Acme Brick Case Study, a Berkshire Hathaway Company

Scott Morgan

The Manager of Enterprise IT Systems

Opus was also the clear choice on UPK conversion, in testing and security. In fact, some of the competitors we looked at to Opus do not have a UPK converting process, which was a major factor for Acme Brick

Key Results

3 WEEK

Implement Epilogus Opus under 3 weeks in 2023

90 DAYS

Using UPK for nearly 20 years

1000 UPK+

Converting thousands of Oracle UPK topics related to content

Acme Brick, a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary, was founded in 1891 and produces and distributes building materials for its construction customers in a variety of colors, shapes and sizes. It operates more than 20 brick manufacturing plants, and additionally manufactures all-brick wood burning fireplace systems. Acme Brick operates a family of companies, including American Tile Supply (residential, commercial and natural stone tiles), Featherlite (masonry materials), IBP Glass Block Grid System (glass blocks set in custom-made aluminum grids) and Texas Quarries (limestone).

In 2022, Scott Moran, the Manager of Enterprise IT Systems was tasked with replacing their eLearning solution Oracle UPK as it would become unsupported by Oracle at the end of the year and Acme needed materials to support their employee base using IT Applications such as JD Edwards. Acme had been using UPK for nearly 20 years and had nearly 500 UPK Topics to convert. Moran considered tools such as Ancile uPerform, Datango & Camtasia, but settled on Epilogue Opus and was assisted through the selection process by their internal UPK Team.

Moran focused on salvaging UPK content, and wanted all educational, end user support and change content for their JDE installation, evolving to have all employees become self-sufficient in ongoing creation and support in Finance, Human Resources and Supply Chain Management. Moran knew that one of the most important aspects was the ongoing, easy maintenance and consumption of that content for those JDE areas for all their business units.

Having used Oracle UPK extensively for 20 years, Acme Brick were able to implement Epilogue Opus in under 3 weeks in 2023 and are planning to have Business Units’ Subject Matter Experts creating content in Opus : as Acme Brick continue progressive change management and change communications. Looking forward with Opus there are no restrictions to any other IT Applicatio.

Acme Brick also looked at other solutions including Adobe Suite, Whatfix, TTS, Ancile uPerform, Datango and Epilogue Opus, and states “We took advise the UPK experts at Epilogue and tested all offerings thoroughly, and because Opus could salvage and convert our UPK content in bulk, and now is 100% web based with Opus stored in one location via AWS, as well as the ability to use the Opus Content Library as an LCMS, the decision was straightforward”. Moran continues “Opus allows us to have a lean content development process, using the SMEs to author the content, then my Team reviews, edits and publishes from one screen and all the Opus outputs are updated : the Opus Solution saved our UPK lives“ Moran continues “Opus was also the clear choice on UPK conversion, in testing and security. In fact, some of the competitors we looked at to Opus do not have a UPK converting process, which was a major factor for Acme Brick”.

Moran continues “The Acme Brick IT Team are focused on keeping all the system data and information safe, and our due diligence for the thousands of end users meant that the IT Team were involved at every step”.

Acme Brick likes the ease of editing in Opus, UPK conversion utility & language conversion functionality.Additional training benefits include Quizzes & Tests on competency of Health and Human Services employees, as well as Sandbox access via Opus Simulations.

The Acme Brick IT Team are focused on keeping all the system data and information safe, and our due diligence for the thousands of end users meant that the IT Team were involved at every step

The key to accellerating your digital adoption

Acme Brick had several Key Business Objectives including migration away from Oracle UPK and increased user adoption. These objectives were mirrored in Learning offerings:

Training covers all employees

Training material available

Reduce time to proficiency in employees

Content is there for new employees

Training uses IT Application system screens

No end user disruption in migration from UPK

Highlights at Acme Brick include

Opus is now the JDE end user support platform for all staff
Replaced all UPK in 2023 in under 1 day
Acme Brick have over 150 Documents created and increasing
Acme Brick have SME Users creating and maintaining
Opus will support multiple languages

ACME BRICK COMPANY

A Berkshire Hathaway Company

Scott Moran

Enterprise Architecture Manager

Opus was also the clear choice on UPK conversion, in testing and security. Only Opus had the UPK conversion capability we needed which was a major factor for Acme Brick

Key Results

3 WEEKS

Implemented Opus in under 3 weeks in 2023

20 YEARS

Used UPK for nearly 20 years

500+ UPK

Oracle UPK content files salvaged and converted

Highlights at Acme Brick include

Opus is now the JDE end user support platform for all staff
Replaced all UPK in 2023 in under 1 day
Acme Brick have created over 500 Documents and counting
Acme Brick have SME Users creating and maintaining Opus content
Opus supports all languages needed

Acme Brick, a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary, was founded in 1891 and produces and distributes building materials for its construction customers in a variety of colors, shapes and sizes. It operates more than 20 brick manufacturing plants, and additionally manufactures all-brick wood burning fireplace systems. Acme Brick operates a family of companies, including American Tile Supply, Featherlite, IBP Glass Block Grid System and Texas Quarries.

In 2022, Scott Moran, the Manager of Enterprise IT Systems was tasked with replacing the Oracle UPK user help solution as it would become unsupported by Oracle by the end of 2022 and Acme needed materials to support their employees using JD Edwards and other key applications. Acme had been using UPK for nearly 20 years and had 500+ UPK Help Topics created. Moran considered tools such as Whatfix, TTS, Ancile uPerform, Datango, Adobe Suite and Camtasia but selected Epilogue Opus. Throughout the process, he was assisted by their internal UPK Team.

Salvaging UPK content was a primary focus but Moran also wanted Acme to become self-sufficient in the creation of in-application help and guidance for their JDE users in Finance, Human Resources and Supply Chain Management as well as other critical applications in their environment. Moran knew that one of the most important aspects for their new Digital Adoption Platform was the ability for easy content creation and maintenance as well as in-application availability of that content so users could effortlessly access the help and guidance needed to perform their application tasks correctly and productively.

Having used Oracle UPK extensively for 20 years, Acme Brick were able to implement Epilogue Opus in under 3 weeks in 2023 and have Business Units’ Subject Matter Experts creating content in Opus. Acme intends to continue to pursue progressive change management and change communications and see Opus being a part of that as there are no restrictions on using Opus with their other critical applications.

In assessing the different Digital Adoption Platforms, Moran stated, “We took the advise of the UPK experts at Epilogue and tested all offerings thoroughly. Because Opus was the only tool that could easily convert our UPK content in bulk and transform that content into fully editable Opus content, Opus easily checked off that critical criteria. Also, Opus is 100% cloud with the power and security of AWS behind them.” Moran continued, “Opus is so easy to use, it allows us to have a lean content development process, using SMEs to quickly author the content, then my Team reviews, edits and publishes from one screen and all the Opus content and outputs are generated at one time, automatically.”

Moran finished by saying, “The Acme Brick IT Team were involved at every step. Their focus was on keeping all system data and information safe, and their due diligence indicated Opus met their standard. Opus was the clear choice for all our criteria.”

“Opus was the clear choice for all our criteria.”

The key to accelerating
your digital adoption

Acme Brick had several Key Business Objectives including the following highlights:

Available to
all users at their moment of need

Task guidance delivered in-app

Reduce time
to proficiency
in employees

Easy onboarding for new employees

Reflects actual deployed system and processes

No end user
disruption migrating from UPK

Acme Brick had several Key Business Objectives including migration away from Oracle UPK and increased user adoption. These objectives were mirrored in Learning offerings:

Training covers
all employees

Training material
available

Reduce time
to proficiency
in employees

Content is
there for new
employees

Training uses
IT Application
system screens

No end user
disruption in
migration from UPK

Acme Brick had several Key Business Objectives including migration away from Oracle UPK and increased user adoption. These objectives were mirrored in Learning offerings:

Training covers
all employees

Training material
available

Reduce time
to proficiency
in employees

Content is
there for new
employees

Training uses
IT Application
system screens

No end user
disruption in
migration from UPK

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Acme Brick Case Study, a Berkshire Hathaway Company