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Background
Interior Specialists (ISI) is a leading provider of flooring systems for housing developers in the southwestern United States. The company had long maintained a competitive advantage through the strategic use of information technology, and after years of leveraging its back-office systems for maximum benefit, ISI was finally reaching the limit of its existing infrastructure. The system had grown increasingly complex and the number of concurrent users had multiplied to the point of straining the underlying architecture. System response time was becoming slower, and further enhancements were difficult and very expensive.
Situation
To ensure that ISI stayed ahead of the competition, it needed to re-architect its back-office systems and develop an infrastructure that could continue to grow along with business demands. A scalable and extensible architecture was imperative. The company needed a solution that would combine an appropriate mix of off-the-shelf accounting, inventory control, order processing and fulfillment with custom vertical-market functionality.
Solution
SCG tailored the Construction Options Management Solution to meet ISI's business needs. Built upon the Microsoft Great Plains back-office foundation, the solution included a custom sub-system for maintaining housing-tract, floor plan, and lot information. This data is used to automate the creation of flooring estimates based on the coverings that homebuyers choose. As estimates are turned into orders, they are pumped into the Great Plains system for order processing and posting to the general ledger. The advanced reporting architecture provides management with key performance indicators via on-demand and scheduled reports.
By utilizing Visual Basic to build a custom subsystem on a Microsoft SQL server, the client benefits from a web-based solution with real-time response and enhanced usability. A Citrix application serves as the end-to-end system that seamlessly connects users, devices and networks to the enterprise resources. Moreover, through the use of Crystal Enterprise Server, SCG’s customers benefit from a flexible, scalable, and reliable solution that delivers powerful, interactive reports.
Results
The Construction Options Management Solution allows ISI to maintain its technology-driven competitive advantage through optimized automation and sharing of data across all business areas. The system's open architecture provides avenues for increased electronic data exchange between ISI and homebuilders, as well as trading partners, and is scalable to accommodate ISI’s future growth.
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| challenges |
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inadequate back office |
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complex accounting system |
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inventory control |
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order processing |
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fulfillment |
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| technologies |
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Great Plains |
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SQL Server |
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Visual Basic |
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Citrix |
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Crystal Reports |
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| results |
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web-based |
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electronic data exchange |
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flexible data-output format |
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