See How Infor And Brown Smith Wallace Team Up To Improve Your Business Processes With iMap

Drive your business forward with a process improvement evaluation.
 
iMAP-Industry Measure, Analyze, and Perform-is an industry-focused, business-process improvement evaluation for Infor clients. This independent offering brought to you by the Brown Smith Wallace Business Process & Systems Group is designed to map key business processes to industry best practices. Brown Smith Wallace has a long history of advising wholesale distributors on best practices and leading software evaluations. With more than 25 years of service, we have the expertise to quickly assess your business challenges, compare your performance to industry benchmarks, and help you build a high-ROI business case for justifying process redesign and system upgrades.   Learn more at: http://tinyurl.com/hzj66a7

Inforum 2016: The Process Improvement Journey

Are your business processes and technologies holding back current performance and future growth? Do you struggle with determining what needs to change and building the support and funding for upgrades?

Jeff Gusdorf will be presenting at the 2016 Inforum in New York City on Tuesday, July 12 from 5:00pm to 5:45pm. He will cover how to quickly analyze your business challenges, benchmark your current process performance versus industry standards, and apply best practices to create "no-brainer" business cases that get approved and deliver great results. If you cannot be there, then download a summary of the presentation. 

Download Inforum Presentation Slides On Building A Compelling Business Case To Upgrade And Modernize Your Solutions


 

Infor Acquires Retail-Demand Software Firm Predictix

Enterprise software firm Infor is acquiring Predictix LLC and merging the company’s consumer-demand forecasting technology into its own supply-chain management systems for retailers.

Infor had invested $25 million in Predictix  in January.

The company is buying out the other investors of Atlanta-based Predictix, which mines data from the internet and other sources to predict demand trends for retailers including Home Depot Inc. and Whole Foods Market Inc.

The acquisition, for an undisclosed amount, follows Infor’s $675 million acquisition in August 2015 of GT Nexus, another provider of cloud-based software for retailers.

Infor and Predictix said subscriptions to the Predictix analytics software grew 40 percent last year and have accelerated since Infor’s initial investment, according to the report.

Infor Completes Acquisition Of Saleslogix Assets

Infor has completed its purchase of the assets of Saleslogix, a leading provider of SaaS customer relationship management (CRM) software.

Saleslogix's CRM will be renamed Infor CRMTM, adding strong sales and service functionality to Infor CloudSuite, the first group of industry-specific application suites available on Amazon Web Services' (AWS) cloud.

Infor plans to further develop the product, including increased scalability, refreshed user interface, and added industry-specific functionality.

Learn more about Infor at www.infor.com.

Tenth Semi-Annual Advanced Profit Improvement Conference

March 19-20, 2013, in Scottsdale, Arizona, Sponsored By: Infor

Attend this unique, high-value conference that will help your wholesale distribution company become more profitable. This two day event packs in the latest best practices in using analytics to significantly improve profitability - in sales, marketing, pricing, inventory and more. Past attendees have achieved multi-million-dollar profit gains using the strategies and tactics learned here. View brochure here.

The Spring APIC Conference will be offering an expanded lineup of conference speakers, adding new perspectives and new techniques to the wide range of time-tested strategies. These people are the best in the business, with published authors and executives with decades of experience sharing the best of their knowledge.

Unlike other events, conference speakers are part of the audience during the entire conference. This gives you opportunities to discuss your business with some of the best thinkers in distribution. For each conference, the speakers update and expand their content, adding new information to suit an evolving market.

Conference Speakers include: Brent Grover, Jonathan Bein, Bruce Merrifield, Tom Gale, Tony Pericle, Mike J. Lamping, Jay Greyson, Randy MacLean, Margaret Reynolds, Steve Deist, Bruce Constantine

Register Now: http://images.magnetmail.net/images/clients/GALEMEDIA/attach/APIC2013Registration.pdf

Infor Introduces Next Wave of Enterprise Software with Infor10

Consumer-Grade User Experience, Complete Industry Applications & Cloud Deployment Options Enabled by ION Technology

Infor, a leading provider of business application software with operations serving more than 75,000 customers, unveiled Infor10, which features a consumer-grade user experience, complete industry-specific software applications and Infor10 ION Suite, a lightweight, middleware technology that changes the way enterprise software is managed. 

"Our customers today already enjoy best-in-class applications with deep out-of-the-box functionality across a variety of highly specialized industries and micro-verticals. Infor10 sets a new standard for how work gets done. People at work have come to expect the same user experience they encounter in their everyday lives as users of Twitter, Facebook and Google. Infor10 and the Infor10 ION Suite bring that to the workplace," said Charles Phillips, CEO of Infor. "This unique combination provides our existing customers the opportunity to dramatically upgrade and extend their investments in Infor applications, and it gives new customers the next wave of enterprise software innovation they've been seeking."

ION Is the Foundation of Infor10
The Infor10 ION Suite is at the heart of Infor10. ION connects and integrates Infor and non-Infor applications, storing information in a common format and repository. ION allows information that flows among applications, analytics and social media streams to be accessed by users from their desktops, laptops and mobile devices.   

Unlike conventional middleware, the lightweight ION technology is not layered on top of existing applications, but infused into them. As a result, ION makes integrations quicker, simpler and more reliable. "ION creates the mobile, social and flexible enterprise," said Soma Somasundaram, senior vice president, Global Product Development, Infor. "Because it's lightweight and built using open standards, ION installs much faster than heavy middleware and allows customers to get up and running quickly and efficiently so they can focus on their core business." 

ION enables new and existing Infor and non-Infor applications to work as a holistic solution, helping to create streamlined workflows and end-to-end business processes, while improving system performance speed and upgrades.

"We say ION is unbreakable architecture because extensions don't break during upgrades," said Somasundaram. "Most of our customers don't want to be in the technology business. They would rather have IT be more agile and innovative, which is what ION allows them to do."

Infor10 Consumer-Grade Experience
Infor10 Workspace is the front end of Infor10 and designed to deliver a consumer-grade user experience and change the way work is done for the average enterprise user.

"Enterprise software users want to work the way they live," said Duncan Angove, president, Products and Support, Infor. "They can see what's going on in the consumer world, where social media, collaboration and mobile devices combined with beautiful design, ready-to-use applications and agile technology have substantially improved the speed, value and productivity of the consumer experience. With Infor10, we are delivering a consumer-grade user experience that begins with a beautiful user interface."

Infor10 ION Workspace unifies and presents all relevant information for each user on one screen, including role-based workflows, task and alerts, in-context business intelligence, event management, social media collaboration, consumer-like search capabilities, and business activity streams.

Infor10 Complete Industry Applications
ION also makes it possible to connect the rich functionality of leading ERP and best- in-class solutions from Infor and affiliate Lawson Software for specific industries.

Infor10 suites are targeted for Aerospace and Defense; Automotive; Chemicals; Distribution; Equipment Services, Maintenance & Rental; Fashion; Food and Beverage; General Manufacturing; Healthcare; High Tech; Hospitality; Industrial Equipment and  Machinery; and Public Sector.

"Generic one-size-fits-all software requires time-consuming configuration and doesn't address the specific needs of an industry," said Angove. "We believe that speed is the new basis for global competition, and we are building the functionality our customers need not only to address their industry issues right out of the box, but also to eliminate extensive customizations that lead to costly and risky implementations."

Infor10 Reimagines How Software is Managed
The Infor10 release also provides flexible deployment options, including Infor's CloudSuite Platform, to increase an organization's speed and agility.

Customers can run their entire solution on Infor10 CloudSuite or can keep core enterprise systems on premise, while running other applications or services in the Cloud. The Infor10 CloudSuite Platform features a unified user experience and security, and enables two-tiered, hybrid deployments.

Whether customers access functionality from a software-as-a-service (cloud) model or on-premise deployment, they get the same functionality and look-and-feel. The only difference is in how their users connect to core applications. Customers can even move from one deployment model to another, since the same application code is used for all deployment models.

About Infor
Infor is a leading provider of business software and services, helping more than 75,000 customers in 164 countries improve operations and drive growth.  To learn more about Infor10 or Infor, please visit www.infor.com.

Infor Announces InForce - Next Generation Social ERP and Marketing Built on Force.com

InForce Everywhere, InForce Order Management and InForce Marketing to Deliver 360-Degree View of Customer Data Across the Enterprise

Infor, a leading provider of business application software with operations serving more than 75,000 customers, and salesforce.com [NYSE: CRM], the enterprise cloud computing company, today announced that Infor will deliver three applications, built on Force.com, salesforce.com's social enterprise platform. The three new InForce applications will bring the power of the back office to the front office, and throughout the social enterprise - helping customers collaborate and drive growth. Additionally, salesforce.com made an investment in Infor as part of the agreement.

Through the partnership, Infor will build and deliver InForce Everywhere, a native Force.com application that brings ERP data into Salesforce; InForce Order Management, a quote, order and proposal management application; and InForce Marketing, which will leverage Infor CRM Epiphany, a leader in recommendation engines, for global marketing automation technology - all on Force.com. Infor will also develop additional applications on Force.com.

Comments on the News

• "Sales professionals in Infor's large manufacturing customer base need fast and easy access to the critical product and order data in our applications, and we will render that rich data in Salesforce," said Charles Phillips, CEO of Infor. "This partnership will help customers focus on building and selling great products instead of configuring databases, middleware, BI tools, or disk drives. Our customers need to automate processes in hours and days, not months and years, and skip the classic 3-by-3 ERP project - 3 years, 300 million, and 3 CIOs. They need results faster."
• "Companies transforming themselves into social enterprises want new ways to run their business," said Marc Benioff, chairman and CEO, salesforce.com. "Infor joins salesforce.com in recognizing these transformations must span across the entire company."

Available later this calendar year, InForce Everywhere will offer:

• A 360-degree view of invoice, contacts, quotes, shipments, receivables, orders, and RMAs (return merchandise authorizations) across the enterprise.
• A way for Salesforce users to view orders from Infor ERP applications.
• Access to customer information and transactions from the Salesforce Sales Cloud and Service Cloud using InForce Everywhere.
• Connection to ION, Infor's standard integration platform.
• Salesforce Chatter, which will make all of this data social to more effectively and quickly engage with customers through features like social profiles, status updates and real-time feeds.
• Infor's 700+ sales people and more than 800 channel partners the ability to resell bundled Salesforce CRM into more than 75,000 customers.

InForce Order Management will:

• Deliver a comprehensive quote, order and proposal management application built on Force.com.
• Integrate with Salesforce CRM to give Sales and Service Cloud users a clear and accurate view of pricing and availability.

InForce Marketing will:

• Offer a comprehensive global marketing automation system built on Force.com.
• Include inbound and outbound campaign management and lead maturation integrated with the Infor CRM Epiphany recommendation engine.

About Infor

Infor is a leading provider of business software and services, with operations helping more than 75,000 customers in 164 countries improve operations and drive growth. To learn more about Infor, please visit www.infor.com.

About Salesforce.com

With more than 100,000 customers, salesforce.com is the enterprise cloud computing company that is leading the shift to the social enterprise. Social enterprises leverage social, mobile and open cloud technologies to put customers at the heart of their business. Based on salesforce.com's real-time, multitenant architecture, the company's platform and application services include:

• Salesforce Chatter, a secure, private social network for your business
• Salesforce Sales Cloud, for sales force automation and contact management
• Salesforce Service Cloud, for customer service and support solutions
• Salesforce Radian6, for social media monitoring and engagement
• Salesforce Data.com, for the most complete source of accurate business data
• AppExchange, the leading marketplace for enterprise cloud computing applications
• Force.com, for custom application development
• Heroku, for building social and mobile customer apps
• Database.com, the world's first enterprise cloud database

Lawson M3 Product Line Set to Receive Significant Investment with Infor Technology

Infor and Lawson Software said the direction of the M3 product line is strategic to the growth of Lawson, and that the development plan is to deliver complete industry suites built around the core M3 application. Lawson M3 solutions are designed for companies that make, move and maintain products or equipment.

The Infor and Lawson M3 product development teams have initially focused on three levels of adding value to M3 customers: 1) the user experience; 2) technology and 3) applications.

"We are truly looking to bring the best of both companies to provide immediate value to M3 customers," said Henrik Billgren, vice president, Lawson product management. "One example is the user experience with the Lawson Smart Office and Infor Workspace products. We see Lawson Smart Office as ideal for the power users within an organization, while Infor Workspace is great for the day-to-day workplace user. We are also looking to bring Lawson's mashup designer capabilities and Lawson Enterprise Search into Infor Workspace."

Among the planned benefits to the user experience include a unified look and feel, single sign-on, improved navigation, and in-context business intelligence.

At the technology level, the development teams have focused on using Infor ION, an innovative interoperability architecture, as a bridge to M3 Collaborator to create a unified and uniform middleware stack. This major advancement in M3 architecture will connect and deliver end-to-end processes across disparate applications, whether they are M3, Infor, home-grown, or third-party applications.

Lastly, at the application level, the initial work has focused on building out industry suites for the core M3 verticals: manufacturing, distribution, fashion, food and beverage, and equipment service management & rental. First examples are targeted at the process manufacturing and distribution verticals with Process Supply Chain Scheduling, Process Product Lifecycle Management, Corporate Performance Management (leveraging M3 Opportunity Analyzer), and Warehouse Management integrated with the core M3 application.

"Over the past five years, the Global Association of M3 User Groups (GAM3) has witnessed significant improvements in the functionality and technical advances, such as Smart Office and Enterprise Search, to the Java-based M3 ERP software," said Graham Maxfield, general manager of GAM3, which represents all M3 customers worldwide. "Following the acquisition of Lawson, GAM3 anticipates that these advances will continue and will accelerate to the benefit of M3 customers, both existing and new."

About Lawson Software

Lawson Software is an Infor affiliate with more than 4,500 customers worldwide, primarily in specific services, trade and manufacturing/distribution industries.

About Infor

Infor is a leading provider of business software and services, helping more than 70,000 customers in 164 countries improve operations and drive growth. To learn more about Infor, please visit www.infor.com.