IFS Welcomes ShipConstructor Software to its Partner Program
IFS North America has signed a partnership agreement with Victoria,
BC-based ShipConstructor Software, Inc., creating a single end-to-end
application environment to meet the needs of the Canadian Government’s
National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy (NSPS).
ShipConstructor provides
an AutoCAD-based CAD/CAM application for the production
design of ships and offshore assets, while IFS offers a
project-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) system
designed to support the entire asset lifecycle including
design, fabrication, construction, procurement and
aftermarket support, along with a broad array of
supporting functions including finance and document
management.
ShipConstructor and IFS
have a long history of collaboration in the United
States National Shipbuilding Research Program (NSRP) and
share a number of common customers. ShipConstructor is
noted for being the overwhelming choice for naval
shipbuilding in their market. The majority of the U.S.
Navy’s future fleet is being 3D modeled in
ShipConstructor software. IFS can boast that some of
world’s most renowned shipbuilders including Damen
Shipyards, Austal, Todd Pacific Shipyards and Babcock
use their ERP enterprise suite, IFS Applications. IFS
Applications holds a unique position in the market having
been recognized by industry analysts as a best-in-class
solution for project-based manufacturing and maintenance
repair and overhaul, both of which are essential
processes for shipyards.
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IFS Touch Apps
Announced at IFS Customer Summit 2011
The IFS Customer Summit, April 10-13, in Chicago was attended by nearly
500 people from over 130 companies, from 7 countries. Attendees learned
about exciting IFS news related to application enhancements,
new products, technology advances and much more.
During the summit,
IFS announced
the IFS Touch Apps program for smartphones. IFS
introduced the first two touch ap plication
prototypes which included IFS Trip Tracker and IFS Notify Me. The IFS
Trip Tracker App
is integrated with IFS expense reporting and provides mobile individuals
on the go, the ability to complete expense reporting from a smartphone
including attaching voice memos and pictures of receipts to an expense
report automatically. The IFS Notify Me App is integrated with IFS
event notifications and approvals which allows an individual to receive
notifications on their smartphone and then provide releases, approvals,
authorizations, etc. based on the notification type.
These Touch Apps are provided as part of the IFS Cloud which
provides the foundation enabling users to connect to the cloud using
various Internet connected devices and work with their IFS Applications
installation – anywhere in the world.
IFS also hosted the first Smartphone Touch Apps Focus Group
meeting at the summit which was attended by five North American
customers. Participants were given some hands-on experience with the
new Smartphone Apps prototypes in this focus group meeting where IFS was
looking for feedback and direction related to Smartphone Touch App
design, user experience, value and ideas for additional Smartphone
apps.
Watch a video on one of the summit presentations regarding IFS
Applications and social media.
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Free White Paper:
eCommerce for ETO Companies
 The
term eCommerce is most commonly associated with the
retail environment. And indeed, the ability to
browse, search and order products remotely has
forever changed how we buy things. In the
business-to-business world, companies selling
commodity items have also erected storefronts, and
those selling to large OEMs are engaged in eCommerce
through EDI, electronic data interchange.
But what of more complex manufacturers, those that
engineer products to customer orders; engineering,
procurement construction contractors or those
involved in large, capital equipment projects that
are highly collaborative? With the right enterprise
application environment, these companies can also
harness the efficiencies of eCommerce. In this
whitepaper, we will discuss the benefits engineer to
order (ETO) manufacturers can realize by adopting
eCommerce practices as well as the specific demands
eCommerce for ETO will place on an enterprise
software product.
Read more about CBS in this white paper today.
Podcast: Key Topics From the IFS Customer Summit 2011
Hear some of th e
topics that were said
by IFS AB CEO Alastair Sorbie, IFS Americas CEO Cindy Jaudon,
Director of Products and Industry Marketing Anders Lif, and analyst Ray
Wang of The Constellation Group at the IFS Customer Summit 2011 in
Chicago last week.
A number of new initiatives and features
were unveiled at the summit. But according to Sorbie, IFS’ core focus on
project- and asset-intensive industry will remain unchanged.
"IFS is true to its
origins... We have not deviated and said to the market that
we want to be number one in banking, as one of our
competitors has done. And we have not gone into retail, on
some sort of right angle turn as our competitors have done.
We are staying in this area. We will invest in that area.
And we will add functionality and value in this area as
well."
~ Alastair Sorbie, CEO, IFS AB |
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IFS Interim Financial Report
Financial reports —
Interim Report, January–March 2011
Strong growth in revenue and earnings
January–March 2011
(first quarter)
- License revenue - an
improvement of 23 percent currency adjusted.
- Maintenance revenue
- an improvement of 6 percent currency adjusted.
- Consulting revenue -
an improvement of 12 percent currency adjusted.
- Net revenue - an
improvement of 11 percent currency adjusted.
- EBIT amounted to SKr
10 million (Q1 '10: SKr 8 million). Cash flow after
investments was SKr 43 million (Q1 '10: SKr 74
million).
- Earnings per share
after full dilution amounted to SKr 0.15 (Q1 '10:
SKr 0.11).
Outlook
IFS expects good organic
growth in 2011, with stronger license sales and an
improvement in EBIT.
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IFS Customer Story - Flexpipe
Gains Speed & Environmental Traceability
Flexpipe Systems Inc., of Calgary,
Alberta, manufactures and sells proprietary non-metallic,
corrosion-resistant pipeline products and crimped steel fittings
primarily for oil and natural gas
producers. The company was acquired in 2008 by global energy services
company ShawCor Ltd. After a thorough comparison and selection process,
Flexpipe Systems chose to migrate
from its existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution to
Shawcor’s instance of IFS Applications.
Roadblock to
Growth
According to Flexpipe Systems’ Business Process Optimization Manager,
Don Miller, Flexpipe’s existing ERP
solution was heavily customized in order to meet the company’s business
needs.
“We were using Epicor Vantage,” Miller
said. “Our implementation contractor had done
 numerous
modifications to the source code. It got to a point that it was
handcuffing us significantly and a lot of the standard functions were
beginning to be hampered. Vantage was
so customized that we could not do an upgrade; upgrading the system
would involve a complete reimplementation. We
were forecasting major growth in the next few years, so we decided it
was time to either replace Epicor Vantage with a new version or go to
something else.” Apart from the company’s immediate system requirements
based on current business levels, Flexpipe Systems was cognizant of its
future growth requirements, and the
additional functionality that could be incorporated into a new system.
IFS Applications provided a solution.
“IFS provided a number of platforms that
could be used in our long term plans, including the use of recipes in
the ERP system. Epicor did not provide this function,” Miller said. “We
didn’t require these recipes right away in our current business process
but in the future we knew we could need the extra flexibility.”
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Events: Meet IFS at These
Upcoming Spring Events
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Upcoming Events |
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OFFSHORE TECHNOLOGY CONFERENCE
May 2-5, 2011 in Houston, TX
Visit IFS at
Booth #7702
Founded in 1969, the Offshore
Technology Conference is the world’s foremost event
for the development of offshore resources in the
fields of drilling, exploration, production, and
environmental protection. Each year, OTC attracts
more than 60,000 attendees and 2,000 exhibiting
companies representing more than 110 countries.
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ELECTRIC POWER
May 10-11, 2011 in
Rosemont, IL
Visit IFS at
Booth #1639
ELECTRIC
POWER is the largest coal power conference in the
U.S. It offers more sessions and speakers and
attracts more coal power producers than any other
event. In addition, the leading users’ group for PRB
Coal holds its primary meeting at ELECTRIC POWER
each year. Register today!
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2011 ITW GLOBAL IT SUMMIT
May 16-20, 2011 in
Phoenix, AZ
Visit IFS at the Summit!
IFS is a
sponsor at the 2011 ITW Global IT Summit that will
be held May 16-20th at the Arizona Grand Resort in
Phoenix, Arizona. In attendance will be up to 200
ITW IT and Telecom professionals representing our
businesses from around the globe. ITW is a
multibillion dollar company with 100 years of
history. ITW today designs and manufactures
fasteners and components, equipment and consumable
systems and a variety of specialty products and
equipment for customers around the world. The
company's more than 840 businesses are mostly small,
decentralized and focused on their customers. |
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Free Web-Based Tool Simplifies CMMS/EAM Evaluation Process
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Meet the IFS Team
Each month the IFS customer newsletter
will feature an IFS employee.
This
month's
spotlight is on:
Missi
- Director of Support Center Americas
 "I
am the Director of Support Center Americas and work out of the
Brookfield, Wisconsin office. I have been with IFS since
November of 1988, and have worked in many different roles within
the company. In 1988, I started in accounting, and over the
following several years worked in many different departments. I
joined the IFS customer support team in 1991 and that's where I
found my passion. I have held every role in customer support
from first line, which was called support receptionist at the
time, to my current role today.
Over the past several years I
have spent much of my time trying to visit as many IFS customers
as possible. This enables us to really get closer to our
customers and adapt to their changing needs. We have also just
implemented a case-based survey so that we can get real time
feedback.
On a personal note, I have been lucky enough to be married for
18 years to my best friend Joel, whom I have known since high
school. We have two wonderful daughters, the oldest, Krysta, is
16 and the youngest, Kate, is 9. We also have 3-year-old Beagle. In the summer my favorite past
time is going to car shows and in the fall and winter it's
watching the Green Bay Packers play football. Go PACK Go!" |
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Seven IFS Key Vertical Industries
      
If you're considering new
ERP/EAM options, take a closer look at IFS - the
choice of successful companies such as GE, BMW,
Ericsson, and Lockheed Martin. IFS' component-based
software makes it easier for companies to achieve rapid
bottom-line results. |
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