For this assignment, you will play the role of a business analyst who has been tasked to select among three alternative "ERP solutions" to data and process integration problems at Amelectserv. This scenario exercise "simulates" a task that a business analyst would be expected to perform. The case study materials listed below are taken from a REAL business case study. We changed the names of the firms and a few of the details for proprietary purposes. In Part 1 {https://www.chegg.com/homework-help/questions-and-answers/assignment-play-role-business-analyst-tasked-select-among-three-alternative-erp-solutions--q29613279} and Part 2, students will be evaluating and reporting on the costs and benefits of three alternative approaches to the scenario provided.

In this exercise you will be provided with various memos, artifacts, and letters regarding the project- including a detailed overview below and an addendum to that. The set of documents provided for you contain all of the data you need to develop the case. You will also be provided with an Excel document that contains templates for three worksheets that you will use to calculate the total cost of ownership (TCO) for each of the three alternatives.

Your TCO analysis worksheets will be used to fulfill the Analytics (Part 1) :{https://www.chegg.com/homework-help/questions-and-answers/assignment-play-role-business-analyst-tasked-select-among-three-alternative-erp-solutions--q29613279} portion of this assignment. Your final recommended solution (Part 2) will be a written report that analyzes the cost and benefits of the three alternatives and justifies of your choice of the "best" solution. (A report template is provided below). The following documents are attached for use in this exercise:

Amelectsrv Overview - This document is a detailed overview of the project and issues at play in the scenario.

Bid Documents: These are the documents you need to conduct the TCO analysis.

BERP, On-premise Bid Macrosoft-On-premise Bid Macrosoft-Cloud Bid Network costs Bid (Networks-R-Us)

TCO Analysis Spreadsheet - {https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ZNvtTtmw6iMZOPQNsOKtJyHajOaWLiIJvojXnXWOeVw/edit?usp=sharing} This file has the key categories and many of the numbers you will need to determine the TCO. In other words, we took some of the numbers out of the provided documents and organized everything for you into a spreadsheet. Now you have to fill in the remaining numbers and graphs, etc...

Solution Template - {https://docs.google.com/document/d/1V5-YxEhmrOkUqg-FexIj6O5O9i_KnzkFR4MXUZaHY5w/edit} This is a file that is based-off of the APA template that is organized for this project. It offers some useful hints... AND directions that should be followed. This is the sheet you will submit for the Solution assignment.

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*Amelectsrv Overview

Amelectserv

ERP Implementation

Company Background

Amelectserv is an electrical service provider in the Northwest of the United States for more than ten years. The Company provides its services to mainly commercial clients that are in manufacturing, telecom, commercial office and residential buildings, corporate campuses, and hospitals.

The founder and CEO, Kyle Offenwrong, began servicing senior living facilities in the Eugene, Oregon area. This work led to contacts for additional facilities in Salem and Portland Oregon. The growth of the Company continued as it gained a reputation with branches into local hospitals and then universities. As the reputation and sales increased, the Company moved into the Seattle/Tacoma area which resulted in even more growth (see Figure 1). In the previous five years the sales have almost tripled.

Year	Sales in millions of $(US)
2002	0.3
2003	0.9
2004	2.2
2005	4.3
2006	6.4
2007	8.3
2008	10.2
2009	14.8
2010	21.2
2011	30.9
2012	20.1
2013	40.0
2014	46.4

Figure 1 Annual Sales of Amelectserv

The extraordinary growth of the Company led to challenges in terms of information overload which made the management of information extremely challenging. In the previous month, in an effort to bid a new major project, Offenwrong found data to be not available when he needed it. The bid required that data be gathered from multiple systems with sometime conflicting data and the effort to gather the information for the bid was high. Even though the Company won the bid, some of the costs used in the calculations were not current, some by over a year.

Analysis confirmed that the project will result in a net loss for the Company. He also realized that the Company needed to become more competitive if its growth was to be maintained. The Companys use of Microsoft Excel for operational systems and day-to-day work was also untenable. Over the last few years, use of Excel caused a great number of Excel files all over the Company, some were not even known to people other than the ones that created the files. Employees found a complete lack of data integrity, data redundancy, and incompleteness. Some data that was known to exist was unable to be found. Backups of operational data were not maintained.

Therefore, Offenwrong called an all-hands meeting (see below) to discuss this problem and the possible solution of implementing an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system on the premises or on the cloud. Some employees are enthusiastic and some have reservations.

The Problem

The first problem faced by the company is convincing employees to implement change in the current data management system of the company. This particular problem has emerged due to the resistance of change and satisfaction with the existing situation of the Company. Furthermore, the major dilemma faced by the Company includes the selection of the various options to improve the IT systems to allow information to be quickly and easily available to the Company to make decisions regarding the different projects. The company faces with three options, adopt ERP on cloud, ERP on premise, or adopt a customized solution.

Also, the Company faces another problem of choosing the company for implementing the ERP system. There are two companies: Berp Corporation and Macrosoft which have proposed the quotations for the implementation of ERP. Berp Corporation is an experienced and a major ERP solution provider, whereas, Macrosoft is a start-up firm with limited experience in ERP implementations but is less costly than Berp Corporation. Moreover, due to the huge investment needed in the implementation of ERP, the company needs to make a right decision to avoid any type of failure which may result in decreased profitability for the company.

All Hands Meeting Notes

An all-hands meeting was held to discuss the problems associated will the current systems and to formulate a plan going forward.

Kyle Offenwrong (CEO) Growth rate, especially in the last years, has been tremendous. The Companys need for processing and storing information is growing at the same rate. The current information management systems are dependent on personnel. All systems are running on local machines and the data are manually entered and extensive labor is required for searching and reporting the data. The workstations we use are not connected to each other which requires information to be obtained from multiple workstations and systems to be collated into usable reports. This worked in our early years when the company was small but growth has made this too complex. Continued growth will increase this level of complexity and reduce efficiency. We require a more efficient solution that is scalable.

Jim Techy (CIO) Implementing an ERP system is the solution to the companys problems. An ERP will allow us to focus on our core work and not IT systems. It will also allow us to obtain real-time data from the system. The ERPs use of a database will eliminate redundant data that we currently have on the multiple un-connected workstations. This will eliminate the problem of redundant data that sometimes is inconsistent across systems. The ERP will also implement industry best practices.

Paul Morris (Project Manager) An ERP system is helpful in some cases but there are many examples where companies have invested many many hours and much money in an ERP implementation and ended up with nothing or a system that never works. In some notable cases, this has resulted in an actual decrease in efficiency. Many of our employees and users are not technically sophisticated so training them on an ERP will be very difficult. Are we sure we can successfully implement an ERP system?

Ann Maples (Assistant Manager) Agrees that there are many problems with the existing system but implementing an ERP system will dramatically change the way the Company works. It may make us terribly unproductive. Many, if not all, of our business processes will change and that will require significant time to learn the new business processes and the new system. Even more time will be required to allow everyone to get comfortable with them. A customized solution is a better one. It should be exactly like our existing systems but more automated. This will not require any business processes to change and therefore will be a less risky option.

Pam Majors (Project Manager) Even though we are all comfortable with the current system and therefore want a customized solution that mimics the current system, there are reasons to not do that. An ERP system could be a game changer. Once the company becomes comfortable with it, we can then reap the benefits from it as many other companies have throughout the world. The best solution would be a cloud solution that allows us to forgo a huge initial investment and start on solutions immediately. This has the additional benefit of transferring the risk to the service provider.

Additional Background

Additional feedback and background was offered by the employees of Amelectserv.

Kyle Offenwrong (CEO) Offenwrong had the following observations from the all-hands meeting. The meeting did not go well. Many of the employees there seemed strongly opposed to the proposed changes. It was clear to him that he would have to push this change and convince the employees that it was the right thing to do. He also knew that this could easily result in failure if the employees were not supportive of the decision.

His other decision was what solution was the correct one. The customized solution would appease the employees and would be the easiest choice for solving the companys problems. This solution provided no substantial change from the current system and provided no interconnectivity between functions.

He feels that the BERP solution is higher than the budget for the project. Macrosofts lack of experience brought great risk since errors could jeopardize the entire investment. His other decision was to host the ERP in-house or on the cloud. The cloud solution appears less expensive but could overtime be more costly. Security of the cloud solution was a concern because the companys data would be stored on a database on the cloud. He needed to ensure that he could receive assurances and build trust with the vendor because of this concern. The up-side is that the data would be available anywhere because of being on the cloud allowing virtual work. The other risk was in Internet reliability. The on-premise solution requires no Internet so it is not dependent on connectivity and speed on an Internet connection.

The cloud solution has additional benefits such as the provider handles the backups, security, disaster recovery, upgrades to the system, and is scalable quickly. For example, new users can be added and get functionality instantly. This is important since Amelectserv expects to double the number of its employees in the next three years.

Jim Techy (CIO) Techy had previous experience working with an IT company. He was the one that proposed the ERP solution to Offenwrong. After investigation he decided there were two alternative (which are the ones we are left with), ERP on premises and ERP on cloud. He also identified the two solution providers, Macrosoft and BERP. Bids were requested from both (these have already been provided to you). The bid requests required support for two laptop users and six workstation users.

Techy also found that BERPs solution was very versatile and a very close match to the companys requirements; however, their ERP software came with fixed asset management and fleet management functionality that the company will probably never use. BERP has a great track record of successful implementations and they offered customizations of the product that would include only the required modules. The cost of customization offset the savings from not including the modules. Techy thought that this solution would put stress on the IT budget but was quite useful.

Macrosoft provided bids for both ERP on premises and ERP on cloud.

The Question

Amelectserv asked for and received four bids:

A bid for an on-premise solution from Macrosoft

A bid for an on-premise solution from BERP Corporation

A bid for a cloud solution from Macrosoft

A bid for network infrastructure service from Networks-R-Us.

The question we are presented with is which solution is the correct one for Amelectserv at this place in their history and for their strategic plan?

Analysis

What are the current challenges facing Amelectserv?

Analyze the TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) for a period of five years going forward).

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the various options that Amelectserv is evaluating?

What are the people issues? How should Amelectserv handle them?

Based on your analysis, which option is best for Amelectserv?

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*BERP, On-premise Bid

BERP Corporation

March 1, 2015

Please accept the following bid for Amelectserv. The option presented is an ERP On-premise solution.

Initial hardware cost (per item)

Item	Cost ($US)	Quantity Required	Notes
Workstations	786	6	HCL Beanstalk AD1V0028 All-in-one
UPS for workstations	84	6	MICROTEK 1 KVA
Laptops	1490	2	Dell Latitude E6430 Premier laptops
Server	2250	1	HP Server ML 330G6
Back-up Server	2250	1	HP Server ML 330G6
Server UPS Systems	87	2	MICROTEK LUMINUS 1 KVA

On-Going Hardware Cost

Hardware Maintenance

Yearly average maintenance rate: 10% of initial hardware cost

Initial Software Cost

Item	Cost ($US)	Quantity Required	Notes
ERP Application Software	2700	8	Per user initial license cost
Consulting	1800		One-time stand-alone consulting expenditure (Includes business process and fit, gap analysis, requirement analysis, implementation planning and configuration)
Deployment cost	11700
Training	4050

On-Going Software Cost

Item
Software Maintenance	Yearly average maintenance rate: 18% of initial license cost

This bid requires additional network costs that Amelectserv has stated that they have requested from Networks-R-Us.

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*Macrosoft-Cloud Bid

Macrosoft

March 21, 2015

Please accept the following bid for Amelectserv. The option presented is an ERP Cloud solution.

Initial hardware cost (per item)

Item	Cost ($US)	Quantity Required	Notes
Workstations	786	6	HCL Beanstalk AD1V0028 All-in-one
UPS for workstations	84	6	MICROTEK 1 KVA
Laptops	1490	2	Dell Latitude E6430 Premier laptops

On-Going Hardware Cost

Hardware Maintenance

Yearly average maintenance rate: 10% of initial hardware cost

On-Going Software Cost

Item	Cost ($US)	Quantity Required	Notes
Servicing fee	45	8	Per user per month

Storage Costs (IaaS)

Item	Cost ($US)	Quantity Required	Notes
Data Storage Cost	1350	1	Annual cost (It is assumed that this cost will increase by 10% every year as the business grows.)

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*Network costs Bid (Networks-R-Us)

Sept 13, 2015

Please accept the following bid for Amelectserv. The option presented is out network solution for your ERP On-premise solution.

Initial network cost (per item)

Item	Cost ($US)	Quantity Required	Notes
Router	348	1	RV082 Model
Network Infrastructure set-up cost	2700	1

On-Going Network Cost

Item	Notes
Router Maintenance	Yearly average maintenance rate: 10% of initial equipment cost
Network Infrastructure Maintenance	Yearly average maintenance rate: 10% of initial infrastructure cost
2 Mbps Internet Line	$22 Monthly cost of shared Internet line

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