ISG Software Research Analyst Perspectives

A Strategic Approach to Replacing ERP Systems for Modernization and AI

Posted by Robert Kugel on 27 February 2025

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are comprehensive software platforms designed to integrate and manage all the core processes of an enterprise while recording transactions and their financial consequences to support the accounting and finance functions. ISG Software Research recently completed our Buyers Guide™ for ERP systems, designed to help enterprises that are replacing their... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, ERP and Continuous Accounting, AI and Machine Learning

Resilient Supply Chains and AI to Manage Costs

Posted by Robert Kugel on 23 May 2024

Rebalancing supply chains to improve resiliency has been a focus of enterprises with even moderately complex and long supply chains for the past four years. One aspect of this rebalancing is that it almost always involves higher costs. Volume discounts and bargaining power are reduced when more suppliers are used, or an alternate supplier may have higher factor costs and therefore must charge... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Product Information Management, Operations & Supply Chain, Continuous Supply Chain & ERP

Smart Manufacturing Increases Productivity and Resilience

Posted by Robert Kugel on 26 March 2024

Smart manufacturing is a strategic operating approach that aligns advanced manufacturing technology with system and process design principles to promote adaptability. It is a digital, event-driven, collaborative orchestration of physical and digital processes designed to increase productivity, efficiency, adaptability and resilience. These systems use technologies to coordinate the planning and... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, S&OP, Operations & Supply Chain, supply chain management, Continuous Supply Chain & ERP, Smart Manufacturing

Planning to Get Ahead of What’s Next in the 21st Century

Posted by Robert Kugel on 22 February 2024

We live in an era of uncertainty, not unpredictability. Managing in uncertain times is always difficult, but tools are available to improve the odds for success by making it easier and faster to plan for contingencies and scenarios. Software makes it possible to manage ahead of any future event, connecting the tactical trees to the strategic forest. The purpose of planning is not just to create a... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, Data Management, Business Planning, data operations, AI and Machine Learning

Technology Makes Purchasing More Effective

Posted by Robert Kugel on 20 February 2024

Digitally transforming finance operations has been a priority since 2020. For purchasing and the procure-to-pay cycle, software can streamline processes, shorten process times, reduce unnecessary costs, provide greater visibility into cash flows, increase control and improve results. Digitizing operations helps attract and retain the best talent because professionals spend less time on... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Supplier Relationship Management, Continuous Supply Chain & ERP

2024 Market Agenda for Operations and Supply Chain: Seize the Opportunity

Posted by Robert Kugel on 29 January 2024

Ventana Research recently announced its 2024 market agenda for Operations and Supply Chain, continuing the guidance we have offered for more than two decades to help enterprises across industries derive optimal value and improved outcomes from business technology. After three years of reacting to disruption, enterprises that have made the right investments and restructured operations are able to... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Product Information Management, Operations & Supply Chain, Property Technology, Supplier Relationship Management, Continuous Supply Chain & ERP

AI Will Increase the Strategic Value of S&OP

Posted by Robert Kugel on 17 January 2024

Sales and operations planning (S&OP) is trending toward becoming more strategic in product-centric companies through the end of the decade. The purpose of S&OP has grown in importance. Since the mid-teens, the trade and economic environment has become less benign and more unpredictable, forcing many enterprises to redesign their supply chains for resiliency while still surmounting the dual... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, Continuous Supply Chain & ERP

Tap Into AI To Do More by Doing Less

Posted by Robert Kugel on 14 December 2023

Doing more by doing less means using artificial intelligence and related technologies to make financial planning and analysis organizations more productive. By eliminating low-value and unproductive work, AI enables FP&A teams to free up considerable time for more useful and consequential forecasting, planning, budgeting, analysis and reporting. AI isn’t some far-off capability. It’s already... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, Business Planning

Board Enables High-Performing FP&A Organizations

Posted by Robert Kugel on 29 November 2023

Board offers a platform that enables financial planning and analysis (FP&A) groups to forecast, plan, budget, analyze and report, using a consistent set of data from across the business to speed these processes, improve forecast and planning accuracy, and accelerate analysis and reporting. Board was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor in our Ventana Research Business Planning Value Index, with... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning

The Question of Generative AI Costs

Posted by Robert Kugel on 25 July 2023

As we celebrate the first half of what seems to be the year of generative artificial intelligence, with an apparently unlimited discussion of use cases and bogeymen, my attention is turning to the very mundane question of costs. Specifically, how costs incurred – through investment and operation – will be distributed along the value chain and how this will affect the demand for AI ‒ by whom and... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Enterprise Resource Planning, natural language processing, AI and Machine Learning, Continuous Supply Chain & ERP

Improving Supply Chain Management in the Post-Pandemic World

Posted by Robert Kugel on 24 May 2023

In early 2019, I first wrote about the escalating strategic challenges facing organizations resulting from the decade-long dismantling of the liberal global trade environment and the shift to more restrictive regimes. Supply chain management was upended in 2020 as a series of extraordinary events, especially the pandemic-induced supply chain shocks, compounded the tactical challenges facing... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, Continuous Supply Chain & ERP

2023 Market Agenda: Greater Agility for a Less Certain World

Posted by Robert Kugel on 20 January 2023

Ventana Research recently announced its 2023 research agenda for Operations and Supply Chain, continuing the guidance we’ve offered for nearly two decades to help organizations across industries derive optimal value and improved outcomes from business technology. Readily available, innovative digital technology can help organizations optimize operations by aligning customer demand with... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Product Information Management, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, continuous supply chain, Property Technology, Supplier Relationship Management

The Data Pantry Accelerates Actionable Analytics for Decision-Making

Posted by Robert Kugel on 22 December 2022

Ventana Research uses the term “data pantry” to describe a method of data storage (and the technology and process blueprint for its construction) created for a specific set of users and use cases in business-focused software. It’s a pantry because all the data one needs is readily available and easily accessible, with labels that are immediately recognized and understood by the users of the... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Business Intelligence, Data Management, Business Planning, Data, Financial Performance Management, Enterprise Resource Planning, continuous supply chain, data operations, Streaming Data Events, Analytics and Data, AI and Machine Learning

Anaplan at a Crossroads

Posted by Robert Kugel on 10 August 2022

Anaplan offers a cloud-based business planning platform that incorporates a modeling and calculation engine. The tool makes it relatively easy to add or expand the scope of plans that can be connected and monitored on a single platform. This Integrated Business Planning (IBP) approach enables organizations to use the software for financial planning or budgeting, sales, supply chain, workforce,... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, Business Intelligence, Business Planning, Financial Performance Management, continuous supply chain, AI and Machine Learning

Kinaxis Optimizes Agile Supply Chain Planning

Posted by Robert Kugel on 26 May 2022

Kinaxis is a sales and operation planning software company headquartered in Ottawa, Canada. Its RapidResponse is an S&OP platform for concurrent planning, designed to integrate an organization’s supply chain planning silos, accelerate planning cycles and optimize supply chain execution to match customer demand. At its recent users’ conference, the company emphasized its continued progress in... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, continuous supply chain

Reordered Global Trade Requires Agile Sales and Operations Planning

Posted by Robert Kugel on 29 April 2022

I first wrote about a new era of trade a few years ago to make the point that the period of optimizing supply chains for the lowest cost was over, and that companies needed to redesign them to achieve greater resiliency. That observation proved correct. Now we are hearing about “the end of globalization,” a hyperbolic phrase describing the effects of ongoing changes to the international political... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Financial Performance Management, Enterprise Resource Planning, ERP and Continuous Accounting, continuous supply chain

2022 Market Agenda: Increasing Supply Chain Agility and Resilience

Posted by Robert Kugel on 02 February 2022

Ventana Research recently announced its 2022 research agenda for Operations and Supply Chain, continuing the guidance we’ve offered for nearly two decades to help organizations across industries derive optimal value from business technology and improve outcomes. Readily available innovative digital technology can help organizations optimize operations by aligning customer demand with fulfillment... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Product Information Management, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, continuous supply chain, Property Technology, Supplier Relationship Management

Fix Sales and Operations Planning to Improve Financial Efficiency

Posted by Robert Kugel on 10 December 2021

Several years ago, I noted the importance of gaining resilience in managing supply chains. The world had entered a new era of trade following the financial crisis of 2007, as multilateral relationships were steadily fragmenting. For decades, sourcing and supply chain management was focused almost exclusively on achieving the lowest cost, and the world’s trade environment supported this approach.... Read More

Topics: Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, Business Planning, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, continuous supply chain

BillingPlatform Bolsters the Rise of Subscription Services

Posted by Stephen Hurrell on 22 September 2021

Subscription management and billing services help organizations offer unique benefits and enhance delivery to customers. By making services more personalized, organizations can acquire – and retain – more customers. Many business-to-business companies are shifting to a subscription business model to remain competitive, imposing new requirements on vendors to support pricing models that address... Read More

Topics: Sales, Office of Finance, Continuous Planning, embedded analytics, Analytics, Business Intelligence, Business Planning, Product Information Management, Digital Commerce, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, ERP and Continuous Accounting, natural language processing, revenue and lease accounting, continuous supply chain, Subscription Management, partner management, Process Mining, Streaming Analytics, Supplier Relationship Management, AI and Machine Learning

ConverSight.ai Earns 2021 Digital Innovation Award

Posted by Mark Smith on 02 September 2021

The annual Ventana Research Digital Innovation Awards showcase advances in the productivity and potential of business applications, as well as technology that contributes significantly to the improved processes and performance of an organization. Our goal is to recognize technology and vendors that have introduced noteworthy digital innovations to advance business and IT. Ventana Research has... Read More

Topics: Continuous Planning, Analytics, Product Information Management, Price and Revenue Management, Digital Technology, Operations & Supply Chain, Enterprise Resource Planning, Conversational Computing, collaborative computing, continuous supply chain, work experience management, AI and Machine Learning