Directorate of distance education

Implementation of ERP
Much more than just software, ERP is a true project requiring 
full integration of a software tool within an organization and a specific 
structure and therefore involves significant engineering costs. On the other 
hand, its implementation in an enterprise requires significant changes in 
the working habits of a significant part of the employees. It is therefore 
believed that the cost of the software tool accounts for less than 20% of the 
total cost of implementing such a system.

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EAI 
The purpose of EAI (Enterprise Application Integration) is the 
interoperability and organization of the flow of information between 
heterogeneous applications, i.e. ensure communcation between the 
different applications making up the information system of the company, 
even those of clients, partners, or suppliers. 
An EAI project therefore involves, in the first place, implementing 
an architecture under which the different applications communicate 
with each other. This therefore involves the development of connectors 
(middleware) which make it possible to interface applications by using 
different communication protocols (generally proprietary). 
However, the EAI project goes beyond interoperability between 
the applications: it makes it possible to define a workflow between the 
applications and therefore represents an alternative to ERP with a more 
modular approach. Nonetheless, EAI still has the limits related with the 
rigidity of the legacy, since it is necessary to modify the middleware in the 
case of significant changes of the applications. 
PLM
Whereas Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tries to collect 
all information regarding clients, PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) 
consists in capitalizing on all information regarding an industrial product. 
PLM is an approach similar to Knowledge Management, but revolving 
around the product. The goal of PLM is to allow the different entities 
of the company, from production to sales, to share knowledge of the 
different stages of the life cycle of a product (design, manufacturing, 
storage, transportation, sales, after-sales service, recycling).