The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music… let's see, we need something to inspire us, fit the mood here on a lovely Friday morning… ah, yes, here we are -- Flogging Molly's Drunken Lullabies:

 

IncorTech, a California-based technology consulting firm, has announced finalized agreements with apps vendor Deltek as a "new business partner."

IncorTech sells business software and service products from entry level accounting and contact management software products and integrates ERP, accounting, professional service, distribution, manufacturing, CRM and HRMS products.

The firm will be adding the Deltek product suite to their current list of offerings and will become a fully integrated Deltek partner.

Steve Birdwell, President for IncorTech, explaining the move, said that Deltek provides products and support "built around the specific needs of our growing customer base."

Taylor Macdonald, Vice President, Worldwide Channels and Sales Alliances for Deltek, said the company sees the deal as "achieving market expansion by partnering."

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Stockholm-based Tacton Systems, a vendor of sales and product configuration software, has announced that MP Engineering has signed a reseller agreement for TactonWorks whereby Tacton Configurator is embedded in SolidWorks as an add-in product.

 

TactonWorks generates quotations for order processing in manufacturing. The agreement covers sales in Sweden.

 

MP Engineering is a SolidWorks reseller in the Nordic region, with close to 1,600 customers. MP Engineeering provides industry expertise and products for the development process, providing software within CAD, CAM, PDM and analysis.

 

Tacton officials say MP Engineering extends their portfolio by adding Knowledge Based Engineering Solution with TactonWorks.

 

TactonWorks markets to manufacturers with a need for order-specific customization of product design, e.g. engineer-to-order, assemble-to-order, or configure-to-order, where rules can define what is a valid design for the customer's requirements.

 

"This means that our customers' design process can become even more efficient. Tacton Configurator automates parts of the process, and works smoothly and easily with SolidWorks, which is needed for the big-picture thinking," said Martin Poulsen, CEO of MP Engineering AB.

 

Tacton Configurator Solution is used for the selling of customized products whether online or from a PC at the point of sale. It can be integrated with any existing system and has standard integrations with leading e-Commerce, ERP, CRM, PLM and CAD systems.

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Torex, a software vendor for the retail industry, has selected Astea International's service lifecycle management application, Astea Alliance, for "visibility and control of its service supply chain," according to Torex officials.

 

Astea says that its product helps Torex have visibility of every interaction that takes place with the customer, from the initial customer call to the closing of work orders, customer invoicing and product replacement. The suite integrates business processes for contact centre, field service, depot repair, logistics, professional services and sales and marketing.

Mark Comer, managing director of the EMEA region at Astea, said that by partnering with Astea, Torex will "break down the traditional barriers between departmental and enterprise systems." In his opinion, Comer said, "an integrated approach that ties call centres, depots, field service, sales and office personnel together provides the most value to customers."

 

Graeme Cooksley, president and COO of Torex, said it is "imperative" that Torex has "a common business product platform to meet our growth plans." He said Astea is "a cornerstone for our global applications product stack," which will in due course be "integrated with our CRM and financial systems."

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Microsoft has announced that American of Martinsville, a Virginia-based contract furniture manufacturer, will integrate Microsoft Dynamics AX 4.0 and Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 to automate its current manual processes.

 

American of Martinsville designs and produces furniture for the hospitality, healthcare and senior-living markets. In other words, it's not that long until you and First Coffee are both regular users of their products.

 

Microsoft Dynamics AX is described by company officials as "an adaptable business-management product that provides industry-specific functionality for midsize and larger organizations." The furniture producer will use Microsoft Dynamics CRM to automate its quoting process, project management and customer communications.

 

The two Microsoft Dynamics products will be integrated so that workflow for the front-end and back-end operations of American of Martinsville runs from the order-entry phase all the way through design, master planning, production and delivery.

 

Before choosing Microsoft, American of Martinsville had also evaluated products from SYSPRO, Sage Software, SAP AG and Infor. The company selected Microsoft to replace its 28-year-old Unisys mainframe system with applications developed in-house. The furniture design process wasn't even connected to manufacturing and delivery.

 

American of Martinsville is implementing a number of Microsoft Dynamics AX 4.0 modules, including financials, e-banking, planning and scheduling, order management, shipping and warehousing, purchasing, inventory, multicurrency and multilanguage capabilities, Enterprise Portal, and field service. For Microsoft Dynamics CRM the company is implementing modules for project management, quote management and customer communications.

 

American of Martinsville produces a large percentage of its products in China, and the Microsoft products let the company use Asian currency and the Mandarin language when managing projects that the company produces in China. All the data in the system can be retrieved directly, through the Web, in reports or through the Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server for business analytics.

 

With its old technology, company officials say, when working with its Shanghai logistics office, American needed to recompile spreadsheets and enter them into the home-office system. With Microsoft Dynamics AX Shanghai personnel will be able to enter information into the system directly through the Web or terminal services.

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VinSolutions.com has announced enhancements to its MotoSnap CRM system for dealers who want to highlight their higher grossing Carfax 1-Owner vehicles through e-mails and

e-brochures.

 

Using the product, Carfax-subscribing dealers can identify any Carfax 1-Owner car for potential buyers, turning inventory faster and for more money.

 

Adding this new feature to our CRM system, said Doug Kinney, VinSolutions.com's CEO, means that "on top of the free Carfax Vehicle History Reports already available to

their customers, they also get to use Carfax's 1-Owner vehicle logo on their Web sites. We're making it as easy as we can for used car buyers to target our clients' dealerships."

Last year, for the first time in automotive history, Internet use surpassed all other shopping methods for vehicle location, with nearly one in four late-model used car buyers using the Internet to locate the vehicle they purchase.

 

Larry Gamache, communications director at Carfax, said recent studies show that "cars sell three days faster online when a free Carfax Vehicle History Report is included and consumers will pay up to 15 percent more for your Carfax 1-Owner vehicles."