A Conceptual Model of ERP for Small and Medium-Size Companies Based on UML

Over the last decade, numerous companies have tried to adopt a commercial ERP package in the world-wide e-business and ecommerce environment. However, most of commercial ERP packages are designed for a large-scaled company so that it is difficult to adopt a commercial ERP package in terms of small and medium-size companies. Therefore, it is necessary for a small and medium-size company to seek for an approach for the ERP solutions. In this paper, authors describe a conceptual ERP model for small and medium-size companies by using "4+1" views of Unified Modeling Language. The conceptual ERP model consists of five subsystems: Manufacturing, Sales, HumanResource and Payroll, Trading, and Accounting. The conceptual ERP model is an architectural approach to enterprise systems. By using the model, small and medium-size companies, especially manufacturing companies, can afford to achieve global business process and to acquire ERP systems efficiently.