Blending Design And Business Data In A Sensible Bill of Materials

Bill of Materials is the lifeblood of every manufacturing company and business. However, when it comes to the data, manufacturing companies are usually facing many challenges related to how this data should be organized, stored and managed 

For many years, CAD was an ultimate tool to store all information. This is usually a place where data is born (design) and naturally stored. However, as we move forward towards the definition of data elements, the question about the separation of data into manageable pieces is becoming more important. 

The first step in this process is to decide what data do you need. Typical set of data parameters such as Part Number, Description, Unit Price, Quantity, etc. comes easy. But there are many other pieces of data.

How BOM data supports production planning

A BOM supports production planning when the released product definition can flow into material planning and purchasing. In an illustrative example, Maya releases the BOM for a pump assembly and needs material for 20 builds. OpenBOM can create an Order BOM (also called a Planning BOM) from that released revision and aggregate the required quantities across subassemblies and other multi-level relationships.

The workflow stays tied to the product data: purchasing can use the Order BOM to prepare RFQs and purchase orders, while the release context identifies which revision the order supports.

1. Start with the released revision that applies to the build.
2. Set the required build quantity and review the aggregated component quantities.
3. Compare Quantity on Hand with the Quantity Gap, then prepare RFQs or purchase orders for the remaining need.
4. When material arrives, receive the purchase order and release the build to production so the recorded quantities reflect the action.

This connects engineering BOM data to material planning and purchasing. It is not a full MRP or production-scheduling system: capacity planning, work in progress, reservations, and detailed shop-floor sequencing remain outside this workflow and may require an ERP or another integrated system.

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Earlier this week, we organized a webinar where we discussed how to organize data, what data needs to managed and what are options to store it. 

Here is a video

Here is a slide deck 

The Bill of Materials is a complex set of data that must be organized and managed. It requires some planning. Don’t skip the planning, otherwise, you will find yourself in the middle of the data management crisis trying to decide what data attributes you need to manage in the Bill of Materials. Do you have a BOM topic you want us to talk about? Please send topics for new webinars to support at openbom dot com. 

Best, Oleg @ openbom dot com.

Let’s get to know each other better. If you live in the Greater Boston area, I invite you for a coffee together (coffee is on me). If not nearby, let’s have a virtual coffee session — I will figure out how to send you a real coffee.

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