Production Planning

Backward Planning Based Upon Sales Orders

Work back from demand to determine the raw material required.

The production planner will determine the volumes of each product to be produced each day based on information from weekly sales orders and stock orders, converting the products to be produced backwards through a series of jobs to derive the required carcass or primal input.

• The planner will track progress of production against weekly production targets to adjust plans for subsequent days as required

Plan Balancing

Combine forward and backward planning into one balanced output.

By using a combination of forwards and backwards planning, the planner can create a balanced plan where a production output is defined for all raw material processed, whether that is finished product allocated to a sales order, finished product allocated to stock, or interim product allocated to work in progress stock.

Daily Work Orders and Instructions to Factory Systems

Turn the daily plan into instructions for the factory floor.

The key output from planning is a set of production work orders, which instructs factory production on what operationally must be carried out. The planning system will interface the planner work orders to the factory floor system.

Plan Scheduling

Drag and drop work orders onto production lines, based on real capacity.

Once the daily plan has been balanced it needs to be scheduled into production. The production planning system includes factory simulation, taking into account process and stock location capacities, enabling scheduling by dragging and dropping planned work orders onto the required production lines. Results are shown graphically and compared to line capacities, enabling planners to schedule the most efficient plan while accounting for target job completion times for same-day deliveries.

Comparison Plan to Actual

Track forecast against reality, and refine standards over time

The progress of actual production against the forecast plan can be analysed in real time when feedback is available from the factory floor system. Further analysis can be carried out on finished production over a period of time and job standards modified if necessary.

Relationship to Factory Floor System

Works with Emydex, or interfaces to any alternative factory floor system.

The Emydex production planning system is designed to work in conjunction with the Emydex production management system as the factory floor system. It has also been designed as a separate database to the factory floor system, making it possible to interface with any alternate factory floor system, provided both share the same master data files, ideally imported from a common ERP or financial system.