Due to confidence agreements we replaced the company’s name by *company*
There is definitely need for change at *company*. This project conducted by four Master students of the Rotterdam School of Management will provide a basic understanding of the problem and its optimal solution. *company* is focused on the marine industry. The company is based in the Netherlands and is part of the German multinational which has over 138.000 employees. *company* has an annual turnover of almost 25 million euros and around 150 FTEs. However, *company* has an IT related problem which lowers its competitive advantage. The ERP system of *company*, Ridder R8, is outdated and should be replaced with a modern and fully functioning system. There are two key reasons why *company* should improve its current ERP system. First, in an ever changing world it is of great importance to adapt to new technologies to stay competitive. By having an ERP system which is only functioning partly competitive advantage will be for the competitors of *company*. Second, now is the time to conduct change, economic times have been better in the past but if the demand rises again, *company* has to be on the top of its game to outperform its competitors. The new ERP system should be compatible with *company*’s current systems, it should increase the efficiency and it should be relatively easy to implement. Since *company* is a medium sized company and due to falling turnover the costs of the system should be kept to a minimum. In our report we proposed three alternative solutions: Ridder IQ, SAP and Cloud computing. After analysing the possible solutions thoroughly, Ridder IQ is clearly best suited for *company*. To support this change, it is necessary to have upper management support, Ridder iQ should be implemented in an iterative manner and include future users of the software, involve a Ridder iQ specialist and evaluate the performance of the new ERP system periodically. In addition, further support should come from within the organization, instead of from a Ridder iQ specialist. Lastly, the video proposes a five-step plan for the implementation, consisting of strategic planning, procedure review, data collection, training and testing and lastly go live and evaluate.
