Solutions for production and logistics

SAP Business One provides many functions that allow for the effective implementation of the production process related to the logistics process.

SAP Business One supports process, discrete and project production. The functions are configured at the stage of implementation with the client and discussed in detail. Production implementations take place in the prototyping model. Prototyping is aimed at preparing a prototype which, after the customer’s tests, undergoes subsequent iterations until the final solution is prepared. This model enables the delivery of the solution expected by the client and means that there are no large discrepancies between the client’s expectations and the delivered solution.

Production preparation process

In order to effectively plan production, it is necessary to build a production technology / recipe. At this stage, the customer can use the standard SAP Business One production module or the extended version of BEAS manufacturing (described in the products section), which requires the preparation of the required data in several steps.

1. Preparation of material indexes – description of all parameters important for the procurement process.
2. Preparation of resource indexes – describing all parameters important for the planning process.
3. Preparation of a description of technological operations – describing the connection and relations between material indexes and resources.

SAP Business One allows you to prepare the data described above directly in the system or copy the customer’s possession from Excel files. A common practice in the case of designing new products is to download data from CAD (Computer Aided Design) and CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing) systems or PDM (Product Data Management) documentation management software.

Technology variants

A very important function that allows for flexible management of production technology is the Technology Variation Function, dedicated to enterprises whose production is characterized by high variability. It allows you to produce a large amount of a modified product without the need to create many indexes in the database that differ only in details such as color or additional equipment options.
The versions may differ from one another not only by changes in the bill of materials but also in the route. An important feature is keeping the main material index unchanged and the ability to copy it to the next version and introduce only the necessary modifications in line with the customer’s expectations.

The versions can be controlled at the BOM level, but also the routes at any number of levels in the product tree structure.

Option to view information about the variant:

• Active
• Inactive
• Released
• Blocked
• History of changes

The process of planning and scheduling production

When the technology / production recipe is already built, you can start the process of building a production plan. The first step is to create production orders, which are the basis for planning. This is a process intended to answer a few questions:

• For when is it possible to deliver finished products to meet the demand?
• What raw materials or components and in what quantities should be supplied?
• Are there possible delays and what could be the reason for them?
• How to change the order of execution of orders so that production works effectively?

Production planning process

It should ensure such a burden to efficiently use the available resources and raw materials. The planning process is based on the sources of demand generated by the sales department.

Two main sources:

• orders from customers,
• sales forecasts.

Important characteristics describing these sources are the dates when finished products should be produced and the quantities of the products. The sales forecast function is available in the SAP Business One standard.
The planning function allows you to control the deadlines of production orders and their priorities. By setting the priority, the orders of an important / key partner will always be planned first. Scheduling can be forward or backward, from the expected delivery date. Each of the methods allows you to get answers that can indicate what should be changed in the process in order to deliver ready-made products on time for as many orders as possible or to agree with the client possible shifts at an early stage.

Supply planning process

It consists in providing raw materials or components in appropriate quantities necessary for the production of finished products in an amount sufficient to meet the demand generated by the sales department. The procurement planning process in SAP Business One can be and most often is supported by the MRP or MRP2 function. The use of MRP allows you to significantly automate the process of calculating the demand for production, taking into account the main sources of demand listed in the first point.

The MRP function can take into account additional demand sources such as:

• framework agreements,
• sale offers

and the purchasing area:

• framework purchase agreements,
• placed purchase orders,
• warehouse stocks, taking into account the minimum, maximum and due stock levels – the number of logical and physical warehouses is unlimited in SAP Business One.

The result of MRP activity are the quantities of raw materials and components necessary to be ordered by the purchasing department in the form of purchase orders or immediately purchase orders. In the automatic scenario, orders can be sent by the system to the supplier without user intervention, however, most often the purchasing department verifies them personally and after approval, they are shipped to the suppliers.

Production scheduling process

The next step after the production planning process is detailed scheduling showing the loads on individual resources, groups of resources, and production cells. After the scheduling process is completed, it is possible to run MRP in order to calculate the supplies, taking into account the exact delivery dates of raw materials and components for direct production or to the work in progress warehouse.

In the scheduling process, technological operations are separated and assigned to predefined resources with raw materials or components related to use. The scheduling process is very important for operational production planning so that each resource is used to the maximum.

Production execution process

In the production process, data on operations, materials, manufactured products, quality data and waste are collected on an ongoing basis. Production reporting gives people responsible for production an insight into what is happening in the production hall at any time. Collecting production data allows you to react in advance to unfavorable changes and re-plan production for the new day, taking into account the actual state of affairs.

Production reporting is the basis for the planning and scheduling process. It takes place most often with the use of touch terminals available in the production hall with the use of any device. SAP Business One with the BEAS manufacturing extension has a browser application, which means that it can be run on any device. It is enough that a WI-FI network is available in the hall.

Job information: the possibility of working in the factory without traditional paper documents thanks to the possibility of viewing documentation on the terminal.

From the terminal level, you can report:

• Start and stop the production operation
• Number of good and defective pieces produced and waste
• Failures and downtime of resources
• Inter-operational or final quality control

The terminal also allows you to use additional functions:

• Calling up a demand for additional raw material for an order
• Moving the raw material from the raw material warehouse to the production warehouse
• Addition of a production operation by the operator
• Preview of production documentation – simple opening / reading of shared documents or photos.

Production settlement

Production costs are an important part of any business. Customers expect the ability to learn and track production costs online, i.e. after each operation or group of operations has been completed. Material expenditures should be posted on an ongoing basis to enable better planning of supplies and changes in the production process or technology affecting the cost optimization. An important function is the ability to compare the calculations before the start of the production order, during its implementation and after the order completion. In a short time, information about the deviations is collected and if they are generated repeatedly in selected production stages, you can consider optimization.

Each enterprise has its own model of calculating production costs. BEAS allows you to create your own pre and post cost calculation models taking into account:

• Raw materials and materials
• Technological operations
• Fixed costs and variable costs
• Faculty costs
• Management costs
• Margin on operations

The calculations can be additionally made real by using price lists or groups of discounts for customers, which will allow for realistic estimation of the planned production margins.

Processes supporting the production process

Quality control

To meet higher and higher quality standards resulting from new safety regulations and growing expectations of customers, SAP Business One from BEAS manufacturing provides the necessary tools to document the control process. The quality control functions enable the necessary quality tests to be carried out during the material flow, from the original purchase for production to the shipment of the goods. Different types of test orders can be assigned to external as well as internal work steps (operations).

Quality control can be qualitative or quantitative:

Qualitative – it comes down to describing the controlled raw material / semi-finished product / finished product with a set of descriptive features or technical parameters, taking into account the standards / tolerance ranges which may or may not be used for further processing or sale.

Quantitative – entering information in the form of a selected measurement unit, e.g. items with the possibility of conversion into alternative units.

The quality control process allows for:

• Management of quality control plans – the ability to create plans for selected key customers or products that determine the company’s income and the quality control process is critical.
• Quality control for orders, from receipt of goods, through production and delivery
• Expiry date monitoring
• Approval / blocking for checking, batch and serial blocking for parts
• Receiving and analyzing complaints about customers, suppliers, internal production

Quality control can be inter-operational, final, ad-hoc, i.e. triggered at any time and carried out on mobile devices such as: Tablet.

Maintenance

Ensuring control over the operation of machines and an appropriate production plan allows you to maintain the continuity of processes and increase efficiency. SAP Business One offers the possibility of planning the frequency of servicing activities, reducing the likelihood of unexpected failures of machines and their components. Tool changes, scheduled maintenance and retooling after a specified number of cycles or machine runtime reduce the risk of failure and better plan costs.

The maintenance functionality allows you to:

• Management of the resource base and tools
• Planning service activities in a manual or automated manner
• Planning the wear of tools and ordering them at the right time with the possibility of automatically generating a service order for tool replacement or its calibration.
• Recording failures and downtimes and informing responsible persons using various communication channels such as e-mail, information on the user’s screen or SMS.