Acumatica Construction Edition development
Itransition helped Acumatica customize its cloud-based ERP system to adapt it to the needs of the construction industry.
Context
Our customer, the owner and developer of the Acumatica Cloud ERP, planned to launch its proprietary product for the construction industry and attract construction companies as users. Their software market analysis showed that the company would need to customize their existing ERP substantially to enter the niche.
To develop a solution that would address the needs of construction businesses, Acumatica once again chose Itransition as its trusted partner for Acumatica integration services, as we had already helped them extend the platform with a range of custom modules and features. Together, Acumatica and Itransition designed and launched Acumatica Construction Edition.
Solution
Itransition customized the Acumatica ERP for construction and developed a set of packages, each being a separate module on top of the Acumatica Framework.
The extended capabilities of the Acumatica construction ERP developed by Itransition include:
- Records and document synchronization. Construction companies typically integrate their ERPs with project management systems to streamline records and document workflows. To address this need, Itransition enabled automated synchronization of Acumatica Construction Edition with third-party project management solutions, thus ensuring the consistency of customers’ and suppliers' records, accounting and project documents.
- Integration with Procore. Our team integrated the Acumatica ERP with the Procore construction management system. We developed the integration layer from scratch to ensure the communication between Acumatica and Procore solutions via REST API. At this stage, Itransition closely cooperated with both Acumatica and Procore developers. The integration made it easier to synchronize data and content related to customers, vendors, and projects across Acumatica and Procore deployments.
- Enhanced billing. Our developers extended the default Acumatica billing feature with the capability to issue bills for multiple recipients.
- Document compliance. The system enables end users to store, review, and timely update critical documents, including construction certificates, lien waivers, insurance policies, agreements, and more. If a particular document is about to expire, the system sends an automatic email notification to responsible employees.
- Built-in construction vocabulary. Itransition extended the default terminology of the Acumatica accounting software with the specialized vocabulary used in
Working with Itransition’s team, Acumatica’s software engineers delivered brand-new features for a more effective accounting and project management in the construction industry:
- Construction finance management for budgeting, expenditure, income, billing, and fund management.
- Document management for code-based document identification and search, contract management.
- Construction project management for project progress tracking, task distribution, obligation management.
Process
The joint project team consisted of an onsite delivery manager, an offshore project manager, a business analyst, a team lead, a QA lead, four developers, and two QA engineers.
To manage the project in line with the Acumatica’s guidelines, Itransition’s business analyst gathered requirements that allowed the development team to design the architecture of future integrations and draw up a feature development plan.
One of the challenges we managed to overcome was to make the solution valuable for a wide range of users while adhering to the established standards of the construction industry.
To balance the features, we worked closely with the construction industry insiders. Itransition collected experts’ feedback and recommendations on the optimal feature sets for the Acumatica construction ERP.
Additionally, Itransition integrated all the features delivered for the desktop version of Acumatica ERP into the Acumatica mobile app. The mobile enablement was critical for gaining the loyalty of construction companies where many specialists work in the field away from their PCs.
Since the launch of the Acumatica Construction Edition, the company continues collaborating with Itransition and extending the solution’s functionality through stable releases twice a year.
The latest release enabled Acumatica Construction Edition users to fulfill the following tasks:
- Create RFIs and project issues right within Microsoft Outlook
- Store and share drawings and sketches with team members
- Track and control project costs
- Modify and submit project-related budget forecasts and compare them with the actual project costs and the revenue for a specific financial period
Results
A long-term Acumatica partner, Itransition adapted the Acumatica CloudERP to the construction industry specifics. Since the release, the company reported a 400% growth in the platform use owing to its wide adoption by construction businesses, including the top 10 construction companies.
As the ERP keeps evolving, Acumatica is continuously extending the list of their customers with general contractors, sub-contractors, specialty contractors, home builders, and pre-fabrication and manufacturing companies.
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