A powerful supply chain is indicative of a strong business. Take a quick glance at companies like HP, Apple or Nike to see that being able to deliver a product quickly, affordably and reliably is essential to running a global business.

But as we continue to deplete our planet’s resources, sustainability within the supply chain will become a pressing issue. And for many leaders, it already has. “Today, sustainability has replaced cost, value and speed as the dominant topic of discussion among purchasing and supply professionals,” is what the authors of an Oracle white paper, The Shape of Tomorrow’s Supply Chains, assert.

Realizing sustainability within the supply chain is often directly correlated to how well the company is able to measure its efforts. Richard Bank, Director of the Sustainable Supply Chain Foundation, says that cost-reduction can be driven through sustainability projects, but effective measurement is necessary for these programs long-term success. Only through effective measurement can leaders truly analyze which initiatives resulted in the highest cost-reduction to investment ratio--and why.

If there's one thing that's abundantly clear in the tech industry, it's that the Cloud is here to stay. The Cloud has matured enough that it's even infultrating business applications--such as ERP MRP software--once thought to be impossible to support in the Cloud.

If you're like me, you rely on a host of cloud applications to get your job done each day. While the convenience and familiarity of apps built for the Web is great, I can't help but notice the differences among the user interfaces (UIs) I use. Currently, all cloud-based ERP software vendors are approaching the user interface with their own design style. For users that work with multiple cloud apps each day, this can be disorienting - not to mention bad for productivity and usability.

As more products are built for the cloud, I believe that we ought to start thinking about creating a set of standards for what cloud-based applications should look and feel like. Getting there won't easy, so it's time to start talking about creating these standards today.

What's the Benefit of Standards?

Inconsististency in UI design has negative impacts on usability and productivity. It results in having to invest in more user training and can lead to costly user errors. A unified and consistent UI, on the other hand, can boost productivity.

The enterprise is buzzing around the emerging trend of enterprise mobility. According to a recent report by Kelton Research, 9 out of 10 IT managers intended to implement at least one mobile application in 2011. A full 50 percent of managers stated that they thought managing mobile applications would be the top priority for this year. 

Clearly, the enterprise is anticipating a shift from performing work within the "four walls" of the enterprise to a world in which many of our job functions are performed remotely. To cater to the increasingly mobile worker, enterprise software vendors have started to focus intensely developing for a mobile platform. As enterprise software vendors develop for mobile applications, they're looking to the king of mobile - Apple - for design inspiration. 

I see three ways that Apple is influencing enterprise software development. Enterprise vendors are: 

1. Creating a mobile user experience that mirrors that of iOS.

As people that live and work with technology and enterprise software on a daily basis, it's easy to forget all the effort it took to bring us to where we are today. As we text and download the next coolest app, we forget that we hold more power in our hand than the mainframe computers that used to take up an entire room. 

At Software Advice, we decided that the tech world needed a bit of context to couch all the great technological innovations that we have around us today. Our editor, Lara Zuehlke recently did just that. She bravely dove into the last 60 years of enterprise software history to tell the story of how software became so integral to our businesses today. The product of her labors is a four-part series that relays the history of enterprise software and technology innovation itself. 

In addition to the great narrative that Ms. Zuehlke put together, she also pieced together an impressive infographic that encapsulates part one of her series, The Origins of Modern Computing. You can find the infographic below.

Though many businesses consider their financial data to be some of the most valuable information they don’t want outsiders privy to, more small and medium-sized businesses are shifting their accounting software from in-house servers to those of software vendors. These online accounting software solutions are easier to deploy than their on-premise counterparts, sold in an inexpensive monthly subscription model, and offer increased collaboration opportunities along with user-friendly interfaces.

As part of our Expert Roundtable series, we reached out to three online accounting software executives to gauge their opinions on industry trends and what they saw for the future of online accounting software. We asked the CEOs at ePartners (a Microsoft Dynamics GP VAR), Intacct, and Kashoo the following questions:

• What are the current trends in online accounting software?
• What’s surprised you about the direction of the industry?
• Who's choosing to adopt online accounting software?
• What are the benefits in switching to online accounting?

If you’re tapped into the enterprise software community, you know that SaaS is the hot new topic of software delivery. The cloud computing phenomenon is taking center stage in the enterprise tech community. For good reason, the SaaS business model and approach to software is completely changing the dynamic of enterprise software.

Much of the attention around cloud computing has focused on the innovation of the web-based architecture. In the race to compete against SaaS companies, many legacy vendors with older client/server offerings have evolved their technology to offer web-based deployment.

So why are SaaS companies like Salesforce and Netsuite rapidly growing their customer base and licensing revenue while legacy vendors amble along with only moderate growth?

It's because the innovation of SaaS isn’t just about web access to software. I can think of five other reasons that the disruption of SaaS companies is about more than the web access to software and the browser-based user interface.

At Software Advice, a website that reviews electrical estimating software, we’re starting up a new executive interview series highlighting various segments of the construction industry. To start off the new series, we decided to tackle the electrical contracting industry. To get a sense of the state of the electrical contracting industry, I caught up with the CEOs from three of the leading electrical estimating software companies to ask them about the state of their industry.

The panel of participants in our first executive interview series were: George Hague of ConEst, Giovanni Marcelli of Accubid, Todd McCormick of McCormick Systems, and Brian Hoffelder of Vision InfoSoft . I asked each CEO about current trends shaping the industry, where the industry is heading in the future and what role software plays in the industry. Here are some of the key takeaways from the Q&A session.

Adoption of Paperless Technology is Accelerating

At Software Advice, we hear from a lot of software buyers that are interested in the cloud and software as a service (SaaS). However, many still have lingering questions that no one has answered adequately. It's not surprising given that the term is rarely followed by meaningful answers to questions that buyers might have. 

Since we hear the same line of questions on a daily basis, we decided to put together a resource to fill the void and help buyers better understand exactly what SaaS is. To be fair the analyst and experts are already way past this level of knowledge, but that makes little difference given that these aren't the individuals making purchasing the products. In order for SaaS to truly succeed in enterprise software, there needs to be a better understanding amongst the layperson and buyer. 

Here are five of the top ten questions that I hear each day:

For many small retailers, the decision to upgrade their retail software or purchase a new point of sale (POS) system for the first time is the easy part. The difficulties arise when deciding on which types of systems to research, and how to decide on one solution.

In addition, most retailers don’t have retail software experience. Their experience is often limited to QuickBooks or Peachtree accounting systems, old-fashioned cash registers, and Microsoft Office. When going into a POS software search, three things should be kept at the forefront of your mind:

(1) Decide which applications you need. If you don’t need merchandise planning, don’t pay more for a system that has it. If you need a module to manage your warehouse inventory, don’t skimp and go with a system that doesn’t offer it. Deciding which applications you really want before looking at your choices is the best way to go about narrowing down systems.

As IBM turned 100 years old this month, the company received a lot of fanfare and attention. Amazingly, the company has managed to stay relevant in the fast-paced world of technology for a century. Many analysts reflected on the past achievements and milestones while others talked about their current innovations.I'm a fan of the retrospective approach, but I often find it more interesting to think about where a company is headed rather than where it's been. 

In the spirit of forward looking analysis, I decided to dig into IBM's merger and acquisition strategy. The name of Big Blue is never far away when the topic of tech mergers and acquisitions is brought up so I thought it'd be an interesting angle to take given the company's 100 year history. Naturally, I had to dig into IBM's history a bit to understand their future. I took a look at the last 10 years of IBM's merger and acquisition strategy.

Small businesses often get stuck in an awkward middle ground - they need to get off manual data entry but they can't afford expensive software. To make matters worse, these businesses know little about researching software. Luckily, when it comes to accounting software, there are several accessible - and affordable - options available. 

Software Advice recently put together a article to help small businesses decide which accounting software is best for them. They selected 5 software systems and dug into the details to produce an easy to understand guide for small businesses. The guide features NetSuite Financials, Sage Peachtree, Sage Simply Accounting, Quickbooks and Cougar Mountain Software's Professional 2011.

In the guide, each vendor is displayed in a side-by-side comparison so buyers can understand the functionality each system offers. Every system will have the basics such as core accounting, billing & invoicing, and accounts receivable. The more sophisticated systems provide functionality for things like project accounting and expense reporting. Which vendor is best for you depends on your business' needs. Here's a quick overview of the functionality offered in each system.

Small manufacturing businesses are constantly looking for a way to remain competitive in this global economy. For years, ERP software has been an effective means for manufacturing companies to reduce costs and increase efficiency. Until recently, ERP software has been out of the price range of small manufacturing businesses. Even though ERP software is now more affordable today than ever before, many manufacturing businesses still operate on spreadsheet and enter all of their data manually. For those that are ready to get off of spreadsheets, I've put together a shortlist a affordable solutions that should make the shortlist for first time buyers.

1. Epicor Manufacturing Express Edition

Epicor has been involved in the manufacturing software industry for more than two decades and has a great line of software products to choose from. Epicor Manufacturing Express Edition is one of the company's newest additions to the portfolio. It is a software-as-a-service offering that is aimed purely at small and medium manufacturers. The software is particularly good at serving the needs of job shops. One thing that I like about Epicor is that you know you have room to grow. Once you are done with Epicor Manufacturing Express Edition, you can transition right into Epicor 9.

By: Gustaf Westerlund, contributing author to Software Advice; CEO of CRM-Konsulterna

By design or by chance, HP is poised to become the world’s most complete supplier of end to end IT infrastructure and business software.  The addition of 3Par and Palm extends the firm’s range from high-end storage solutions down to a complete line of handhelds and smart phones. What is missing is software to tie it all together. We thought it would be fun to guess who might be next on HP's M&A agenda.

There is an elephant in the room. As HP contends with public relations fallout from previous CEO Mark Hurd and first quarter drops in two of its largest divisions, New CEO Léo Apotheker needs some success. His previous firm, SAP, could be a very good acquisition for HP for the following five reasons.

Leadership: Before Apotheker was CEO at HP, he was forced out as SAP’s CEO. He is intimately familiar with the synergies between the two firms. In addition, there is always the allure of a little payback.

Application event streams - timely business intelligence (BI) updates that can be followed and discussed in a social activity stream - promise to kick start conversations around critical business data. 

We have all witnessed the value of Twitter and Facebook acting as critical communications networks in times of crisis... or just boredom. Yammer and Salesforce.com’s Chatter application apply these same concepts to business, enabling workers to share their thoughts and experiences in a social activity stream for the enterprise. 

Now middleware vendor TIBCO is extending the conversation to include machines. The company’s Tibbr offering pulls application event data from existing systems and incorporates the data into an activity stream. Workers can take it from there, adding their own qualitative assessment of the data. Users can follow relevant event streams and form groups around related topics.

Social Media and Business Intelligence Converge 

Enterprise applications such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) systems have created overwhelming troves of corporate data. BI tools provide a sophisticated means of summarizing and analyzing this data, but but these tools have not become pervasive across the enterprise. Too often, they are limited to a few executives and business analysts. Social media concepts, when implemented with more traditional BI and middleware tools, present a new opportunity to disseminate and discuss intelligence gleaned from corporate systems.

Technology enthusiasts have long praised the cost savings and simplicity of cloud computing, but some accounting firms just aren’t convinced. Accountants warn of pitfalls, but current trends suggest improvements are on the way. 

“I’m a firm believer in [the cloud] - I really am,” says Carolyn Duffy, who directs business advisory services for Hein & Associates. “But if I had some special legacy system, I would have to look at the integration issue.” 

Concerns from accounting firms about integration, customization, cost, and IT services should grab software makers’ attention, given accounting firms’ history of influencing the software-purchasing decisions of their clients.  The list may seem troubling for cloud adoption at first glance, but upcoming releases are set to solve the problems. 

Customization

“If you have a secret sauce in how you want to handle some orders or how you handle your pricing, then often times the cloud might not be the best way to do that,

VARs have traditionally made money selling and servicing on-premises systems, but now cloud computing is poised to rain on their parade. VARs will need to adapt to compete in the times ahead.

Over the next five to ten years, opportunities to resell software and hardware will dwindle as more companies adopt cloud-based systems. Processes for software procurement, implementation, and training will change. VARs must change their current service offerings to be successful in this new market. Let’s examine what’s happening to VAR revenue sources.

Software resale has comprised a large portion of VAR cash flow. But cloud vendors have adopted a consumerized sales approach, emphasizing simplicity in the purchasing process and selling directly to customers. Also, without the need for hardware set-up and other ancillary services, local resellers are less important. Resale opportunities will decline, but new opportunities will arise.

Hardware resale opportunities will also decline. With cloud-based systems, servers are no longer installed on-premises - so this revenue will vanish. Desktop computer sales will be fewer and far between. Because cloud-based systems require less memory and processing power than on-premises ones, desktops will require less frequent replacement and will be sold at lower price points.