Manufacturers, fasten your tool belts. Epicor Kinetic 2025.1 isn’t just another incremental update—it’s a serious leap toward productivity, sustainability, and digital transformation. From tighter carbon tracking to smarter MRP planning, this release puts more control in your hands and fewer headaches in your operations. Here’s what you need to know, and (more importantly) how to prepare to get the most out of it.
What’s New & Why It Matters
Here are the key capabilities in Epicor Kinetic 2025.1 that will move the needle—especially if you’ve been wrestling with inefficiencies, compliance, or scale.
| Feature | What It Does | The Benefit / Why You’ll Care |
| Expanded Carbon & Sustainability Tracking | Full-blown carbon cost/cost-roll-up features in Purchase Orders, Jobs, Quotes, Receipts, and resource/method-of-manufacture assignments. | Helps you meet ESG/regulatory requirements, understand where emissions are creeping in, and make data-backed decisions to reduce waste or optimize sourcing. |
| Smarter Urgent MRP Planning | For rush jobs / emergencies, the system can suggest alternate supplier options, switch between “make vs buy,” or adjust sourcing method. Less manual override. | When supply chain hiccups hit, you pivot quicker, reduce delays, and keep production moving. |
| Inactive Tagging for Warehouses & Reason Codes | You can mark warehouses, reason codes, bins, etc., as inactive (once they have no inventory) so they aren’t selectable in future transactions. | Cleaner data; fewer errors from selecting the wrong location or code; more accurate transactions. |
| Min/Max / Safety Lead-Time Enhancements | Lead-times now take into account how parts are sourced (manufactured in-house, transferred, or purchased), giving more realistic buffer levels. | Inventory is less likely to overstock or starve; better cash flow and parts on hand when needed. |
| User Experience & Dashboard Upgrades | New tools in Application Studio (e.g. converting classic dashboards, adding gauge views), better data collection / search capabilities, improved UI elements. | Your teams spend less time hunting for info, more time acting on it. Less frustration. |
| Cloud Management Portal & Admin Self-Service | More cloud tasks can now be handled by your admins internally (security controls, config changes, routine cloud-admin work) without calling support. | Faster changes, less dependency, better security posture. |
| Expanded Integrations & Regulatory / Local Compliance | Tighter integration across sales quoting, order fulfillment, field service; tax / e-invoicing / country-specific functionality improvements. | If you operate in multiple regions, you avoid nasty surprises with local tax laws; integration helps reduce duplication of effort. |
How to Prepare for an Upgrade: Making Epicor Kinetic 2025.1 Work for You
Upgrading to 2025.1 is more than just clicking “Install.” To avoid embarrassing chaos (yes, spreadsheets exploding count as chaos), here are best practices and prep steps.
Audit Your Existing Data Quality
Identify warehouses, bins, reason codes, or part properties that are obsolete, unused, or inconsistent. Now is the time to clean up so “inactive tagging” works correctly.
Ensure your suppliers, purchase orders, job setups have clean and valid data to avoid migration or sync issues.
Map Carbon & Resource Data
Define how your company will assign carbon values or cost burdens: What resources / processes will have a carbon cost? Do you have supplier carbon data or emission factors?
Decide which processes will need new entries (e.g. quotes, purchase orders, jobs) to use these carbon values. Training will be needed so staff understand why purchasing decisions might change based on carbon cost.
Review & Adjust Safety Stock / Lead-Time Policies
Since 2025.1 now factors sourcing method into lead times, consider if your minimum, maximum, safety stock settings are still valid. Run simulations (if possible) to see how urgent planning changes might affect stockouts or inventory holding.
Establish escalation procedures for urgent MRP situations (i.e., who approves alternate supplier, what qualifies as “urgent”).
Plan for Change Management
Train key users: purchasing, inventory control, engineering, operations, and finance on new features (especially those with sustainability / carbon cost implications).
Update workflows / SOPs to incorporate new inactive tagging, dashboards, self-service cloud tasks, etc.
Communicate upstream: sales reps, suppliers, leadership should understand what data they’ll need to supply (carbon data, part sourcing info, etc.).
Test in Pilot / Sandbox Environment First
Before rolling out to all sites, test with a subset of users / products. Try creating POs with carbon costing, emergency MRP scenarios, marking warehouses inactive, etc.
Validate dashboards, reports, and customizations still work (especially legacy dashboards that might get converted).
Ensure Regulatory & Compliance Readiness
If you operate across regions, double-check country-specific regulations (e-invoicing, tax, environmental disclosures). Use the new compliance features in 2025.1 where available.
If sustainability disclosures are required in your supply chain (or by customers), ensure your carbon tracking aligns with the required metrics / standards (e.g. GHG Protocol, Scope 2 or 3), as far as applicable.
Optimize Your Integrations
Review existing integrations (MES, PLM, Field Service, Order Fulfillment) to see how they’ll interact with new Kinetic features.
Any custom applications or scripts that assume old behaviors (for example, selecting inactive warehouses / coding) may need revision.
Strategic Advantages: Why This Upgrade Pays Off
If you do this right, Epicor Kinetic 2025.1 doesn’t just patch up your process—it positions your company ahead of the competition. Here are the kinds of gains you can realistically expect:
- Reduced Costs: Less inventory waste, fewer emergency orders, cleaner purchase operations. Savings in materials, storage, and compliance penalties.
- Improved Throughput & Shorter Lead Times: Faster decision-making (urgent MRP, alternate sourcing), more realistic safety stock reduce production delays.
- Stronger Sustainability Credentials: Carbon tracking built in means you can credibly measure, report, and improve emissions. This helps with regulatory compliance, ESG reporting, and possibly market differentiation.
- Enhanced Visibility & Decision Intelligence: Real-time dashboards, better analytics, Prism-assisted alerts—all help you catch issues early and act instead of react.
- Future-Proofed Operations: As customer demands, regulation, and supply chain pressures increase, you’ll be better equipped to adapt. The cloud portal, integrations, self-service, compliance enhancements make scaling smoother.
Why Data V Tech is the Partner You’ll Want for 2025.1
At Data V Tech, upgrading ERP isn’t just technical lift—it’s about aligning technology, processes, and people. Here’s how we help manufacturers make the most of Epicor Kinetic 2025.1:
- Deep knowledge of both Epicor and your industry (automotive components, electronics, metal etc.), allowing us to tailor carbon costing, inventory policies, and urgent planning workflows to your realities.
- Rigorous data cleanup and migration services so inactive tagging, safety stock, and other features land cleanly without disrupting operations.
- Change management, training, and documentation support: making sure all teams (finance, purchasing, operations) understand both “what’s new” and “how it changes what we do.”
- Integration experts who ensure your existing MES, field service or fulfillment systems work without surprises after upgrade.
- Ongoing support: once upgraded, we help monitor performance, tweak dashboards, and keep things running with new release patches or feature updates.
More Than a Release — A Movement
Epicor Kinetic 2025.1 shows a clear trajectory: manufacturing isn’t only about output—it’s about how efficiently, sustainably, and intelligently you operate. If you execute the preparation well, this upgrade isn’t just a version bump—it’s a transformation. Lower emissions, better agility, fewer surprises.
If you’re ready to explore what this looks like for your shop floor, your product lines, or your multi-site operations, Data V Tech is ready. Let’s map out your path to 2025.1 success.
