Getting Ready For Manufacturing Challenges in 2023

Fictiv’s State of Manufacturing Report 2022 brings a few very interesting sets of data points about trends & insights from a third-party survey of 230 senior manufacturing decision-makers. If you’re in the manufacturing business, I recommend you take a look.

Here are my top 3 picks from the report:

• Supply chain disruption is here to stay
• Outsourcing will continue to grow
• Companies are looking for operational efficiency in new product development

My absolute favorite thing about how to get engineers back to innovation and release them from the burden of dealing with supply chain, part procurement, and outsourcing communication.

Engineers today are spending significant time managing suppliers. 72% of leaders report engineers are spending 10% — or more — of their time on part procurement.

And the connection (or lack thereof) between engineering and supply chain teams is a related issue: almost 3/4 of those polled see room for improvement in the way engineering and supply chain teams collaborate.

And the following picture is actually spot on – how to bridge the gap between engineering and purchasing.

To me, it triggered the question about data management and communication efficiency.

Engineering to Procurement (In)efficiency

Working with thousands of companies at OpenBOM, we learned the root cause of all communication inefficiency from getting involved in data management and communication challenges. For most companies, engineering and procurement are two separate silos that are communicating very poorly. Regardless of how these silos are managed (spreadsheets, local databases, PDM, PLM, and ERP solutions), there is always a gap between how these two silos are connected. For most of the companies I see, it goes by the number of Excels and Emails with a lot of data re-entry and low visibility on both sides.

OpenBOM Integrated “Engineering to Purchasing” Process

The thing that positions OpenBOM outside of the typical tools is the ability to combine both engineering and procurement processes, multi-tenant data modeling, real-time collaboration, and streamlining data handover. Although, OpenBOM flexibility in data processing is the key.

OpenBOM efficiency starts from one-click BOM creation from any CAD system, real-time collaboration and simultaneous editing by a team creating a multi-disciplinary BOM, instant cost rollup and connection to item master data management, integrations with OTS catalogs, and seamless communication with custom parts manufacturing.

Learn more about OpenBOM tools, functions, and capabilities:

• One-click BOM for all CAD systems
• OpenBOM real-time collaboration
• Online catalog integrations (Eg. Octopart)
• Marketplace integration for custom parts (Eg. OpenBOM – ManuFuture)

How to Quickly Change Suppliers

In the turbulent supply chain and with high demand for outsourcing, changing suppliers is a big deal. OpenBOM can help you with this a lot by streamlining the process. We developed full guidance for companies on how to change the outsourcing contractors and turn it into a structured process of

• Understanding the needs
• Contacting suppliers
• Transferring product data

Organizing product data is one of the key elements. The way you manage your product data will impact the speed and efficiency with which you can change suppliers. If your product data is all over the place then the transition will take longer. However, if your product data is well organized then the time it takes to switch suppliers will be considerably shorter. 

Conclusion

To have a digital data foundation behind all the key activities – product data management, collaboration, communication, data sharing, and procurement planning is the key element of manufacturing strategy in 2023. Companies that will realize the importance of data management transformation, escape the Excel nightmare, and will organize a streamlined process of data handover and process integration will be winning in 2023.

OpenBOM is a modern digital tool that can help you to organize it. OpenBOM is subscription-based (SaaS) that takes care of everything you need (running software, upgrading, training, onboarding) to improve your efficiency and digitally transform the entire operation.

REGISTER FOR FREE and try OpenBOM for 14 days to learn how can we help.

Best, Oleg