Strategic Information System: ERP Implementation at Apple Inc.

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Apple Inc.'s strategic information system, with a particular focus on the implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). It begins with an introduction to ERP and its significance in modern business, highlighting its role in automating processes and enhancing transparency. The report delves into Apple Inc.'s business processes, including research and development, design, and procurement, and explains how an ERP system can streamline these operations. It examines business requirements in relation to ERP, emphasizing the need for financial and accounting integration, material management, production management, and customer service management. The report also discusses the selection of vendors and software, the benefits of ERP in improving efficiency, and potential risks associated with implementation, along with mitigation strategies. The report underscores the importance of ERP in achieving organizational goals, expanding business in the global market, and improving overall performance. Finally, the report concludes by summarizing the key findings and emphasizing the value of a well-integrated ERP system for a multinational corporation like Apple Inc.

Running Head: Strategic Information
Apple inc.
Strategic Information System

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Business Process..............................................................................................................................3
Business Requirements in relation with ERP system......................................................................5
ERP’s requirements in relation with business.................................................................................6
Selection of Vendor and Software...................................................................................................7
Significance of ERP in enhancing the efficiency............................................................................8
Level of efficiency with the implementation of ERP system..........................................................9
Potential Risks with the implementation of ERP..........................................................................10
Measures to mitigate the risks.......................................................................................................11
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................12
References......................................................................................................................................13

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Introduction
ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), it is a process through which an organization could be
moved towards the automated process. In the modern world, every business enterprise
irrespective of its size have adopted the technique of Enterprise Resource Planning to develop
the transparency in the organizational process as well as it will also help the organization in
achievement of the organizational goals and the objectives. Under this process, a set of advanced
software is included such as an internal communication process, advanced accounting software
for recording the financial transactions adequately as well as to get the error-free results.
Generally, this process is practiced in the administration department of the organization and it
also helps the management to resolve the various big concerns. Employees’ details could also be
gathered from this procedure and it will be the only system for the organization as it will be a
mixture of unique software on the basis of unique needs of organization. Under this report,
system of enterprise resource planning will be discussed in order to analyse the requirement of
the process and to attain that requirement with the help of the enterprise resource planning in the
workplace.
In the multinational corporations, this process is quite useful as well as essential also. In a
multinational organization, for instance, Apple INC. thousands of employees are working over
there. In order to record the data of each and every employee, this process is very crucial in order
to attain the objectives of the organization as well as to determine the requirements of the
business. Apart from this, in Apple INC. numbers of operations are performed at a time and
along with the number of operations, suppliers’ details, buyers’ details, etc. will also be recorded

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under this process only. The main aim of maintaining and launching this process in the
workplace is to maintain the whole data of the organization at one place safe and secure.

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Business Process
Business process of every organization varies and being in the same industry, organizations
adopt unique business process in order to make the take the competitive advantage. Apple Inc. is
a multinational organization and involved in manufacturing of consumer electronic goods. Their
famous products are iPhone, iPod, iPad, etc. Hence, this organization’s business process is very
huge and to manage all the functionalities, Enterprise Resource Planning will be a great resource
for making the process of Apple INC. smoother and effective (Leon, 2014).
The major functionalities of the business process of Apple INC. are:
 Research & Development process to make the existing products more effective and
efficient.
 Designing of the products in order to meet the customers’ expectations.
 Purchase department thee perform their duties in order to gather all those things which
will be required while developing the customer-oriented products (Seo, 2013)
 Apart from these things, functionalities of the promotion and the advertisement
department start. These are the most crucial segment of the business process of Apple
INC. because it enhances the demand for the new product which is about to launch in the
market (Shaul & Tauber, 2013).
 Apart from these functionalities, there are numerous activities are involved in the
backstage of the operations.
To record all these activities in one process, Enterprise Resource Planning is being adopted in the
workplace in order to ease the work as well as to achieve adequate objectives. Access to this

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process will be provided by the requirement of the organization. For instance, production
manager wants to record the data in relation to the recent purchases then he will be able to see all
the sections which are related to the production team and the same goes for each and every
department of the organization. The major access i.e. access to the whole system will be with the
CEO of the organization only and on the mutual consent, this access can also be shared with
anyone. Regulations on the access are imposed to maintain the confidentiality of the resources,
information and the key aspects of the organization. Apart from this, there are numerous types of
information's available with the organization i.e. suppliers' details, clients' details, etc. and this
information could easily be misused. In order to prevent this confidential information from the
external as well as with the internal stakeholders, restrictions on the over access to the system are
imposed (Tarhini, Ammar & Tarhini, 2015).
All the functionalities of the organization will be recorded in the single system only and it will
help the organization to enhance their performance in order to reduce the complications in the
work procedures as well as to keep the organization’s information safe and secure. With the help
of ERP system, organization could also meet the requirements which are crucial from the
perceptive of the expansion of the business in the global market. In addition to this, organization
will be able to achieve the success and the growth objective easily. Most of the functionalities of
the organization will be performed with the help of enterprise resource planning system hence;
chances of errors in recording, auditing, and in other functionalities of the organization reduces.
Thus, implication and the execution of the enterprise resource planning system will be effective
for the organization and it will help the management of the organization to execute the
functionalities with comfort and ease (Hoch & Dulebohn, 2013).

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Business Requirements in relation with ERP system
Evaluation of the business requirements in relation to the need of enterprise resource planning in
the workplace to make the functionalities of the organization effective and efficient, it has been
observed that various multinational organizations have adopted this system already. Enterprise
Resource Planning system is very helpful in achievement of goals for the business in terms of
various aspects as well as it also increases the chances of the organization in terms of expansion
of the organization in the international market. With the help of the implementation of enterprise
resource planning system in the workplace, achievement of targets set up by the management
becomes quite easy task. Enterprise Resource Planning is the major requirement for every
organization in terms of expansion of the business as well as to build the market image in the
global market. Apart from this, it is also useful in the procedure of attaining the competitive
advantage. This system also helps the organization in various ways such as it describes unique
ways to save cost of the production. This ultimately increases the demand of the product because
decrease in the prices of the commodities will be recorded with the decrease in the cost of the
production. Apart from this efficiency as well as the profitability of the organization also
increases and this builds the effective way for the organization in terms of developing the
adequate way to reaching the desired destination (Hunton, McEwen & Wier, 2015).
Furthermore, while evaluating the effectiveness of the process followed by the Apple INC.
Before implementing the enterprise planning resource system in their workplace, it was observed
that all the functionalities were managed adequately and for every department, a center head was
appointed who was held responsible for the performance of the particular department. This
procedure was time consuming as well as in the scenarios of critical issues, organizational

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procedure was not able to resolve those issues. Due to these issues and to maintain the adequate
performance in the competitive business environment, organization adopted the technique of
Enterprise Resource Planning system. This resolves various types of issues such as it enhance the
effectiveness of the internal communication system as well as it also fills the gaps between the
relationship of employer and employees (Seethamraju, 2015).

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ERP's requirements in relation to business
Implementation of enterprise resource planning system in the workplace is not an easy task; it
requires various efforts, as well as there, are number of requirements mentioned under enterprise
resource planning system which needs to be fulfilled before implementing it into the workplace
(Yeh & Xu, 2013). Following are some of the organizational aspects which need to be matched
with ERP system’s requirements:
 Financial & Accounting: This is the major requirement of enterprise resource planning
system because this is the only procedure which requires being practiced on the daily
basis and at the end of the year, this process requires huge efforts. Through enterprise
planning resource system, this vast process could be converted into easy and smooth
process which does not requires big efforts as well as it also helps organization to save
their time at the end of the year while closing the accounts as, through this software,
financial statements could be obtained automatically with accurate information. Under
this software, organization’s various requirements are fulfilled such as preparation of
payroll, payments to the daily wage employees, etc. in adequate time and with effective
results (Tasevska, Damij & Damij, 2014).
 Material Management: With the implementation of the enterprise resource planning
system, material management also becomes an easy task for the organization. This is big
and again a vast task which requires various employees’ efforts and knowledge in
relation with resolving the issues such as accurate recording of the available inventory,
recording of purchased materials and the same procedure goes for the supplies and the
sale of the products. To perform this process in an adequate manner, a certain number of

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employees is required but while performing the same procedure with the help of
enterprise resource planning, it becomes an easy as well as effective task for the
organisation. With enterprise resource planning system, bar codes are pasted on each and
every product and it is scanned before coming or going out of the premises of the
organization. And with the automated process, accurate results in relation to the
management of the inventory are obtained (Chofreh, et. al., 2014).
 Production management: While reviewing the scenario of Apple INC. it has been
observed that organization requires an adequate procedure through which appropriate
quantity of products could be manufactured as per the market demand. Enterprise
planning resource system involves various steps which are crucial from the perception of
the organization and these steps also help the organization in relevance with analysing
the organizational requirements as well as in fulfilling the same. In terms of Apple INC.
numbers of materials are purchased from various parts of the globe and some are
manufactured too. Hence, enterprise resource planning will help the Apple INC. to make
the production management quite easier in relevance with the previous system followed
by them (Shen, Chen & Wang, 2016).
 Customer Service Management: This is the part of the organizational process which
has the enough capacity to increase the demand of the products manufactured by
organization as well as it could also decrease the demand of the same. The better, the
customer service will be, the more its demand will be. Hence; enterprise resource
planning helps the organization to evaluate the gaps in the customer service management
and rectifies them with the view to provide adequate services to the customers (Ha &
Ahn, 2014).

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Selection of Vendor and Software
Selection process of the adequate software and the vendor from which software needs to be
purchased is quite difficult. In relevance with this and to make this process easy and simple,
organization develops its requirements and on the basis of those requirements, adequate set of
software are implemented in the workplace to obtain effective results. The management needs to
adopt the safest software because, after its implementation, most of the tasks will be performed
by the system only hence; employees will work only as the maintaining the system as well as to
fulfil the requirements of the clients. Inferior quality or the unsafe software may develop various
issues such as leakage of clients’ confidential information, leakage of confidential information of
the organization, secret formula to manufacture unique products, etc. Hence, qualitative and safe
software adaptation will be a good decision in relevance with maintaining the market image in
the global market (Kermani & Rouhani, 2014).
For selecting the adequate software considering the organizational requirements, selection of the
vendor should be done on the same requirements because the more reputed vendor will be, trust
over their software can be easily built up (Kurbel, 2016).