Direct materials sourcing is a critical process in product design, engineering and manufacturing. That was never more apparent in 2017 when Tesla began to ship the Model 3, its first electric vehicle meant to be affordable for middle-income buyers.

The company had set two ambitious and unprecedented goals: building an EV for a base price of $35,000 and completing the development cycle in three years, half the typical turnaround in the automotive industry. The compressed timeline put tremendous pressure on employees to source quality parts economically and on time while keeping up with the tight design and production schedules.

But Tesla was working at a disadvantage. Much of its sourcing and procurement was still done manually, and an IT gap existed between the product lifecycle management system, where engineering and design were managed, and the ERP.

In this episode, we explore the impact inefficient procurement can have on profit margins, how a direct materials sourcing platform can close the technology gap for manufacturers, and the role played by AI.

Featuring: Spencer Penn, Co-founder and CEO, LightSource   

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

Agentic AI is the hottest trend in ERP. It promises to infuse enterprise applications with AI that anticipates users' needs, communicates with them in natural language and handles more of the tedium of working in ERP systems.

SAP is one of the leaders of the push for agentic AI. It has aggressively added special-purpose AI agents and development tools for building custom agents and beefed up its data platforms to accommodate AI's needs.

But in practice, building agentic AI that works across SAP and non-SAP systems is challenging, and it often requires outside help from a consulting firm or system integrator.

In this episode, we explore the practical realities of implementing AI applications on SAP systems, including the design process, development tools and integration challenges.

Featuring: Gianluca Simeone, Vice President, CTIO and GenAI Leader, Capgemini   

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

Controversies over artificial general intelligence (AGI) mostly come down to two big issues: whether it's possible to make computers that are as smart as humans, and whether doing so is worth the risk of AGI somehow turning against its creators.

But what if AGI is not only feasible, but actually dependent on humans, and could ultimately be the ideal collaborator?

The head of an AI research lab asserts that a human-machine symbiosis will be necessary if AGI is ever to attain the "embodied" intelligence of humans: the creativity, intuition and values that go beyond the computational intelligence of today's machines.

In this episode, we explore how this human-machine symbiosis would work in practice, how it could change enterprise applications, and its implications for human intelligence.

Featuring: Nik Kairinos, Co-founder and Chief AI Architect, Fountech AI   

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

Artificial intelligence is starting to transform buy-now, pay-later options and other types of embedded lending by taking over many of the steps of credit approval. It can speed up the information processing, analysis and decision-making of online lending, improve its accuracy and profitability, and ultimately make credit available to more consumers and businesses.

But AI lending also carries the risk of bias against minority groups, and borrowers and lenders must feel they can trust the AI to make fair, fiscally sound decisions. Many banks already have digital infrastructure for online lending and use it to offer loans on websites and retail payment terminals, but they're reluctant to add AI until the regulatory and risk management issues are resolved.     

In this episode, we explore how embedded lending platforms work, who uses them, and the benefits and challenges of automating the lending process with AI.

Featuring: Yaacov Martin, Co-founder and CEO, The Jifiti Group   

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

  References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

Fraud is among the most common abuses of information technology. Defined as intentional deception to gain an unfair advantage, fraud is increasingly common in talent management, especially recruiting, and has only gotten worse with the easy availability of AI.

For example, AI enables job applicants to misrepresent their qualifications by falsifying resumes and cover letters and tweaking them to match job descriptions. One study showed that the technology levels the playing field so much that companies are less likely to hire the most qualified candidates and more likely to choose the least qualified ones. It's a growing problem for HR departments and hiring managers.

In this episode, we explore the types of HR-related fraud, the role technology plays and strategies organizations can use to minimize its impact. 

Featuring: Brian Sommer, Founder and President, TechVentive   

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

  References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

Dynamic pricing is an increasingly popular agentic AI application that showcases AI's advantages over humans in certain tasks. In seconds, AI can analyze customer histories and external data to optimize price quotes without turning off customers.

Such labor-intensive work can take salespeople minutes to complete, and they often have biases that cause them to miss opportunities. AI-driven dynamic pricing tools perform the analysis quickly and dispassionately, which is helping to make salespeople more productive and boosting profits.  

In this episode, we explore an electrical distributor's use of an Infor ERP dynamic pricing tool, the work that went into developing and deploying it, the challenges, and lessons learned.

Featuring: David Magee, CTO and CISO, Turtle   

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

While ERP cloud migration promises numerous benefits, including cost savings, leading-edge features, broad accessibility and ease of use, it also carries substantial risks. This is especially true of moving the accounting and financial management modules of on-premises ERP to the cloud.

A poorly executed move can break an organization's financial processes and expose sensitive data, raising significant financial and regulatory risks. But establishing internal controls early in the ERP planning process can be an effective safeguard.

In this episode, we explore the kinds of controls that are most effective, who is responsible for them, the steps in developing controls, and where they fit in enterprise application ecosystems.

Featuring: Laura Bellinger, audit and assurance partner, David Rains, audit and assurance principal, Deloitte accounting, controls and reporting advisory.  

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

The affordable connected sensors made possible by the internet of things seem tailor-made for supply chain management. IoT sensors are ideal for collecting and transmitting the data that companies need for numerous supply chain processes, from traceability and procurement to inventory optimization and logistics.

But has IoT lived up to its initial growth spurt and hype of a decade ago? Recent indications are that it is beginning to show clear value and positive ROI at companies that have implemented IoT in their supply chains.

In this episode, we examine trends in IoT in general and in supply chains, the challenges of deploying IoT, and why widely available AI is boosting IoT's practicality as a business tool.

Featuring: Subodha Kumar, Distinguished Chair and Professor of Statistics, Operations, Data Science and Information Systems, Temple University

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

The evidence that AI can eliminate jobs is piling up. Amazon said recently it would lay off 14,000 corporate workers in an effort to become more nimble. The cuts weren't directly tied to AI, but the CEO previously said the workforce would shrink as Amazon continues to embrace AI. Target and UPS announced similar layoffs.

Meanwhile, software vendors announced reductions that were explicitly caused by AI. For example, Salesforce cut 4,000 customer support positions weeks after its CEO said AI was already doing nearly half the work.

In this episode, we examine AI's impact on jobs from the worker's point of view, with insights from people who maintain AI data centers, test the accuracy of search engines and use AI to automate some of their tasks.

Featuring: Shannon Wait, Senior Organizer, Alphabet Workers Union-CWA

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

There's little doubt that AI is starting to eliminate jobs. Recent headlines confirm it. The trend presents a special risk to the manufacturing sector just as baby boomers retire in droves and more companies seek to build up their workforces and reverse the decades-long preference for cheap overseas labor.

But there are positive aspects to AI's impact on manufacturing jobs. Many workers are learning to use it to do their jobs more effectively and prepare themselves for an AI-centric future. Companies are training AI to do work that might not get done at all amid the labor shortages.

In this episode, we explore how using AI to capture and encode the skills of factory workers who are leaving the workforce could keep manufacturers in business, counteract the baby boomer brain drain and make industrial jobs more attractive to young workers.

Featuring: Alex Sandoval, CEO and Co-founder, Allie Systems

In today's episode, we'll also cover:

References:

To learn more about enterprise applications, check out Search ERP.

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