Epicor Apps Add Up To Clarity Of Bottom Line

For Epicor, a developer of front-end and back-end software solutions, no glitz is necessary. The company has built itself a business based on delivering solid, reliable financial systems, said Karen Adame, director of product marketing at Epicor, Irvine, Calif.

"Ours is an end-to-end accounting solution," Adame said. "What sets us apart from the competition is the business intelligence we integrate with our applications. That's key because it allows the [corporate user to build datamarts and to graph and chart the data it collects."

Epicor's offerings cover the gamut, from front-office applications such as e-sales, marketing and help desk to back-office applications such as accounting and finance, distribution and warehousing. The company also has a CRM package, analytics tools for budgeting and reporting, and an e-commerce suite.

Epicor's back-office products, collectively called eBackOffice, have made it onto the line cards of more than 200 partners worldwide, said Jeff Gariepy, director of channel sales at Epicor.

"Our partners generally fall into three categories,VARs, authorized consultants and influencers," Gariepy said. "About 25 percent of our business goes through these partners now, and in the next 12 months, we'd like that number to be closer to 50 percent." Epicor also hopes to double the number of its partners in that time, he said.

"We're looking for national partners that know accounting solutions and have multiple sites," Gariepy said. "We're also looking for regional companies, partners with vertical expertise,be it in distribution, hospitality or some other niche,and organizations that already have a specific value-added solution to offer, one they can integrate with our software."

Epicor is also in discussions now with large hardware providers such as Hewlett-Packard and IBM about prepackaging its applications with desktop systems, Gariepy said.

At Axis Accounting Systems, a solution provider based in Nashville, Tenn., customers using Epicor's software range from local startups in the entertainment industry to health-care practices with operations overseas.

"Epicor's offering is so broad-based that every company is a potential customer," said Dallas Hagewood Wilt, president and CEO of Axis. "Every company needs to account for something."

Axis' specialty is integrating software from Epicor and other vendors with customers' existing systems and with vertical software solutions provided by third parties, Wilt said.

In the meantime, more and more companies are turning to their financial applications to provide the "visibility they need to effectively monitor their bottom lines," said a spokeswoman at Epicor. The company provides midmarket organizations with integrated accounting applications that help them manage an entire scope of operations, she said.

Features of Epicor's accounting and financial software include a flexible general ledger; an accounts payable module that allows users to improve efficiency and the management of vendor relations; multicurrency and intercompany transaction processing to support global business requirements; cash-management capabilities to help users forecast future cash flow; automatic journal allocations and accruals; and a financial reporting application that's tightly integrated with the general ledger.

Epicor's end-user customers,among them, the Chicago White Sox and California Pizza Kitchen,consist primarily of companies in the distribution, professional services, financial services, entertainment, sports and hospitality markets, Adame said.

"Our solution is typically for companies with multiple operations that run independently," Adame said. "A franchise owning five restaurants is a good example. Each location runs itself, but the folks in corporate have to see what's going on across the board and might have to do the purchasing for all five locations."