ZOHO + MANUFACTURING · PREMIUM INTEGRATION
Zoho manufacturing software:
the production layer your stack is missing
ALIX is a manufacturing software (MRP) natively integrated with Zoho Books, Zoho CRM, and Zoho Analytics.
Replace Zoho Projects and Zoho Inventory with a real production system designed for manufacturers. From the shop floor to the balance sheet.
Why Zoho alone doesn't work for manufacturing
Zoho is a powerful business suite, but it wasn't built for the specific needs of manufacturers. Running a factory with Zoho Projects for production tasks and Zoho Inventory for stock management leaves critical gaps: no material availability checks before starting a job, no real product costing, no production capacity planning, and no tool designed for the shop floor itself.
❌ No way to check materials before starting a job
❌ No real product costing — just estimates
❌ No capacity or production planning
❌ Nothing for the shop floor itself
❌ No cross-business reporting between operations and finance
How ALIX completes your Zoho stack for manufacturing
ALIX handles the operations layer Zoho doesn't cover: production management, inventory, shop floor control, lot traceability, quality management, and preventive maintenance. Zoho keeps doing what it does best: sales (CRM), finance (Books), and business intelligence (Analytics). Together, they form a complete manufacturing ERP alternative with one source of truth across every department.
INTELLIGENCE LAYER
Cross-business dashboards · Data warehouse
Zoho Analytics consolidates data from ALIX, Books, and CRM into a unified data warehouse.
Cross-business dashboards answer any management question in real time.
Note that Zoho Analytics can also connect with lots of other datasources and become your enterprise data warehouse.
Sales & prospecting
Zoho CRM runs sales and prospecting. Standard for B2B manufacturers with a sales team. B2C manufacturers often connect transactional websites directly to ALIX instead.
Operations, production, inventory, shop floor
ALIX is the manufacturing core. Production management, inventory, shop floor control, traceability, quality, and maintenance. It replaces Zoho Projects and Zoho Inventory with a system designed for manufacturers from day one.
Finance & accounting
Zoho Books handles accounting and invoicing. It receives information from ALIX for accurate invoicing based on actual sales orders or costs, not estimates.
Marketing
Automation
Electronic
Signature
Smart
Forms
Human Resources
Expense Reports
Recurring Billing
ALIX replaces Zoho Projects and Zoho Inventory. Everything connects with Zoho Analytics.
ZOHO ANALYTICS SPOTLIGHT
Cross-business dashboards Zoho alone can't give you
With ALIX, Zoho Books, Zoho CRM and tons of other apps all flowing into Zoho Analytics, you get cross-business intelligence that no single app provides.
Cross-business questions you couldn't answer before:
Customers & Sales
- Which customers have the highest on-time delivery rate?
- Who are my top 10 customers by profit contribution, not just revenue?
- What’s the average order value by sales rep, by region, by product line
- Which deals closed in CRM but are stuck on the shop floor?
Production & Operations
- Which products take longer to produce than estimated, and why
- What’s my actual capacity utilization by machine, by shift, by week?
- Which operations bottleneck my production most often?
- How much of my production time is scrap, rework, or downtime?
- What’s my first-pass yield by product family? CRM but are stuck on the shop floor?
Costs & Margins
- Which products are losing money when I factor in real labor and overhead?
- How did my gross margin evolve by product family over the last 12 months
- What’s the true cost variance between quoted and actual on my projects?
- How do my production costs compare against my quoted prices, by customer?
Quality & Risk
- Which suppliers cause the most quality issues downstream?
- What percentage of my orders required a rework, by month?
- Which products have the highest warranty or return rate?
Why ALIX + Zoho beats Zoho alone
End-to-end visibility
From the moment a lead enters your CRM to the moment an invoice is paid, one connected flow, in real time.
Real product costing
Labor, equipment, materials, overhead captured on the floor are all captured in ALIX and get real-time profitability before invoicing even get pushed to Zoho Books.
Data-driven decisions
Zoho Analytics turns your sales, ops and financial data into dashboards answering any question.
Frequently asked questions about ALIX and Zoho
Can I use Zoho alone to run a manufacturing business?
Zoho is an excellent business suite, but it wasn't designed for manufacturing operations. Zoho Projects and Zoho Inventory lack critical features like BOM-driven planning, shop floor control, lot traceability, and real product costing. ALIX fills that gap and integrates natively with the rest of your Zoho stack.
What does ALIX replace in my Zoho stack?
ALIX replaces Zoho Projects and Zoho Inventory for manufacturers. It becomes the operations core, while Zoho Books handles finance, Zoho CRM handles sales, and Zoho Analytics handles business intelligence.
Does ALIX also integrate with Zoho Forms and Zoho Flow?
Yes. ALIX integrates with Zoho Forms to capture quality inspections and custom workflows, and with Zoho Flow to connect ALIX to thousands of other apps without code (Slack, Google Sheets, Asana, and more).
How do ALIX and Zoho Books work together?
Real production costs. Labor, worksrtations, materials, overhead are followed in real-time in ALIX. This enables accurate invoicing based on sales orders or actual costs and true margin reporting by product or order.
How do ALIX and Zoho CRM work together?
Deals in Zoho CRM become Sales Orders from which Manufacturing Orders are generated in ALIX in seconds. Customers and items stay synced between the two systems, so your floor starts building the moment a deal closes.
What can I do with Zoho Analytics and ALIX?
Zoho Analytics consolidates data from ALIX, Books, and CRM into a unified data warehouse. Build cross-business dashboards answering questions like real margin by product family, shop floor productivity, on-time delivery rate, and order-to-cash cycle time.