Tally to custom ERP: how Kanpur factories move

By Sahil Chauhan · Founder & CEO, Verelios Labs · Published 7 September 2026

Let us start where most articles on this topic do not: Tally is good software, and most Kanpur units should stay on it. It handles accounting and GST properly, your CA knows it cold, and there is a consultant on every second street who can fix it. Replacing it because someone said the word “ERP” at a trade fair is how businesses waste six months.

But there is a specific point at which Tally plus Excel stops being a system and starts being a set of disconnected files. This post is about recognising that point, and what to do when you reach it.

The signs you have outgrown it

Not one of these on its own. Three or more, consistently:

• Month-end takes a week. Somebody merges files, matches numbers by hand, and finds a discrepancy every single month.
• Stock on the system does not match stock on the floor. And everyone has quietly accepted a tolerance.
• Production lives outside the system entirely. Work orders on paper, wastage in a register, job-work in someone's head.
• Separate company files per unit. The owner sees a consolidated picture only after a manual merge, days late.
• One person is the system. If they take leave, month-end waits. This is the most dangerous one on the list.
• You cannot answer a customer's question without calling the godown.

If you recognise fewer than three, fix the process rather than buying software. Software does not repair a process that nobody follows — it enforces it, faster, and that is a different thing.

What replaces what

A common misconception is that ERP means throwing Tally out. Usually it does not. Most of our Kanpur builds keep Tally as the accounting ledger and take everything around it:

Keeping Tally is deliberate. Your CA's workflow does not change, filings carry on as before, and you remove one enormous objection from the people who have to approve the project.

How the migration actually runs

Ten to fourteen weeks for a full system, and the sequence matters more than the speed.

• Week 1 — process capture, no code. Someone sits on your shop floor and writes down what actually happens, including the rules nobody has ever written down. This is the week that decides whether the project works.
• Weeks 1–2 — blueprint and fixed quote. Every screen, rule and integration on one page with a price. You approve before anyone builds.
• Weeks 2–10 — build, in modules. Inventory first, because it is the foundation everything else reads from. Then purchase, production, sales. A staging system your team can open every day.
• Weeks 8–12 — data migration. Item masters, then parties, then opening stock, then balances. In that order, every time.
• Weeks 10–14 — parallel running. Both systems, side by side, for a full cycle. You switch only when the closing figures match to the rupee.
• Rollout and training. On-site, in Hindi, with the people who will actually use it.

Do not skip the parallel run. It is the step clients most often want to compress, and the one that separates a smooth switch from a bad quarter.

What goes wrong, honestly

• The rules were never written down. Every unit has undocumented logic — a rate that changes by season, a wastage allowance that varies by operator. If discovery is rushed, these surface during parallel running as “the software is wrong”.
• Dirty master data. Duplicate parties, one item under three spellings, stock on paper that is not on the shelf. Every migration finds this. Budget time for the cleanup.
• The floor was not consulted. A system designed with only the owner and the accountant in the room gets quietly bypassed by the people who have to use it.
• Scope creeping mid-build. Every “while you are at it” costs a week. Write version two down and build it later.
• Going live at year-end. Never switch in March. Pick a quiet month.

What it costs

A focused module set — inventory plus purchase, say — starts at ₹99,999. A full ERP covering inventory, manufacturing, purchase, sales and accounting typically runs ₹2,50,000 to ₹10,00,000+, depending on how many modules and integrations it carries.

Fixed quote before any code, milestone payments of 30/30/40, hosting cost shown up front, and the source code in a repository under your own organisation. For a full comparison of subscription versus build, including the break-even maths, see our guide to ERP software cost in India.

Start smaller than you think

The best outcomes we have seen in Kanpur did not start with a full ERP. They started with the one module where the pain was sharpest — usually billing and inventory — proved it worked for a quarter, and grew from there. Modules added onto something already running are cheaper and far less risky than a big-bang replacement.

If the pain is really enquiries going cold rather than stock going missing, the first module is a CRM instead.

Not sure whether you have outgrown Tally? Tell us what happens at your month-end. If the honest answer is that Tally is fine, we will say so — we have talked units out of ERP projects before. Ask here, or come to the office in Govind Nagar.

More on custom ERP in Kanpur, or see our roundup of ERP software companies in Kanpur.