For years, companies have used digital supply chain technologies to improve service levels and reduce costs. But the inability to connect disparate systems, provide end-to-end visibility into the supply chain, and crunch massive amounts of data, among other issues, has prevented many companies from achieving the full potential of their supply chains. Now, thanks to the wide availability and adoption of much more powerful digital technologies, including advanced analytics and cloud-based solutions, companies are generating dramatically better returns on their investments.

A recent survey shows a clear disconnect between large manufacturing companies and mid-sized ones when it comes to so-called Big Data, with 96.3 percent of the latter finding the phenomenon to be either difficult to understand or only somewhat understandable.

The major direction of most of the big ERP companies these days is modernizing and upgrading their ERP portfolio. Epicor, Aptean, Infor, QAD, UNIT4, SAP and others all have major platform upgrades to which they are trying to migrate their customers. This presents a huge dilemma for both the customer and the ERP providers.