A brief history and executive summary
After
more than 30 years in the corporate world designing electronic circuits and
later implementing Information systems, we selected entrepreneurship and
started a small information Technology business in Upland Ca in 1986. We started out assembling and
selling custom made IBM compatible computers to small businesses and
individuals. Since most people had no exposure to computers at the time we also
filled the demand for training. The
demand was high
for DOS and windows
and the few limited
applications that were available.
The demand was mostly on word processing and spread
sheet analysis.
There
were no accounting and production management software packages available for
PCs as they were for lager computers and mainframes to help us with the basic
sales and accounting needs. Thus we began with a home-grown manual accounting
and Production management system to satisfy out immediate basic needs of a
systems integrator and Retailer. In
summary:
1) We had to obtain and record the Customer
information.
2) Identify and translate customer needs
into a Sales order.
3) Determine what components are needed
for the order and find a supplier offering quality components at competitive
prices.
4)
Maintain inventory
for “just in time” delivery of needed components.
Prepare and receive Purchase orders and maintain Accounts Payable.
5)
Prepare work orders for each work station to build sub-assemblies needed to
complete the final assembly based on the BoM
6). Calculate the cost of the finished
product-based cost of the components labor and overhead.
7)
Assemble and compute the actual cost of the finished product.
8)
Update and Invoice the Customer order.
9)
Account for the cash received or maintain Accounts Receivable.
10)
Update and manually produce financial and Sales reports.
We
immediately began developing
programs (in visual basic) to automate each one
of the basic accounting functions first.
General Ledger, Journal, Invoicing and purchasing functions, Inventory
management and cash management. We
witnessed improvement in productivity after we automated the basic Accounting
functions and were motivated to continue with the plan to complete a complete
server based integrated Accounting with Production Management system that
included all the functions needed to make it a total solution for any
entrepreneur who users parts and labor to produce a finished product.
We developed
and integrated all the needed production management functions to the accounting
modules in a simplified manner but consistent with the structure used by larger
manufacturing entities. Inventory
management with “just in time” ordering, Bills of Material, Work
Orders, Work Station Routing cost, Payroll with Time and Attendance. We later
added Fixed Asset management with depreciation.
Upon
completion of all related functions we installed the package onto a home-grown
PC server and discontinued the old manual system. This new system improved our
productivity further served us well with Accounting, production and the
in-house sales functions. We
did however spend a lot of time taking sales orders a third party shopping cart
and from orders received via e-mails or Faxes and manually entering them to our
in house system.
By the end
of 2003 we added Payroll Time and Attendance and Fixed asset Management with
depreciation to the package. We
added a shopping cart package and using Microsoft’s .NET framework we
re-coded the package
in basic script and Java for web based use. We integrated it to our domain
Websba.com and thus enter orders and perform accounting functions from anywhere
at any time. This increased our
sales and productivity manifold.
Additionally, we offered the complete functionality of the package on a
subscription basis to other small business operators who in turn increased
their efficiency and effectiveness without the need to invest in acquiring and
maintaining hardware/software packages.
We have recently
reconfigured the package to install on any domain with a Microsoft Windows web
server connected to the web with a fast line. As it was mentioned earlier all sales
and Accounting functions and data are seamlessly integrated into one data base
that can be accessed securely from anywhere at any time using a web connected
PC including a smart phone and or an iPad. The Microsoft access data base can
be download for backup and off site safe keeping. We have also been uploading
the data base back on to the cloud when needed.
There are currently three
versions of the package available.: 1) The original websbaTM Accounting package that was
installed onto our own home-grown server for private in-house use. This package can be installed on any
private in-house traditional server and is named websba
Plus and need not have Internet access.
2) The updated Accounting with Production Management package that was originally installed
onto our domain, “websba.com “ can now be installed on any
webserver under any domain name. Both websba Plus and
websba.com can be configured to share data base on the installed server. 3) The
WebSBM includes multi-company on-line
shopping cart and a Fixed Asset management package with depreciation choices.