For job shops running Global Shop Solutions
Global Shop runs a lot of American job shops, and most of them are answering questions with Crystal reports and exports. We build the layer that turns your shop data into something people can see and ask questions of.
We do not replace Global Shop. We build on it, and everything runs in your accounts.
The gap
Job shops running Global Shop tell us the same three things.
Custom reporting means Crystal, and Crystal means a specialist. So the questions that get answered are the ones somebody already built a report for, and everything else becomes an export.
New questions wait on an outside resource
Estimating runs off a spreadsheet somebody built. Scheduling is a whiteboard or another file. Global Shop has the jobs, but the decisions get made somewhere else and keyed back in.
The real numbers live on one person's PC
A GAB script solved a problem years ago and the current team is not sure what else calls it. Custom reports answer each department's question and disagree on the definitions. An outside database got wired in by somebody who has since left.
The customization layer became its own system
What we do
Six things, in whatever order helps you most. Most shops start with two.
MCP is the standard that lets AI assistants talk to real systems. We build one against your Global Shop data so Claude, ChatGPT, or Copilot answer from live job and inventory records.
In practice
Someone asks "which open jobs are past due, and which of them are already over estimated hours." The assistant reads Global Shop through the MCP server and answers with real records. Read only by default, and scoped to what that person is allowed to see.
Shop floor tablets, scanning, quoting tools, and customer portals. Purpose built for one job and connected through the Web API or GAB.
In practice
An estimator builds a quote in a tool that already knows your routings, your material costs, and what similar jobs actually ran at. The accepted quote lands in Global Shop instead of being retyped.
A chatbot grounded in Global Shop data plus your own documents. Travelers, prints, work instructions, customer history. It answers from your reality.
In practice
A customer calls about an order. Whoever picks up asks the assistant and gets status, what shipped last time, and what it ran at, without opening four screens.
Jobs, throughput, on-time delivery, and margin on a wall screen and a phone, refreshing on their own. No Crystal designer required to see a number.
In practice
One dashboard everyone shares, built off the same data your Crystal reports use. The morning meeting starts with numbers nobody argues about.
Global Shop connected to CRM, shipping, EDI, and accounting. Data entered once, showing up everywhere it should.
In practice
Global Shop exchanges data through flat files, XML, direct database, FTP, REST, and Web API. We pick whichever your other systems can actually speak, and build the bridge once.
Every place someone copies a number between Global Shop and something else, we automate it. Quotes, POs, travelers, invoices.
In practice
Customer POs that arrive as PDFs get read, matched to the right part and price, and turned into orders. Exceptions go to a person. The rest stop being anyone's morning.
A documented map of the GAB scripts, custom reports, external interfaces and database dependencies you actually have, produced before anyone expands or replaces them.
In practice
We list what each GAB script and Crystal report feeds, who consumes it, and which outside database it reaches, then say what should stay close to the ERP and what belongs outside it. The map is yours regardless of what gets built next.
Not sure which of these matters most for your company? That is what the first call is for.
Under the hood
Global Shop is genuinely open about integration. We use the route that fits your install.
2 to 4 weeks
from first call to something live in your shop
0
Crystal designer installs needed to see a dashboard
0
writes that go behind the application's back
Questions
No. Global Shop stays your system of record. We build the layer on top: dashboards, custom apps, AI, and the connections to everything else you run. Most ERP replacement projects overrun and a majority miss their goals. This is deliberately not that.
Global Shop supports flat files, XML, direct database access, FTP, REST, and its Web API, and Global Application Builder sits inside the system for customization and data movement. We look at your version and setup on the first call and use whichever of those fits.
For day to day reporting, usually yes. A dashboard that opens in a browser does not need Crystal Designer installed on the right machine or a specialist to change a column. Keep Crystal for the printed forms and documents it is genuinely good at.
MCP is the open standard for letting an AI assistant use a real system safely. An MCP server for Global Shop means your team asks questions in plain English and gets answers from live job data, with every request scoped and logged. It is the difference between an AI that guesses about your shop and one that reads your actual job list.
Yes, and that is most of who we work with. We handle the build, the deployment, and the documentation. What we need is a few hours with the people who actually run the shop, and someone who can approve access.
No. GAB is strong when the requirement belongs close to the ERP workflow. A cross-system service, or a user experience that should not live inside an ERP screen at all, usually fits better outside it. Building everything in GAB is how the customization layer turns into a second system nobody owns.
Often, yes. Global Shop publishes customer examples where GAB connected an existing outside database into shop-floor access. We still review support, security and upgrade impact before choosing the architecture, because "it can be done" and "it should be done this way" are different questions.
Two to four weeks for the first working piece. We work from your live data rather than months of interviews.
Let's talk
Thirty minutes. You show us how Global Shop is set up and where the spreadsheets took over. We tell you straight what we would build first, and what it would take.
Read next
Other systems we build on
JobBOSS²
Job and schedule dashboards, quote-versus-actual analysis and API integrations for machine shops and make-to-order manufacturers on JobBOSS² or legacy E2.
Sage X3
Multi-site reporting, batch and lot traceability views, and integration modernization around Sage X3 for discrete and process manufacturers.
Made2Manage
MCP servers, custom apps, AI chatbots, and live dashboards built on Made2Manage through its Web API, SQL Server, and SSRS.
abas ERP
MCP servers, custom apps, AI chatbots, and live dashboards built on top of abas ERP. We keep abas as your system of record.
All ERP work