FAQs on Sage’s enterprise ERP – Sage X3

Sage X3 is Sage’s Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software for medium to large businesses and is particularly suited to manufacturers and distributors. In this article, we’ll answer some frequently asked questions around ‘What is Sage X3?’.

1.    Is Sage X3 an ERP System?

Sage X3 is an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. ERP software is a single system that allows organisations to manage business activities, including accounting, purchasing, manufacturing, supply chain, distribution, project management, and compliance to name a few. Sage X3 is Sage’s global ERP system and is used by over 5,000 customers in 80 countries worldwide.  

2.    Why should I choose Sage X3 over other Sage systems?

If any of the following characteristics apply to your business, Sage X3 may be the right solution for your organisation:

  • You operate across multiple offices, sites and/or countries
  • You have complex business processes
  • You need to manage multiple legislations, companies and perhaps even languages
  • You need to manage multiple currencies
  • You require ledger consolidations, eliminations and advanced reporting and analysis
  • You want to manage everything from a single system

 Check out the ‘Signs you have outgrown your current Sage solution’ article for more information.

3.    Is Sage X3 a cloud ERP?

Sage X3 offers flexible deployment options. It can be implemented on-premises or in the cloud, giving you flexibility and control over your IT strategy and business needs. 

4.    How much does Sage X3 cost?

Pricing depends on many different components, such as whether you are a manufacturer or a distributor or just want to manage your finance function, the number of users and what roles they have and whether you require any add-on modules, e.g. Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) or Document Management.

Sage X3 is highly configurable and flexible. Whether you deploy the system on-premises or in the cloud, payment is through subscription pricing.  

5.    Which industries does Sage X3 support?

The industries that Sage X3 is well-suited to include:

  • Manufacturing: Sage X3 provides manufacturing companies with tools to manage their production processes, inventory, and supply chain. It offers features such as bill of materials (BOM), work order management, quality control, and traceability.
  • Distribution/wholesale: Sage X3 helps distribution companies manage their inventory, orders, and logistics. It offers features such as warehouse management, order processing, shipping, and returns management.
  • Services: Sage X3 supports service-based businesses such as professional services firms, non-profits, and government agencies. It offers features such as project management, time and expense tracking, and financial management.
  • Other industries that Sage X3 supports include defence, food and beverage, chemicals, medical devices, pharmaceuticals, high tech, and telecoms.

6.    What features does Sage X3 provide?

In addition to core capabilities for manufacturing and distribution, Sage X3 provides a wide range of additional functionality including:

  • Financial Management

Sage X3 offers general ledger, accounts receivable, accounts payable, cash flow management, bank management and budgeting capabilities. The ERP natively supports multi-country, multi-currency, multi-legislation and multi-entity finances suiting organisations with any structure from a single entity to group-tiered multiple entities. 

  • Purchasing

Purchasing functionality in Sage X3 provides end-to-end procurement capability covering supplier and product category management, Request for Purchase (RFP), requisitions, purchase orders, approvals management, delivery, scheduling and dynamic pricing and discounts. 

  • Shop floor control

Production and shop floor control capabilities in Sage X3 allow for the collection of labour time, direct and indirect labour tracking and management, clock in/out and much more. 

  • Project management

Sage X3 allows for efficient project tracking and execution. The solution offers integrated project management features including work breakdown structures, project cost breakdown structures, budget tracking, multi-level time tracking and resource allocation. 

  • Quality control

Sage X3 is popular in industries where quality is key. And, it’s easy to see why. Sage X3 offers robust capabilities for batch management, serialisation, use-by-date management, inspection management, stock status support, expiry date management and bidirectional traceability management. 

  • Bill of materials (BOM) planning

BOM planning functionality in Sage X3 covers multi BOMs including production, sub-contracting, commercial and more. It also includes version number (major and minor) management, mass maintenance and more. 

  • Inventory management

Sage X3 is well-suited to product-centric organisations and allows for robust inventory management. Sage X3 caters for location and bin management, stock movements, import tracking, strong quality control, stock transfers and movements, plus Material Requirements Planning (MRP) and Master Production Scheduling

Check out the Sage Capabilities guide for more in-depth features and functionality.

7.    What are the benefits of Sage X3?

Below are some benefits that Sage X3 already provides to organisations across the globe.

  •  Streamlined operations

A consistent flow of information from sales and finance, through to purchasing, supply chain, inventory management and manufacturing allows you to streamline operations.

  • Powerful workflow

Sage X3 provides an advanced workflow engine, enabling you to define any business event and condition to initiate workflow messaging.

  • Boost collaboration

Sage X3 allows you to connect with remote employees, customers, suppliers, partners and remote locations, without the need for additional infrastructure, whilst providing the highest level of security to ensure your information remains safe.

  • Enhance business insight

Sage X3 has powerful easy-to-use business intelligence tools, driving smarter decisions in every area: finance, sales, purchasing, supply chain, inventory management and manufacturing.

  • Grow your business

The flexibility and configurability of Sage X3 speed up your entire business – from purchasing to manufacturing, distribution, sales, customer service and financial management.

  • Achieve ROI

With Sage X3, Return on Investment (ROI) can be achieved through savings in labour, inventory levels, purchasing, financial management, production improvement, improved productivity and reduction of errors.

Working with the right partner

The success of your Sage X3 system depends not only on the system that is right for your company but also on finding the right partner who understands your business.

At Inixion, we will work solely with Sage X3 and in partnership with you to ensure that we understand how you currently manage your business processes and which business-critical systems Sage X3 needs to integrate with. We then translate that into how Sage X3 can manage these processes; an ideal opportunity to look for new productivity gains and efficiencies.

We have zero failed Sage X3 implementations to date, so why not talk to us to discuss how we can help you achieve the many benefits that Sage X3 offers?

Get in touch today to talk about your requirements.