Microsoft and Astea integrate ERPand service-management suites
By Staff -- Manufacturing Business Technology, 9/1/2006 12:00:00 AM
Microsoft Business Solutions' latest bid to add vertical-industry functionality to its ERP offerings came via a partnership with Astea International, a field-service operations vendor.
Astea's Alliance suite will be integrated with Microsoft Dynamics AX and GP ERP packages, enabling access to a set of CRM-like applications for field-service operations support. Alliance, which caters to companies that sell and service industrial equipment, has functionality for managing field-service contracts and service-level agreements, and scheduling a field-service workforce.
The Astea/Microsoft Dynamics integration actually expands on an existing relationship between the two vendors, whereby Astea software is built on the Microsoft .NET platform.
"This is a natural progression for us," says Astea CEO Zack Bergreen. "We see many opportunities where our customers are interested in not just our software, but in replacing their back-end systems. Now we can offer them a total solution."
Bergreen says the alliance will give customers a single point of contact—Astea—for service and upgrades, and a common technology platform for both ERP and service management.
"In field service, [customers are] dealing with defects and quality issues," explains Bergreen. "If a defect is found, that information needs to be driven back into manufacturing. If the field-service and ERP systems are integrated, that information flows smoothly back and forth. Companies can put a business-intelligence layer on top of such a fully integrated system and data-mine both field service and manufacturing. This can lead to better control of data cleansing, and higher accuracy and consistency."
