Manufacturers’ margins are under sustained pressure
Manufacturers continue to operate in a period of sustained volatility. Margins are increasingly tightening under rising input costs, tighter compliance requirements, unpredictable demand patterns, and ongoing geopolitical shifts.
These global shifts are amplifying pressure across manufacturing operations. McKinsey¹ highlights how changes in tariffs, industrial policy, and global supply networks are reshaping production footprints and restructuring global supply positions for US manufacturing businesses. These shifts are prompting firms to reassess supplier concentration, evaluate alternative operating footprints, and navigate new trade exposures that directly influence landed costs and operational resilience.
Trade-related pressures continue to build. Deloitte’s Manufacturing Outlook² reports that 78 percent of manufacturers rank trade uncertainty as their top concern, with expectations of increased exposure to tariff shifts and cross-border cost volatility in the year ahead. These forces are prompting firms to rethink sourcing strategies and strengthen cost-modeling to manage volatility more effectively.
Cost pressures are intensifying across the value chain. According to a recent PwC survey³, nearly nine out of ten operations leaders expect supplier and material costs to increase significantly in the coming years. Collectively, these forces create a complex operating environment where manufacturers face mounting financial strain, heightened planning uncertainty, and growing exposure across every stage of their value chain.
Traditional ERPs Can’t Keep Up
Traditional ERPs were built for predictable, linear operations and no longer fit today’s volatile manufacturing environment. As disruptions become continuous, these systems struggle to keep pace with the level of adaptability and operational clarity manufacturers now require.
McKinsey’s recent supply chain analysis⁴ highlights this structural challenge: only 10% of organizations have fully deployed advanced planning systems, with data fragmentation cited as the primary barrier to accurate forecasting and effective scenario modeling. These findings reflect a broader issue—manufacturers cannot operate at speed when the data foundations of their ERP environments are incomplete or inconsistent.
Microsoft’s Future of ERP⁵ research reinforces this reality, reporting that 93% of leaders say fragmented data limits operational efficiency and 91% believe modern architectures improve decision agility. When core information is scattered across systems, every decision—costing, procurement, production, or demand planning—starts from a position of uncertainty.
This fragmentation appears across the value chain. Teams face conflicting numbers and repeated manual reconciliation, slowing planning cycles and reducing financial clarity. Reporting lags leave leaders reacting to outdated information, making it harder to respond to demand or supply shifts in time. Rigid architectures further restrict how quickly organizations can model sourcing alternatives, adjust lead-time assumptions, or evaluate cost impacts.
Together, these constraints create systemic blind spots at the exact moment manufacturers need faster insight, tighter coordination, and more adaptive intelligence to protect margins.
The Five Building Blocks of Modern Manufacturing Efficiency
Today’s volatility demands more than incremental upgrades. Manufacturers are rebuilding their operating models around unified data, coordinated execution, and intelligence that adapts in real time. The following five capabilities define that foundation and position businesses to strengthen performance under uncertainty:
1. Unified Data Foundation
Centralized, consistent data that brings together financial, operational, and supply chain information into one reliable source of truth.
2. Connected People, Processes & Systems
End-to-end process integration that removes handoffs, reduces reconciliation cycles, and ensures decisions across planning, procurement, production, and finance are coordinated rather than siloed.
3. Real-time Decision Intelligence
Continuous insight into cost, demand, inventory, and capacity shifts, enabling earlier detection of exceptions and faster evaluation of operational scenarios.
4. Scalable Operations
Flexible, cloud-ready architectures that support changes in sourcing strategy, multi-site expansion, tariff exposure, or demand variability without operational disruption.
5. AI-driven Planning & Execution
Predictive and prescriptive models that sharpen forecasts, recommend optimal responses, and automate routine planning tasks to improve precision across the value chain.
Together, these capabilities represent the core operating disciplines manufacturers need to navigate volatility with greater clarity, agility, and confidence.
The Intelligent Operational Engine Manufacturers Need
Manufacturers are accelerating their shift toward modern systems that unify operations, strengthen landed-cost visibility, and deliver real-time decision intelligence. Industry data⁶ shows that 70 percent of ERP deployments in 2024 were cloud-based, signaling a decisive shift toward platforms designed for continuous change, deeper integration, and accelerated decision-making. Meeting this need requires more than traditional system upgrades; it demands an operational core that connects finance, production, procurement, and inventory, reinforced by an intelligence layer that enables timely and confident action.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central delivers that foundation. As a modern cloud ERP, it consolidates financial and operational activity into a single, coherent system, eliminating the fragmentation and manual workarounds that slow response and weaken visibility.
Microsoft Power BI extends this foundation with a decision-intelligence layer that sharpens interpretation, highlights emerging performance shifts, and accelerates coordinated action. Together, the two platforms move organizations beyond disconnected tooling toward an operating environment where decisions are informed, connected, and consistently grounded in reliable, realtime data.
With both systems working in tandem, operational, financial, and supply chain activity converges into a unified source of insight. Leaders can detect cost movements earlier, assess operational implications with greater precision, and intervene before disruptions escalate. Shared, current information strengthens alignment across planning, procurement, production, and finance— establishing a more synchronized, transparent operating rhythm.
This combined engine also provides the structural flexibility manufacturers need in a volatile environment. Scenario modeling and predictive forecasts become more dependable because the data that powers them is consistent and integrated. As organizations expand footprints, rebalance sourcing, or introduce new product lines, the platform scales without increasing complexity— improving decision speed, strengthening governance, and reinforcing long-term operational resilience.
What This Means for You
With Business Central and Power BI working together, manufacturers gain a financial and operational lens that is both sharper and faster. Leaders can monitor landed costs, production variances, and working-capital movements in real time, replacing stitched-together spreadsheets with a single, reliable source of truth. This gives leaders one timely, reliable view of performance, improving the precision of planning and margin decisions.
This combined solution also strengthens control across day-to-day execution. Teams gain clearer visibility into material usage, stock deviations, and supplier performance, helping them identify risks earlier and respond before they cascade into production delays or cost overruns. As signals become more consistent and timelier, functions coordinate more effectively, reducing friction across the entire value chain.
As manufacturers scale, they benefit from an architecture designed to grow without adding complexity. New sites, product lines, and sourcing models can be integrated into the same operational backbone, supported by enterprisegrade security and governance. With cleaner, connected data, organizations are better positioned to adopt AI-driven forecasting, scenario evaluation, and continuous optimization—capabilities that help protect margins in an increasingly volatile environment.
Protect Margins with Weidenhammer
Weidenhammer helps manufacturers navigate volatility with modern, Microsoft-driven operations. The team brings deep manufacturing expertise and a proven approach to implementing Business Central and Power BI in ways that reduce complexity, strengthen visibility, and drive measurable operational gains. Engagements focus on simplifying processes, aligning data, and building decision intelligence that supports confident margin management.
Why manufacturers choose us
Deep manufacturing expertise
Proven success solving complex industry challenges with Microsoft solutions.
KPI-driven outcomes
Measurable improvements across accuracy, efficiency, and operational performance.
Right-sized outcome
Tailored deployments that scale with your needs and leverage the full Microsoft ecosystem.
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