Kinetic

Pros

Epicor is extremely flexible right out of the box, and is exceptionally strong in the areas of managing and tracking Production Jobs, Bill of Materials, Scheduling, Labor, Inventory, Purchasing, and Order Entry. It also has the ability to have customized development, and things like the Epicor BAQ's, Dashboards, and Business Activity Manager features allow customizes information, exportable grids, and notifications to be setup by administrators and even end users as these modules are user-friendly and fairly intuitive! The Shop Floor Data Entry Module (MES) is also very intuitive and simple to use for the users on the production / manufacturing floor.

Cons

Epicor ERP is expensive software, and since it's such a wide product that handles so many aspects of your business, setup really must be done according to Epicor's recommendations and completed thoroughly. Also, since it's so flexible, there is a lot of it that you won't use, so it's best to create clear work instructions for your team and/or hide fields and/or functions that you will not need to use.

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Switching to Kinetic

Pros

Easily mass upload and update data. Configurable modules to meet your business needs. Responsive, knowledgeable and helpful consultants.

Cons

Some restrictions which are costly to customize and work around. Forms are not easily edited. Many modules are an extra added cost to subscribe every year.

Pros

Great service. And Overall easy process.

Cons

Everything was great. There nothing i can of i didn't like.

Pros

Lots of different ways to do one thing.

Cons

There is a lot of steps to do one process. -it’s bulky-it’s very unforgiving

Pros

This software handles all of your company needs. It does time management, inventory, project management, and more. This was very easy to roll out to end users.

Cons

So far we have only used this for less then 6 mo. I don't have any down side at this point. There is still a learning curve that we need to over come.

Pros

it is a very complete software, it can really help you with you planning and manufacturing process, you can control your purchases and your inventory very easy

Cons

it lack of controls, you have to customize in order to get more control of your process, the cost of customization it is very high, and the support you get for your maintenance fee is is very poor.

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Switching to Kinetic

Pros

The MS stack makes it easy to customize for reporting, data storage. Multi-tier configuration with database, application server and options for web-clients, fat clients and terminal servers.
Many options for customization in addition to code development. Multi-everything.

Relatively easy to upgrade and stay on current releases. Great administrative tools and ability to add resources as demand grow, including localizing servers for better performance.

Cons

Nothing really. There are lots of modules and each has a lot of simple to understand configuration options.

Pros

Epicor is relatively easy to use and learn. Our whole organization rely on Epicor for order entry and accounting/ financial management. It is our main ERP software that we use 90% of the time.

Cons

We have on premise Epicor and we struggle with some performance issues frequently. The communication between the app server and database server encounter a lot of issues from time to time and we end up having to reboot the systems to try to get us back working again.

Pros

I used this software for 6 years and so I really got to know the ins and outs of it. It's hard to say what I liked most because I didn't really like it that much. One positive is that it's a very robust product probably best suited to a much larger company than ours.

Cons

As the out of the box product, there is zero ability to customize anything without paying another company to do it for you. It's possible to make changes if you have training or an additional module, neither of which I had.
There are many security measures in place that makes it difficult to undo something or revise after you've done it.

Pros

We use Epicor for all the activities at work, from order entry, shipping all the way to invoicing.
This system allowed us to keep track of inventory and was even tailored to our company needs, which helped pull real data to keep track of KPI’s. My department was in charge of the orders.

Cons

Sometimes pulling reports could take longer than wanted/needed.

Pros

Data Driven and Customizable for various departments.

Cons

Needs to be more user friendly and software needs to be faster.

Pros

This software has about anything you could think of to help and personalize it to your business. It has so many different reports and assets to help your business. It even has the ability to link together different chains of stores owned by the same owner. They also use what is called "Bomgar" which is a system that allows them to view and control your screen on any terminal to help resolve any issue.

Cons

Nothing is free with this software. If you want the smallest thing they will charge you. You do pay a monthly fee, just like anything else, so you do have access to a call center to walk you through things. However, depending on who you talk to, it is a hit or miss if he/she knows what they are doing and understand what you are looking for. They have different help levels so if they don't understand that can pass you up to a different help level. Sometimes they charge will charge you by hour to take to someone high up.

Another CON, is that nothing is simple or straight forward. With it being such a high-tech system, if you want your system to do more than basic, you have to call the help line to help set it up. Sure, you could do it, but good look trying to figure it out and knowing what other flags in the system you need to mark so nothing else is messed up.

Pros

ITs flexibility and ability to customize. Cloud versions available. Offers many modules for most needs. There has been in the past several years a building of third party software vendors with the ability to augment the customization, implementation and general maintenance of the software requiring less reliance on Epicor consulting services. Features such as document routing has greatly improved forms handling. The software is definitely in growth mode resulting in new features and abilities. The number one feature I like is the ability to export any report and most data grids directly to excel. Overall I have more likes on were the software is going rather than were it is at today

Cons

The software is not at all user friendly. Little if any documentation on how to use the product. Education is available but pricey. Support system is totally ineffectual and support personal are lacking in basic knowledge. Company has built many silos and employees do not have the ability to see across those barriers. The online support system called Epicare has added a layer of difficulty in that you cannot speak with an employee to explain an issue. The online submission is often limited to drop down selections that have nothing to do with the problem. The helpful tips you are given when submitting a case are almost always way off topic and of no use.

Pros

We are able to do more with fewer people

Cons

We struggle with scheduling complexities and the reporting tools are limited

Pros

This ERP makes it extremely easy to quote items that do not have part numbers set up in the system. We fabricate custom designed process equipment which requires many purchased components. And often times our customers require us to follow their specific Approved Material List which could include components we have not purchased before.
Epicor allows to quote parts, kits, systems without forcing us to create part numbers which makes quoting very easy and quick. No sense in setting up part numbers if we don't have the job yet.

Cons

The CRM part is not the greatest. Needs to be improved or allow Sales Force or other leading CRM software to tie in to Epicor.

Pros

The way to present dashboards and reports on the fly

Cons

At this momment we still havent found least likely. But if we need to choose one could be the financial module.

Pros

Epicor had many features which helped us manage inventory and the financials for the many facets of our business from retail gas stations to business to business fuel deliveries across the country.

Cons

The user interface was not user friendly and could have had many improvements. Everything was in menus and there were some items that were labeled similar name which could be confusing. One upside on this was that you could create custom menus for yourself to easily find things which made it easier, however if you needed to transfer those list to a new team member you had to try and remember where each item was from originally.

Pros

Built-in customization tools are very powerful - allowing detailed tailoring to company needs without direct coding. BPMs now allow excellent logic branching and very nice built in features such as email alerts. Publish & Subscribe dashboards are a great reporting option with drill down capability. Form customizations are also very easy. SQL Server DB is a big improvement over Progress and MUCH faster.

Cons

Reliance on SSRS for reporting - although Crystal Reports still works. Does not handle really complex BoM/MoM situations well for jobs with thousands of assembly levels and hundreds of branches or indents. Projects module isn't quite robust enough to be used for complex jobs/orders.

Pros

I frequently use this program to track historical product records. I can pull a full production detail report, to see each and every operation a part has gone through.

Cons

Sometimes, the reporting feature takes awhile to pull the report. This is only the case for very large reports however!

Pros

We have used Epicor for about 3 months and so far it has went very well. Change over from our previous system went smoothly. Movement in the system is very simple, it is easy to find what you are looking for through the menu system.

You are a click away from about any information you would need for planning and scheduling.

Cons

In the beginning we had some issues with inventory suggestions, the system wanted everything at the moment it realized we were below minimums, but after a few weeks or research we were able to set the system to work as we needed it to.

A few other small issues at start up, but over all not difficult implementation

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Choosing Kinetic

Pros

The software interface resembles a Microsoft product which helps end users pick up the basics of navigation.
Epicor 10.1 represents a significant improvement over legacy versions of the software and performance is much better.

Cons

Support is poor. First line support team members are really just called takers and it is difficult to get to someone who actually knows the software and who might be able to assist you with the problem you are experiencing. Most times, it seems like the first line support tech's job is to find out if you have customized the software so that they can use that as a reason not to provide support, which is frustrating since the Epicor sales pitch emphasizes ease of customization.

Pros

The ability to customize reports is outstanding. I also like that I can easily find the information I need when I need it.

Cons

Modules. You have to purchase quite a few separate modules to be able to use everything which can cost

Pros

Good value for the money
Good little manufacturing system
They put on really nice annual conferences

Cons

Epicor grew by acquisition so some of the interfaces are cloodgey (I think they are working o improving this with their cloud based systems).

General maintenance in Mexico is very good, the US arm needs to help them more instead of tossing hard problems over the border without proper training.

System is not user friendly, based on HUNDREDS of tables!!!

US customer support is very good if you get the right people.

Customer support for real issues (forex) is a cash sink hole - any time you have a bug or a real problem, they refer you to a consultant at per hour basis. Worse, they do not have many consultants who really know the product so you waste thousands of dollars getting them up to speed, only to end up with the problem not fixed. We have since learned some of these issues were fixed but only in the new version which costs us to upgrade.

Pros

Very configurable software which is both good and bad. Software has a lot of capability to flex to our needs.

Cons

Support and training for implementation was very poor, we kicked out 3 different consultants before we found one that could understand our needs and work with us. The initial assessment program by Epicor was a waste of time and money. The program management at Epicor also did not add much for the cost.

Pros

It was easy to learn for me - Been a user for 5 years

Cons

I have no issues with this software.
I cant think of anything I dont like after 5 years of being a user.

Pros

Epicor Kinetic is a robust, mature ERP system that is continuing to innovate. The core function and structure is sound, included modules are robust, and there is a strong and growing architecture for extensibility & customization.

Cons

Many features have been added over the years, some via acquisition - not all are done well or at feature parity. The new UI still feels like it's in Beta, but all new features are developed for the new UI. Internal support is poor, but there is a strong consulting and user community that offsets that somewhat.

Pros

This software allows a quoter to include every facet of a project before it gets a customer PO. From that quote, every detail is able to be brought through to the order, the job, the packing slip, and the final invoice. There are so many different ways to track various phases of the project as it moves through. Every detail can be recorded if every employee is disciplined enough to make the input. Then, 10 years from now, when the machine finally has a hiccup, (and assuming everyone entered all the details) you know every purchased part and have a link to every drawing used in manufacturing. Your customer will be amazed when you can recite those part numbers and pull prints within minutes 10 years later with absolute accuracy. You will eliminate QuickBooks, sales force or any other CRM, MS Project, and a host of programs that are not integrated and require multiple entries once you are fully functional. This software will transform your company, and you will become more profitable than you were before. Your work week will never be under 50 hours again, and you will either learn very facet of the software of spend well over 100k every year to keep it running, but if you stay on every employee all the time to do their best and do YOUR best, you will realize some incredible benefits. Our company does more with 20 people than many companies do with 50, and we manufacture parts and machinery. We can credit a lot of that success to the Epicor ERP system.

Cons

There are a few Caveats. There is no way you can employ a single person who is not college educated. Without math skills, great writing and data entry skills, and an exceptional amount of discipline, you will not get the quality inputs, and the software will not be able to give quality outputs. Slowly, over a period of about 3-5 years, you will come to the realization that people just cant come up to the level of inputting the information correctly, and you will have to decide if you want this software to work and be useful of if you want to eliminate these people. There is no other way, it simply cant work. Garbage in - Garbage out.
The complexity of the entire computer industry has taken the decision that they are going to complicate every facet that they can to require you to hire consultants to do what for 20 years you could easily do yourself. Continual updates, incredibly complicated reporting that an average person used to be able to do, and a constant push to the cloud really get in the way of helping your customers at every turn. It is almost as if, as a machine shop in our case, your mission is to configure software all day and never deliver a single project.
The pros outweigh the cons, but the cost of ownership and value of the effort put into keeping the software functional was less than 10% in 1996-2010 than it is today. If our company was looking at this software today, I really don't know if it would be possible to justify it.

Pros

Epicor ERP is an all-in-one solution for medium-sized manufacturers. It covers everything needed and has lots of optional modules.

We use it for:
Quoting
Orders
Jobs/BOMs
Product Configurator
Dashboards
Reports
Purchasing
Inventory
Production
AP & AR invoicing

The Epicor team has worked hard to improve the software over the years, and it is now 100% Microsoft Stack. The SQL database can be queried from within the software using reports and dashboards, or externally using Business Intelligence software such as Power BI or Tableau.

The price point is better compared to some of its larger competitors in the ERP space. If you have less than 200 users, Epicor will be a much more cost-effective ERP than the ERP leaders.

The opportunities for customisation and personalisation are very high.

Cons

Earlier versions of Epicor ERP were slow and clunky, but the new version is really fast. Also, you need experts to help you implement the software, and a dedicated team to maintain it.

This is not an "out of the box" solution. It requires you to map your business processes and then implement the software carefully to suit the way your business works. You can customise almost anything you want in the system, but greater customisation brings with it added complexity and possible issues when upgrading point releases and versions.

Pros

I mostly like the ease of use of this software. Data entry and Data queries are easy to do with the many screens provided in this software. One thing to mention is the powerful search function to find different screens, displays their path within this software so that is also a big plus. Another positive is the overall navigation of this software with the different modules feels natural because of the 'tree view' option for the menu items. The different maintenance screens are set up pretty nicely and can be customized depending on what type of SaaS option you have so that is great as well. I also really like the security settings I can adjust to prevent users from accessing certain screens or hiding certain fields from them. One final mention for this section would have to be the SSRS integration. I design lots of reports and it is extremely easy to pull data into an SSRS report and present them how I want it.

Cons

Of all the pros that I have listed in the previous section, there are some cons to mention as well. One mention that I like least about this software is the optimization of this software. Many screens take at least 2 minute to open and that is with the recommended hardware specs provided. Another mention is that the PDF reports take at least 2 minute or more to view. I know that the reports are server side and I don't know the process flow of it but it would be nice to click the print preview button and 3 seconds later, have the report show.

Pros

Like the fact that it had the features we needed, was easy to use, and see continued effort by Epicor to improve it by adding new abilities and features to it. We get great support and training is available in many different forms.

Cons

Cost was a little higher than what we initially were thinking of in our budget. However, after looking a many ERP systems we quickly found that Epicor had what we wanted and felt that it was worth the investment. It has been 10 years now, and still believe we made the right decision to go with Epicor as our ERP system.

Pros

Very flexible and powerful user interface. Software modules have extensive flexible options to tailor the configuration to work as desired. Most modules very integrated, allowing powerful user capability. User personalization is powerful and easy to administer.

Cons

Customization is often too complex. Need C# programmer and still can be complicated. In V9 to V10 customization languages changed which required rewrite of previous customizations. This is very costly rather than tools being available to effectively migrate existing customizations. Upgrades of software modules is too complex and is being worked on to improve and focus more on ease, allowing companies to keep on the current release without seeming like a new implementation. More work than it should be. Several modules are included for improving requirements and are very weak. Example: Integration to Salesforce.

Pros

Being able to track parts through all operations and the short cuts Epicor has

Cons

Can be tricky when using transaction History

Pros

- very powerful and thorough functionalities for all manufacturing operations
- extremely good costing capabilities (all financial features are quite good, actually)
- can be customized to a great extent
- many tools for reporting and data analysis
- integrates with tools such as MES, bar code reader, is ready for EDI

Cons

- it's a bit more slow that I wish it were
- customer support is very bureaucratic, it takes from a couple of days to weeks to get any issue solved (to be fair, they do solve them)
- learning curve is steep. It's not that easy to use so people who are not tech-savy get a bit intimidated by this tool
- instruction manuals and help menu are only available in English

Pros

Ease of use. Build for manufacturing
Integration with other platforms

Cons

Epicor is a good ERP. Unfortunately, the ERP industry is more focused on the next customer versus the customers they have and Epicor is part of that. The industry as a whole needs to improve quality and customer service.

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Choosing Kinetic

Pros

Epicor's service-oriented architecture is powerful - allows us to adapt their platform to our business use case and workflows when necessary. Recent versions hit at a somewhat modern UI which we're looking forward to, and the addition of the RESTful API has been a godsend.

Cons

Lots of bugs introduced in each version - but the pace of releases is fast to keep up with them. Their support is rough when necessary. Can take literal days or weeks trying to get through to someone in the right country/right team who actually understands the failure mode and is willing to take the issue seriously.

Pros

Epicor ERP creates purchase orders, senders and invoices that generate a high return on investment. In addition, we have been able to accurately track work activity. Epicor meets our accounting needs. Epicor ERP is ideal for companies that buy components from many different places, so there can be traceability. A large number of departments use the system (order entry, sales, IT, finance). In addition, Epicor has a user interface with the ability to export to Excel. Epicor allows real-time data analysis and financial reporting to help make decisions faster.

Cons

Epicor does not take advantage of innovations in the development of queries, which would allow inexperienced users to generate their own results without the help of the IT department. In addition, the software support team still needs to improve greatly in order to achieve better efficiency.

Pros

We like that it's incredibly flexible. Epicor has put a lot of work into tools to help customize the product. Each tool has a different level of complexity, and some take more knowledge than others to use, but it will get as advanced as your skill set.

Cons

Out of the box it's fairly clunky to use. One record at a time is usually how things are done. That makes initial acceptance from users a bit of a challenge. But if you have users that are creative and can convey what they want, you usually can find a way to make things easier for them. If they just whine, not so much.

Pros

This software has a ton of features. From Quote to Invoicing and every piece of the production pipeline in between.

Cons

It's not super intuitive and requires a bit of a learning curve to get it going in the right direction.

Pros

The very thing that kind of sucks about this software is also the thing that makes it “work” for our company. The ability to customize the software for our day to day business needs is awesome.

Cons

Unfortunately, those customizations make fixing things a little more difficult than if we were able to use the software “out of the box.” Having developers in a different country also prohibits and lengthens “fix time” due to time difference.

Pros

Epicor ERP has incredible functionality for supply chain management, which is acquired by an entire organization, in order to maintain proper control, to classify appropriate use, that is, to know precisely where these will be used digital products, in the different departments that we acquire in executive disposition, mentioning that it allows us to modify their visual aspects, to establish them in our most conducive environment, being one of the tools that most attracts my attention, as it is one of the ones that I use for adequate familiarization, when executing the pending work to be done.

Cons

It is important to note that many of the functions that most companies use must be added by users, which allows the process at work to be slower and delays the qualities in productivity, being a significant problem, since these working parts must be integrated. by the same software, for a majority management in the performance and profitability of the time, which requires an update in these sectors of the system.

Pros

It's easy to implement and if you have an .NET team the knowledge curve is low and you can customize the modules by yourself

Cons

CRM is not good, also the web version has so much problems when we compare to other competitors

Alternatives Considered

Reasons for Switching to Kinetic

Pros

The software is very robust. Just about everything that the software does is configurable and modifiable. The interface is fairly customizable, you can move things around and even change the color scheme to your liking.

Cons

I wouldn't say I dislike this, but do take into consideration that the customization of the software requires a significant amount of programming skill. This software is not targeted at smaller companies that wouldn't have an IT staff or are not willing to spend money on outside programmers.

Pros

I like the flexibility to customize the software to fit your business. There are many features which can be incredibly useful. The fact that it is Windows-based is a plus fo our antiquated facility.

Cons

The one con I have about this software is the price. I like that we can find status updates in real-time on orders or inventory; however, to get this feature you have to pay even more money.

Pros

very easy to work with our client likes a lot.

Cons

I have no issue with software at all it work great .

Pros

Very versatile software that can be adapted to fit any business needs. I have been a Senior Consultant for Epicor and also an end user for a total of 15 years in all functional areas.

Feel free to contact me with any questions.

Robert W F Krause
Epicor/ERP/Consulting
Krause Consultants
Cell: 516.983.8095
Email: [email protected]
http://www.krauseconsultants.com/

Cons

The software is very complex and requires some initial training to use it effectively.

Pros

Has scope for customisation and works well when used as an ERP

Cons

When used as a CRM, the software is very slow
Requires technical knowledge and a lot of development time to make changes (create views, reports, etc)

Pros

I have been using this software for 5 years and have learned to use it correctly. I liked the approach of the software despite the fact that it was necessary to take new benchmarks but that is the goal of a new software! This very versatile product would be more suitable for a larger company than mine where I worked as a team but since COVID19, I have become a freelance.

Cons

This software package allowed me to personalize and optimize the management of my contacts. On the other hand, I was not able to make any changes easily because I had not taken the additional training module. Note that there are many security measures leaving the cancellation of certain aspects impossible for me.

Pros

This ERP is very customisable. You can change the behavior of the software with it's DATA DIRECTIVE, METHODE DIRECTIVE. You can change the look and feel of every screen with it's internal .NET engine.

Cons

It is slow... You will need a very fast server.
The query engine (BAQ) is very limited with Epicor 9 but I heard it's better with Epicor 10.
If you made a lot of customisation, the upgrades will be difficult.

Pros

It has truly helped the company grow and able to analyze what works and what isn't. Purchasing and Project Management is simple and straightforward.

Cons

It isn't aesthetically pleasing and I have noticed many users like it to be sleek..

Pros

Ease of use, E10 is cloud based, support (when in US) is good, Short learning curve, fairly flexible, highly customizable

Cons

Highly customizable tends to get pushed to overly customized which = a mini-new ERP project with every upgrade to fix broken customizations, VAR network: some are great, some not, support for down-rev version falls off quickly, plan on extended cost of ownership, import/export functionality is limited unless add-on products are purchased, Field Service module is the weakest link in the product.