Heads up: Generate Orders from Specific BOM Revisions in OpenBOM

Managing procurement directly from engineering data is one of the powerful capabilities of OpenBOM. By connecting BOMs, inventory, and purchasing, OpenBOM allows teams to generate purchase orders and manage ordering processes directly from product structures. This approach ensures that procurement activities are aligned with engineering data and reduces the risk of ordering incorrect parts or quantities.

Until now, OpenBOM allowed users to generate orders based on the latest snapshot of the BOM. For many workflows this works well, but as teams grow and processes become more structured, customers increasingly need more control over which version of the product definition is used for ordering.

Why BOM Revision Matters

In real-world engineering and manufacturing environments, BOMs evolve continuously. Engineers may be working on new changes while procurement teams must continue ordering components for the currently released product revision. Using the latest BOM snapshot is not always appropriate because it may contain:

• Work-in-progress changes
• Experimental components
• Updates not yet approved for production

This creates a gap between engineering activity and procurement execution.

Ordering from a Specific BOM Revision

To address this need, OpenBOM is introducing a new capability: generating orders directly from a specific BOM revision.

Instead of relying only on the latest BOM state, users can now select a particular revision and use it as the source for order creation. This ensures that procurement activities are tied to the exact product definition that was approved or released.

Key Benefits

The new functionality brings several important improvements to the ordering process:

• Better control over procurement sources — Orders are generated from a clearly defined BOM revision.
• Alignment with engineering release processes — Procurement can rely on released product definitions rather than work-in-progress changes.
• Improved traceability — Each order can be traced back to the exact BOM revision used for procurement.
• Cleaner separation of responsibilities — Engineering manages revisions, while procurement works from approved data.

Combined with “By View” access control and upcoming capabilities to restrict users to revision-only views, procurement teams will be able to operate strictly on released information, avoiding accidental ordering from drafts or in-progress changes.

Video Demo 

Here is a quick video demonstration how to use a new ordering mechanism from a revision. 

Conclusion

Adding control over the ordering source (BOM revision) strengthens the connection between product definition and procurement execution. By allowing orders to be generated from a specific revision, OpenBOM helps establish a structured process in which only released BOMs are used for ordering, improving accuracy, traceability, and coordination between engineering and procurement teams.

REGISTER FOR FREE to check how OpenBOM can help you. 

Best, Oleg