The Top 5 Real-World Impacts of Sage Intacct on the Manufacturing Industry

At the core of every successful business is connectivity. That’s why Continental Optronics has been dedicated for over 50 years to manufacturing custom-length cabling for businesses needing reliable wired connectivity solutions. However, they wouldn’t be where they are today without the help of a powerful financial cloud-based manufacturing software solution. From production optimization to supply chain collaboration and real-time data insights that actually drive innovation and growth, Sage Intacct has done just that for Continental. We spoke with their President and Lead Engineer, Jimmy Gilbreath, and discussed the top 5 impacts Sage Intacct has had in reshaping the manufacturing experience for this growing multi-entity company.

1. Flexibility
   Sage Intacct’s cloud-based manufacturing software solution brings flexibility felt throughout an entire enterprise. For Continental Optronics, they already knew what they wanted. They knew they wanted a modern Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system in the cloud because after doing the necessary checks and balances, they found that while cloud-based systems have an initial investment, the ROI is worth it in the long term - especially without the server or support costs that come with an on-premise solution. Continental’s findings match a study done by Nucleus that stated the cloud delivers on average 4.01 times the ROI as on-premise deployments.
   
2. Cost-Savings
   It's not rocket science that every business wants a strong ROI, but Continental Optronics also wants the flexibility to access the system from anywhere. They want to be able to access valuable insights and make informed decisions while at home, traveling, or on the shop floor, without connecting to a remote desktop or a clunky VPN. Jimmy Gilbreath, President and Lead Engineer of Continental Optronics says after migrating to Sage Intacct from their QuickBooks software desktop version, “I like it being in a web browser. I like that interface. I like all of that. It was a good transition.”
   
3. Ease of Use
   Working with an intuitive manufacturing software system goes beyond just shortening the learning curve for staff. Sage Intacct’s easy-to-use platform enables businesses to tailor the system to its unique manufacturing processes. Easy customization is crucial to maximizing productivity. While training and education on a new system are key, by tailoring Sage Intacct to mirror a business’s current operations, you can significantly reduce training time because the system seamlessly integrates with existing operational workflows. Basically, our team sets the system up to work the way your team already works.
   
   When discussing how Sage Intacct’s ease of use impacted Continental Optronics, Gilbreath explains, “Sage Intacct was a lot easier for me. It made a lot more sense, a lot more intuitive. It takes people about 2 weeks [to learn], and then they never look back.” Additionally, if it’s a challenge to gather key data insights, that can result in delays to timely decisions, which can have a detrimental impact on a business. According to HPE’s Global Data Maturity Survey, just under a quarter of manufacturers recognize that customer experience and satisfaction (24%) and internal efficiency and productivity (23%) could also suffer as a result of inadequate data capabilities.
4. Seamless Growth
   At the time, Continental Optronics was growing rapidly, but their existing QuickBooks software was holding them back. This is a common theme among businesses, not just in the manufacturing industry. Having an accounting platform that can scale and adjust quickly is incredibly important to landing opportunities and keeping up with our technologically forward world. 
   
   Not long after transitioning to Sage Intacct, Continental Optronics opened a new office in Pennsylvania. Setting up this new office as a separate entity in Sage Intacct was virtually pain-free because of Sage Intacct’s game-changing multi-entity capabilities. Now, they can do everything they need to run a successful multi-entity manufacturing company, including consolidated reporting, within Sage Intacct for all their locations without any added expenses.
5. Valuable Insights
   Last, but certainly not least, Sage Intacct’s financial reporting and dashboards have a significant impact on the manufacturing industry. Thanks to industry-specific functionality, manufacturers can tailor their dashboards to what’s most important to them, so that at a glance, staff can uncover trends, track performance, and make data-driven decisions. Plus, if a data point is high level and the user needs to do a bit more digging, they can drill down to slice and dice the data to gain deeper visibility. 
   
   When it comes to Continental Optronics, Gilbreath had this to say about Sage Intacct’s reporting and dashboards, “The custom reports are pretty easy to create ourselves and are very useful. I use the custom reports all the time, and they go on the dashboard now. I prefer that way over the old page reports - it’s way easier to do.” With the help of Equation, they also tailored Sage Intacct to give them the option of printing out a document that shows only the part number or printing out a document that shows the components of their assembly kits. This gave their warehouse the ability to pull the exact parts they needed quickly from inventory, saving them time and money. 
   
   Set your manufacturing team up to work smarter (not harder) by implementing modern, cloud-based technology solutions. They are no longer a nice to have, they are a need to have if companies expect to thrive in today’s highly competitive and constantly (and quickly) evolving manufacturing landscape. These are only five impacts that this client has experienced with Sage Intacct’s manufacturing software solution. Contact our Equation experts to find out what sort of impact Sage Intacct can have in your manufacturing business.