As of today, Exact Synergy Enterprise product update 248 is generally available, which marks the end of the controlled release period which started in the mid of December 2011.

Please see below what the main highlights of this product update are:

• Realigning features for users with the CRM role, that offers now full functionality in the CRM module. Please watch this video to learn about other improvements to this role.
• Numerous enhancements to Exact Synergy Office Integration based on direct customer feedback. For a complete overview of enhancements, please click here and choose tab ‘General’; you can also watch this video to find out more.
• Improvements to the Exact PSA solution, among others by enhancing the project planning board that offers a more interactive way of planning with a drag-and-drop interface. The Work Breakdown Structure is now merged with budgets to simplify work of a project controller and project managers. Please watch this series of videos to find out more.
• With Central Master Data Management you can now easily centrally manage people, in follow-up of the earlier introduction of supporting accounts, items and general ledger accounts (video)
• The possibility to save pivot analysis for opportunities as templates based on a direct customer feedback (video)

Moreover, the new Exact Service Management solution that helps wholesale and manufacturing companies who service the products they sell to optimize their service activities is currently in extended controlled release. Please watch our introduction video to find out more about this solution.

The Exact Synergy Enterprise Configurator will remain in controlled release with this product update until the end of January. Please read more about Exact Synergy Enterprise Configurator in the previous announcement.

For a full overview of all new functionalities, please refer to the release notes for product update 248 and the Product Update News page.

Should you have any questions regarding this announcement, please do not hesitate to comment on this blog post.

On behalf of product management I’m happy to announce that as of today, Exact Synergy Enterprise product update 248 is in controlled release. This new product update is planned to be generally available in the mid of January 2012.

The main highlights of this product update are as following:

• Realigned features for the CRM role, that offers now full functionality in the module CRM. An important addition to the CRM role is the ability to perform delegation.
• Improved ease of use and speed of Exact Synergy Office Integration. You can now automatically save emails from certain folders directly to Exact Synergy Enterprise, based on a template set for those folders. You also have a possibility to deactivate option of automatic mapping of a contact person when saving an email. Moreover, Synergy Office Integration has been enhanced with numerous features, such as option to save multiple emails at once and pop-up notification to ask user to save an outgoing email. For a complete overview of enhancements, please click here and choose tab ‘General’
• Changes to the Exact PSA solution, among others enhanced project planning board that offers a more interactive way of planning with drag-and-drop interface; Work Breakdown Structure merged with budgets to simplify work of a project controller and project manager.
• Additional features in the new design of Exact Synergy Enterprise, such as expanding self-service wizards, ability to select themes, SDK support on mega menu, top right menu and search entities
• People supported in Central Master Data Management, please see this video to find out more

Based on a direct feedback from our customers, we are continuously improving our products. This product update includes features mentioned above for CRM role and Exact Synergy Office Integration. Moreover, we offer now possibility to save pivot analysis for opportunities as templates.

As of this product update Exact Synergy Enterprise Configurator will be available. This toolset is meant for consultants and partners. It can be used to create and implement pre-configured templates, in pre-sales trajectories to ‘quickly’ realize a demo showing the Exact Synergy Enterprise features. Moreover, it can also be used in configuration of customer specific solutions to support the primary and secondary business processes. 

For a full overview of all new functionalities, please refer to the release notes for product update 248 as well as articles on our Product Blog.

Should you have any questions regarding this announcement, please do not hesitate to comment on this blog post.

As of today, Exact Synergy Enterprise product update 247 is generally available. This marks the end of controlled release period which started in the end of August.

Based on customers’ feedback, we have focused on multiple developments in the following license roles: Exact Synergy user, Employee Self-Service, Incoming Invoice Register and users with CRM role (video). For the customers who make use of Exact Synergy Office Integration we have introduced calendar management that allows you to link your project, account and contact to your appointment you create in MS Outlook (video). Moreover, as of this product update quotations are now fully integrated with Exact Globe, so the item information can be retrieved from Exact Globe and you can now select a division to be linked to your quotation.

All Exact Synergy Enterprise users who work with the standard functionality can now switch to the new Exact Synergy design that includes new features, such as customizable dashboards and enhanced mega menus navigation. Furthermore, the Exact Synergy Enterprise PSA solution make it now possible to plan people against a deadline and register costs of approved hours and expenses in Exact Globe.

Exact Integration launched in August has now new features, such as supporting the batch update of items and restoring database. To follow earlier introduction of Central Master Data Management for accounts and items, as of this product update it is possible to centrally manage General Ledger accounts (video).

Based on a direct customer feedback, we have also implemented a number of small enhancements, among others:

• Directly set status of project during creation
• Set opportunity status from Won to Undecided
• Full name of users displayed in timestamp
• New criteria to search for opportunities 

A full overview of all new functionalities you can find in the release notes and some additional information on the Product Update News page. Please also refer to previous articles on the Product Blog.

We would like to thank all customers, partners and colleagues who contributed to this product update.

Should you have any questions regarding this announcement, please comment on this blog post.

As of today, Exact Synergy Enterprise product update 247 is in controlled release. This new product update is planned to be generally available by the end of September 2011.

The main highlights of this product update are as following:

• License roles improvements: Synergy user, Employee Self-Service User, Incoming Invoice Register user and users with CRM role (video)
• Calendar management with Synergy Office Integration to link your project, account and contact to your appointment
• Quotations fully integrated with Exact Globe, so the item information can be retrieved from Exact Globe and you can now select a division to be linked to your quotation
• New Synergy design includes new features, such as customizable cockpits and enhanced mega menus navigation
• Exact PSA solution with new functionalities and numerous improvements, such as planning people against a deadline and registering costs of approved hours and expenses in Exact Globe
• Exact Integration with new features, such as supporting the batch update of items and restoring database
• Central Master Data Management makes it now possible to centrally manage General Ledgers (video)

We have also implemented a number of small enhancements based on a direct customer feedback and suggestions, among others:

• Directly set status of project during creation
• Set opportunity status from Won to Undecided
• Full name of users displayed in timestamp

For a full overview of all new functionalities, please refer to the release notes for product update 247.

Should you have any questions regarding this announcement, please contact Bert Siekmann (Manager Product Management) at bert.siekmann@exact.com.

We are happy to announce that as of today, Exact Synergy Enterprise product update 246 is generally available. This marks the end of the controlled release, which started in the beginning of July.

In this product update we have mainly focused on Professional Services Automation. Among others we have added the following improvements:

• Multiple improvements have been added to the existing hour and expense entry screen for consultants (video, release note)
• A full-fledged project manager role (video, release note)
• Rates and items enhancements for project controllers (video)
• Several improvements for administrators, such as 64-bit environment compliance

Moreover, we have added new features in Reporting services (release note)

• Possibility to share reports via the customer and reseller portal
• Retrieving information from many administrations separately with one report
• Linking multiple persons to a report irrespective of the assigned roles
• Identifying reports as web parts

We have also extended features in Mobile Synergy, based on feedback and suggestions from our customers. You can now view your own calendar and schedule appointments with your accounts and colleagues (release note).

As you know the iPhone app for Exact Synergy is already available and you can download it from the App Store. This app makes it possible for the users of iPhone and iPad to directly send emails, call customers and colleagues with a single finger tap while being on the go. Moreover, you can manage your schedule, but also view planning of your colleagues. Watch the video here to find out more.

For a full overview of all new functionalities, please refer to the Product Update News page and release notes for product update 246.

Should you have any questions regarding this product update, please contact Bert Siekmann (manager of product management) at bert.siekmann@exact.com.

As of this week, Exact Synergy Enterprise product update 246 is in controlled release. As usual, the release is now available for resellers and all controlled release customers that take part in it. This new product update is planned to be generally available in the end of July 2011.

Professional Services Automation
This product update focuses primarily on automation of professional services organizations, where we have added several new features to support project managers, consultants and project controllers in their daily work, such as:

• Additional improvements in the hour & expense entry screen for consultants (video);
• A new project manager license role that can create PSA projects, define budgets and project scopes, create work breakdown structures, find and plan people, approve their realized hours and invoice them to the customers via Exact Globe (video);
• Improvements to rates and items for project controllers and project managers, who will be able to, among others, define project, customer and personal rates with cost and sales prices in multiple currencies, and on top of that define multiple assortments of items. We have also increased the total amount of allowed rates. (video)
• Improvements for administrators such as:
  • 64-bit environment compliance;
  • Additional request types to be used by consultants;
  • Control over sections of the hour & expense entry screen.

Reporting services
Moreover, we have added new features in reporting to provide our customers with even better insight into enterprise data:

• Possibility to share reports via the customer and reseller portal
• Retrieving information from many administrations separately with one report
• Linking multiple persons to a report irrespective of the assigned roles
• Identifying reports as web parts

Mobile Synergy
Based on feedback and suggestions from our customers, we have also extended features in Mobile Synergy. You can now view your own calendar and schedule appointments with your accounts and colleagues.

Looking forward to your feedback on the new update!

In order to make use of the PSA in Exact Synergy Enterprise and start to enjoy the Time&Billing capabilities, you can do that in two ways:

1. Having a Synergy user with a professional role. Such a user can be granted any other license role (like Hour entry role) free of charge and without any further license checks
2. Assign a Synergy user, who doesn’t have the professional role yet, with  the hour entry role. When doing so, a license check is done whether the customer has sufficient available Hour entry roles (YA1401) in his license
3. #1 and #2 also apply to the situation where the user doesn’t need hour entry capabilities, but rather project controlling capabilities. So a Synergy user who already has the professional role, can be assigned with the project controller role free of charge and without any further license checks. Those Synergy users who don’t have a professional role, can only be granted the project controller role if there’s sufficient available project controller roles (YA1402) in the license

All the applications needed to make use of PSA in Exact Synergy Enterprise, are downloaded via the standard update mechanism of Exact Synergy Enterprise, so no seperate installation on the webserver is required.

More info on how the role mode works via this video.

When working with fixed price projects, the registration of labor hours will not lead to a sales invoice for these realized hours, because the invoices are generated via project terms. This document explains how customers can register the costs related to these labor hours, independently from the sales revenue process.

Step 1: After you’ve created and activated your fixed price project, go to the project rates and fill in 0.00 for the hour categories you intend to use on this project:

Step 2: go to Project>>Reports>>Invoicing term requests and create the project terms:

Step 3: start planning the people who will perform activities on this project

Step 4: hour realizations are being registered on the project. Each request will automatically have a “to be invoiced” sales amount of 0.00

Step 5: the project manager approves the hour realizations

Step 6: The project manager is in control when he wants to send the costs of the realizations to his financial Globe administration. He creates a new project term with a zero revenue amount, just to register the costs:

Step 7: The project manager approves this zero invoice-term for invoicing:

As a result, the invoice will appear under Invoices:

Step 8: run the PSA background job that generates the invoices and costs in Exact Globe

As a result:

-          The costs are already registered in Exact Globe on the fixed price project:

-          The project term request as well as the hour registration request, will get the status Processed:

That’s all!  The costs are correctly registered in the financial administration where, optionally, several Work-In-Progress calculations can be done and project profitability reports can be shown.

More info

- Working with project terms on fixed price projects: chapter 10.2  of the Exact Synergy Enterprise PSA manual

- Setting up the PSA background job : chapter 12  of the Exact Synergy Enterprise PSA manual

- Introduction video on Exact’s PSA solution

Since it is almost weekend time in the Netherlands, the office will soon be empty and many people will be off for a dinner and a movie night, I’d like to recommend a trailer to watch before that.

Now, this is our product blog, so the recommendation is indeed related to one of our key products – Synergy Enterprise and its newest release 244 that will be on the market very, very soon.

But more importantly, the movie trailer is about the new solution that we were working on in the past months – professional services automation. In a nutshell, the solution is designed to help consultancies and similar project-driven firms to administer their projects: particularly when it comes down to scheduling people, tracking hours and expenses, and creating invoices.

In the coming weeks I will share in detail with you what the solution is about and how exactly it helps our existing and will help future customers to run their businesses. But for tonight, to whet your appetite a little, here is the video.

(And if your Dutch language is not yet up to speed, now is the perfect time to practice it, because the trailer is called Projecturen en Facturering and is in Dutch.)

In order to offer existing and new customers a more complete solution, Exact has acquired the Exact Synergy Enterprise add-on “Timesheet”, as developed by our Dutch partner Eddon Software.

By incorporating this solution into Exact Synergy Enterprise, we’ll be enriching our offering with functionality to plan, register and invoice hours for project-driven companies. Our goal is to offer the functionality as per product update 243 of Exact Synergy Enterprise (for an overview of the 2010 planning of Exact Synergy Enterprise, please see this document).

Eddon Software is an independent organization focussed on development and distribution of software add-ons on top of standard software of Exact. The team of Eddon Software consists of Exact specialists with a huge experience on Exact’s software stack. The specialists of Eddon Software are working continuously, together with partners, to help and support organizations in optimizing the use of Exact’s solutions.

In the coming period we will be giving more information about availability, pricing and functionality.