Example Manufacturing Scenario

This is an overview of the main features of opentaps manufacturing. As is the case in all opentaps processes, the manufacturing process provides an end-to-end treatment of operations rather than an "application" that exists unto itself -- leaving the business owner with loose ends that consume time and additional resources to manage.

Preliminaries

As a complete process flow, manufacturing begins with definition of the finished goods (products) in the catalog. Then the definitions of all the purchased materials and services are defined in a parts and materials catalog. This provides the system with information about what items are required to make the finished product.

Suppliers of all the raw materials, component parts, and the services are specified along with each supplier's product or service identification data so that when orders are created they can be placed and filled effectively.

When production requires the use of machines, spaces, or other fixed assets these items are defined so that the system can capture the costs of using these assets in your production runs.

Product Manufacturing Documents

Documentation about how the finished product is actually processed (as it is manufactured) is captured in three types of information items used in the opentaps manufacturing:

• The bill of material (BOM) describes the components and materials used in each stage of the fabrication

or construction of the finished good. The BOM provides for capturing material costs as they are used up in production.

• The routing tasks describe how each step of the manufacturing operations is performed and provides

for capturing the cost of labor and time when executing each step.

• The routings are the documents which specify how the step by step (routing tasks) operations are combined in sequences resulting in a finished good. So, routings are the road-map or the orchestration for how the whole

production run is conducted.

Planning for Production

The next step after preliminaries and documentation are ready is the planning for needed production runs. Planning can be done manually of course, but the use of Material Resource Planning will really expedite the whole process.

Production of your products is necessary whenever the actual inventory level of the products is less than the planned inventory quantities, or when a sales forecast for your products clearly indicates that more production is required, or when actual sales orders will require additional production for fulfillment.

When there are recognized and approved requirements for additional production, then steps must be taken to order any needed raw materials or services, to receive and stock the materials or components inventory, to schedule the needed work force and machines, and to calender the planned production runs. Of course, the company team must be notified of production plans.

Material Resource Planning (MRP) provided in opentaps manufacturing process automates a great deal of this whole planning cycle every time you need to use it.

The completed cycle of this planning process results in receipt of the inventory needed for production runs that will satisfy the approved requirements for product manufacturing. The next step is to execute the production runs identified in the (MRP) plan.

Producing Products

Production Runs are created on the system with a full and detailed description of what is to be produced, in the needed quantity, and in the required time frame. Once the production run is created it can then be executed step by step, records of all costs and times can be captured, adjustments to the production run can be implemented in mid-flight when adjustments must be made, and then the product inventory can be recorded and moved into assigned storage spaces used by order fulfillment teams.

Manufacturing Accounting

Because the system keeps records of all manufacturing related business transactions, and costs along the way, when any step in the process is executed the accounting implications are recorded in real time, and thus the manufacturing accounting status is immediately available for review by any authorized persons with the data access privileges. This real time feature makes it possible for business people to keep current on valuable cost and expense information from every part of the process.

This completes our simple scenario explaining what we mean by the end-to-end manufacturing process. The outline that follows summarizes in a bullet format what we have just discussed. In the remaining sections of this chapter we will step through each part discussing how it is actually executed using the opentaps system and screens.

• Catalog Setup
  • Finished Goods (the manufactured product)
  • Parts and Raw Materials (purchased for production use)

• Suppliers Setup
  • Materials suppliers
  • Outsourcing Partners in manufacturing

• Fixed Asset Setup
  • Production equipment used in manufacturing

• Product Structure
  • Bill of Material
  • Routing Tasks
  • Production Routings

• Material Resource Planning
  • Ordering the Materials for production

• Receiving Inventory for production use

• Executing a Production Run
  • Planning the Production Run
  • Executing the Production Run
  • Recording results of the run
  • New finished goods inventory