Sample Thesis Paper

The latest trends in the existing literature (Reilly, 2005) state that the top vendors account for 72% of the ERP vendors total revenue. However, in these cases of Enterprise Ireland, the vendors were small-scale organisations with specific functionalities designed for particular set of requirements for eg: The criteria for vendor selection in Company A_EI was due to the previous experiences with the vendor in the installation of their MRP systems. Company C_EI had opted for a sophisticated customer order management which was being extended as an ERP system.

The findings from the cases of Enterprise Ireland (2003) conclude that the functionality and add-on features provided by the vendor was one of the most important criteria while selecting the vendor. Company B_EI carried out series of workshops where all staff were involved in the process of detailing required functionality and requirements (used the Business System selection process designed by the consultants), based on which a screening document was sent to 11 potential vendors out of which two organisations were chosen to progress to the final phase, where a test script was run on both systems. Similarly, Company A_EI wrote an RFI (Request for information) document alongwith the external consultants and submitted it to 10 ERP suppliers, out of which three vendors were chosen for the next stage. Company A_EI also highlighted the use of reference sites when buying products and services, as they did when selecting the ERP vendor. Low cost was also an important criteria for Company A_EI whereas Company C_EI emphasised upon the interface and platform of their ERP system. Company B_EI was very keen on buying the off-the-shelf packages provided by the vendor in order to avoid customisation and secondly, to avoid building up a deep relationship with the vendor. A summary of the criteria for selecting vendor has been illustrated in Table 5.3, shown below:

Table 5.3  Criteria for vendor selection in case studies from Enterprise Ireland (2003)

No.	Selection Criteria	Companies
1.	Functionality and add-on features	BEI , CEI
2.	Low cost	AEI
3.	Reference sites	AEI
4.	Off the shelf packages	AEI
5.	Interface	CEI
6.	Previous experience	AEI

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