The Study of Implementation of ERP in the Machinery Industry: A Case Study of Company X

Wang, Ben-Jeng, Chien, Yung-Chieh, Chen, Yen-Hung, Chou, Sheng-Wen, International Journal of Business Research

ABSTRACT

Rapid technological advances have caused fierce price competition, diminishing product life cycle, rapid changes in market requirements, and increased complication in international management and operation. To compete in such an environment, companies sometimes choose to expand both their organizational levels and sizes, which in turn require closer and tighter integration and control of their resources. To do that, many companies spend a great deal of resources, both money and people, to implement ERP systems, in the hope that the above difficulties can be overcome and competitiveness enhanced. However, for a successful implementation of ERP systems, current work flow must be redesigned and relevant information system integrated to cut down response time to customers' demands. Therefore, how to be a more competitive E-enterprise is a task all businesses are facing today.

The purpose of this research is to study if the company in this case, were aware of the characteristics of the machinery industry and followed the key successful factors, before and during the implementation of ERP. The company studied was one of the pioneer firms in the industry to adopt ERP system. Its ERP system is also relatively complete. Unfortunately, the research found that its coordinating vendors' systems were not computerized adequately, and require further attention and improvements.

Keywords: ERP, machine tool industry, performance evaluation

1. INTRODUCTION

As a part of a cost cutting strategy, modern organizations often devoted great efforts on reengineering business process, downsizing, restructuring, or implementing IT. Some of the most common IT implementations include supply chain management, enterprise resource planning (ERP), and customer relationship management.

As technologies continue to advance, companies are more and more likely to use IT to upgrade their operation efficiencies. In light of today's ever competitive environment and infinite changing market demands, it becomes imperative that companies are able to get a hold of their internal resources, while have accesses to external information sources. In addition, often companies must also be able to change and adjust quickly in order to reach their goals. This is especially true for the domestic machinery firms, whose competition is getting tougher all the time. In order to compete, machinery firms not only have to upgrade their qualities without raising prices, customer services is one area they have tried to strengthen. However, different industries often require different after services.

Much valuable resource could be wasted if required information is not exchanged between a company's production, marketing, human resources, R&D, and finance departments. Therefore, all departments must be integrated not only to cut down waste, but most importantly, cut down response time to external environment changes. To do that, many companies have turned to ERP.

This research is a case study of a machinery firm: X. In the …

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Publication information: Article title: The Study of Implementation of ERP in the Machinery Industry: A Case Study of Company X. Contributors: Wang, Ben-Jeng - Author, Chien, Yung-Chieh - Author, Chen, Yen-Hung - Author, Chou, Sheng-Wen - Author. Journal title: International Journal of Business Research. Volume: 7. Issue: 4 Publication date: July 2007. Page number: 103+. © 2007 International Academy of Business and Economics. COPYRIGHT 2007 Gale Group.

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