, Australia, New Zealand – do you really care if get phone/skype/websession support, not peer-to-peer?

• Step-by-Step. Well, we have to be conservative in order to be profitable and mutually beneficial. Let’s start from small - assume that remote support and outsourcing are for Oracle E-Business Suite Extensions & Customizations, Oracle Report Builder design & development, plus typical customer support cases, when you as a client are OK to call 800 number

• International Challenge. This is when Oracle Applications has to be supported in their localized (multicurrency, local and regional taxation and language: Portuguese, Spanish, French, German, Russian). This is definitely the obstacle, however we see more examples when company has employees from Argentina, Brazil, Haiti, Montreal, China sitting in the same office…

• Conclusion. Probably the most likely scenario will be the one when you will have to accept the conception of virtual reality.

Author: Andrew Karasev

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