Implementing A New ERP System: Is it About Time to Have “Cloud-First” Strategy?

Adoption of a new ERP system requires intensive planning and strategy. You’ll have to analyze everything from data retention, storage protocols to software testing, configuration and upfront costs.

But for some businesses, it has always been a dilemma to upgrade from existing legacy ERP systems. You have little idea of the implications and the thought of migrating to the cloud before the impending new ERP implementation seems chaotic. Do these questions come to your mind?

“Why we should disrupt our processes twice?”

“Will we need to move data in the cloud before decommissioning our legacy applications?”

“Should not our approach be ERP first and cloud second?”

But trust us, these very thoughts are more problematic than anything to your IT advancement plans.

If you are resolved to implement ERP, you should understand that migrating data to the cloud is a must for maximum operational efficiency. In fact, if your operations are already cloud-friendly, you can leverage your new ERP system to its highest levels of performance.

Think About Data Migration

For any company, data is the primary asset and issues with migration can have a sizeable negative impact on business operations. However, many companies restrict their primary focus on software testing and configuration and put off data migration until very late in the ERP implementation process.

On the other hand, experts say that data migration should be performed very early in the ERP implementation project. In fact, businesses should assess the feasibility of moving their ERP systems to the cloud from the very beginning.

According to tech professionals, Cloud ERP is one of the best approaches to enterprise resource planning, which provides organizations with more scalable, agile and practical business process functionality.

Adopting the Cloud-First Strategy

Do you expect better business intelligence or need real-time analytics for your business? Most industries expect leveraging data to the fullest in order to make operations more efficient and productive.

In this respect, the cloud is a vital business tool. About 90% of enterprise organizations use cloud technologies in one form or the other, and public cloud computing environments are also developing significantly.

According to Gartner, it is expected that 28 percent of spending with crucial enterprise IT markets will shift to cloud by 2022. Here are key takeaways from the cloud-based researches –

• Faster Growth in enterprise IT spending on cloud-based offerings in comparison to traditional IT offerings.
• A relentless shift will continue towards enterprise IT spending and new cloud-based alternatives.
• It is expected that 60 percent of enterprises who implemented appropriate cloud visibility and control tools during 2018, will experience one third fewer security failures.

What we would push is that when you adopt a cloud-based ERP approach and instate a cloud-first strategy to ERP upgrades, you are not merely shifting from legacy ERP but actually moving towards the digitally transformed enterprise.

Reasons Why You Need Cloud-First Strategy Before You Move Towards ERP Upgrade

Challenges with Legacy ERP Systems: There are different challenges with legacy ERP systems when it comes to organizing, analyzing and extracting critical data. There are issues related to system limitations as well. Moreover, there are substantial costs involved with maintenance and support of legacy ERP systems. The cloud can eliminate all this from the bottom line more quickly.

Advanced-Data Management: Cloud ERP provides advanced levels of business intelligence, which can help organizations work in new directions and take decisions based on data analytics. If you are trying to implement a new ERP system, cloud migration beforehand allows for data-driven solutions and high-performance business intelligence capable of competing in the increasingly mobile world.

Growth Scaling: Modern business operations require to make decisions faster. Cloud-based ERP systems can keep pace with your company’s growth. You may need data localization, and right cloud ERP systems can facilitate localization in a broad range of countries. Many cloud ERP systems understand regulations pertaining to information, privacy, data usage and data residency requirements. Cloud-based data localization can help in sharing everything from accounts payable/receivable, general ledger to cash management, collections & more seamlessly across operations and different business units.

Get Help with Cloud-First Approach and ERP Implementation

Cloud computing has matured on several fronts in the past few years. More organizations now realize that cloud-first strategy is one of the most efficient, cost-effective approaches to upgrading and replacing your legacy ERP systems.

Working with the cloud is very simple. Get in touch with GRIP I.T., and we’ll help in smooth migration from legacy systems to cloud with more cost savings. Discuss your new ERP system implementation with our experts to advance your IT goals with better insights and analysis.