Gartner defines a product-centric cloud ERP suite as a set of loosely coupled products comprising: Operational ERP — supply chain and manufacturing-related functionality such as demand management, order management, material requirements planning (MRP), inventory management, supply chain/direct procurement, manufacturing control capabilities, and distribution/logistics. Financial management functionality (those vendors that provide only financial management as a suite are rated in a separate Magic Quadrant). Purchasing focused on indirect goods, services and capital equipment. HCM — for cost management as well as staffing for operational resources. Specialized, industry-specific modules or applications including, but not limited to, modules such as configure-to-order (CTO) or make-to-order (MTO), and field service management (FSM), or broader application solutions like enterprise asset management (EAM) and product life cycle management (PLM).
Content services platforms (CSPs) are integrated platforms that provide content-focused services, repositories, APIs, solutions and business processing tools to support digital business and transformation. Typical CSP use cases include document management, back-office processes, business process applications, records management and team productivity. A CSP has its own repository. CSP services and data may also integrate with external, non-native repositories and applications through prebuilt connectors, API development or prepackaged integrations. CSPs have web, desktop and mobile app interfaces that let users navigate through and work with the different content services. The platforms may also offer prebuilt solutions for vertical and horizontal content processes such as case management, legal matter management, contract management. CSPs are available on-premises, as hosted services, in the cloud (SaaS and/or PaaS) or in hybrid architectures that combine cloud and on-premises storage and/or services.
Human Capital Management (HCM) Suites encompass functionality to help organizations attract, develop, engage, retain and manage their workers. HCM encompasses the following HR functions: Administrative HR includes organizational and employee data, transactional employee and manager self-service, benefits, and payroll administration. Talent management applications are composed of recruiting, onboarding, performance and engagement management, compensation planning, career and succession planning, learning and development, and workforce planning. Workforce management includes absence management, time and attendance management, task management, budgeting and forecasting, and scheduling, and is usually deployed to manage hourly paid workers. HR service delivery includes direct access to policy and procedure guidance for employees and managers. It may also include case management, knowledge base and digital document management.
Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) is a specialist class of production-oriented software that manages, monitors and synchronizes the execution of real-time, physical processes involved in transforming raw materials into intermediate and/or finished goods. These systems coordinate this execution of work orders with production scheduling and enterprise-level systems like ERP and product life cycle management (PLM). MES applications also provide feedback on process performance, and support component and material-level traceability, genealogy and integration with process history, where required. These capabilities extend from product/process design release (PLM) and work order release (ERP) through completion of the manufacturing process. Gartner’s view of the MES market does not include production automation software such as supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), distributed control systems (DCSs) or programmable logic controllers (PLCs).
Gartner defines a warehouse management system (WMS) as "a software application that helps manage the operations of a warehouse or distribution center (DC)." WMS applications offer capabilities such as receiving, put-away, stock locating, inventory management, cycle counting, task interleaving, wave planning, order allocation, order picking, replenishment, packing, shipping, labor management and automated materials-handling equipment interfaces. These systems incorporate mobile devices along with bar code and, possibly, RFID scanning/sensing to form the transactional foundation of a WMS. Gartner includes integrated functionality what we refer to as extended WMS capabilities as components of a WMS evaluation. These include labor management, slotting, yard management, voice picking, parcel manifesting, value-added services, light manufacturing/kitting and third-party logistics (3PL) billing. We do not, however, consider stand-alone solutions in these areas as part of this market