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Retail and Distribution Company meets growth
projections with hosted ERP solution
Challenge
PeakWear, a retail and distribution company specializing in outdoor wear has grown tremendously over its 11 years in business. The company, which opened its doors in 1996, started its ERP initiative with a small 10-user system, and has since grown into a 50-user complete ERP system.
The success and growth of PeakWear was managed, more or less, by a client/server installation of Microsoft Navision. Over time, however, it became apparent that the growth in user base also presented new issues related to PC compatibility, service, maintenance and performance of the application. Facing severe external competition, PeakWear soon realized that the current IT configuration could not sustain its growth objectives. As a result, company officials quickly began their search for a technology partner who could respond to the critical need that was slowly hurting their company’s operations and profitability.
As one company official explained: "Our previous system required a programmer for every little change and fix that was needed. We also hired two help desk employees who were constantly fixing client PC’s. We needed a reliable system that wasn’t dependent on internal resources."
Penta Solution
By leveraging its advanced infrastructure competency and status as a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, Penta designed an Application Service Provider (ASP) infrastructure model centralized in its world class, secure data center in Geneva, Switzerland. The installation consisted of a dedicated Citrix server loaded with Navision 4.3, Exchange 2007, Office 2007, and SQL 2005. Additionally, Microsoft SharePoint 2007 was added to bring new means of collaboration, enterprise search, content management and business process facilitation.
This server-based infrastructure was secured by multiple firewall configurations across every communication point. A disaster recovery infrastructure was provided implemented through a mirrored server environment hosted in Penta’s Zurich data center.
Results
The immediate result of this solution helped all 50-client users of PeakWear standardize on a single version of Navision 4.3 without worrying about PC hardware compatibility issues. With the availability of Microsoft Office 2007, the sales team could now better synchronize sales, marketing, and ordering with Microsoft Office productivity tools, such as Microsoft Outlook. By introducing Microsoft SharePoint 2007, a new level of collaboration was formed between retail operations and distribution. As a result, retail could prevent overstocking inventory by communicating shipment needs in real time in advance of distribution.
Financial cost savings by moving to an ASP model of service provided PeakWear with a three-year savings of over 40% in technology expenditures.
Contact us for custom ERP solution using Microsoft Dynamics
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As a Microsoft Certified Gold Partner, Penta provides local, personalized service – from planning and implementation, to customization, to ongoing support and education. In addition Penta also offers Advanced Infrastructure Solutions, Information Worker Solutions, Networking Infrastructure Solutions, Hosting Solutions and Office Systems Desktop Deployment.
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