SOLIDWORKS Bill of Materials: From Complex To Simple – Learn How OpenBOM Supports SOLIDWORKS BOM

Last week, I shared stories of how OpenBOM is helping SOLIDWORKS users to escape BOM spreadsheet madness. 

In case you missed it, you can find the blog post here. 

In a nutshell, the point is simple… As you go forward with a design, moving from early prototypes to production and also in the custom product development, there will be a need to create a BOM that will feed an entire team of production planners, procurement and other people with the information needed to plan manufacturing, purchase components, and communicate with contractors. 

Excel is a great tool for certain tasks but when it comes to more complex organization management it can fall short. Excel will bring you to a mess of multiple spreadsheets and emails. 

But no worries, because OpenBOM is here to rescue the day! I am going to share more details on how easy you can do it with OpenBOM. 

First… You can start using OpenBOM in Less than 5 minutes

OpenBOM intelligently processes SOLIDWORKS data that leaves you with a beautiful Bill of Materials with images, geometry, files and everything else you might need. 

Watch the video of how to get OpenBOM for SOLIDWORKS (first 5 minutes) – it will give you an idea of how it works. 

Read what our customer, FF Robotics said about the value of OpenBOM SOLIDWORKS integration. 

Here is the story of how FF Robotics Saves Time and Money by Optimizing BOMs with 16K individual Components using OpenBOM. 

“Getting our BOMs out of SOLIDWORKS in Excel was hard.  We would add some non-modeled items like hardware then have to manage all those additions individually each time we updated the Excel from SOLIDWORKS”. Using OpenBOM with SOLIDWORKS and PDMWorks is much much easier, he says.

This is the time to do some experimenting and discover the value that OpenBOM brings to the table. If you haven’t done so yet, now is the time to download and install OpenBOM Add-in for SOLIDWORKS and try it out with some of your data. 

How OpenBOM Supports SOLIDWORKS Features 

I know you love SOLIDWORKS and all the powerful features it has. All these SOLIDWORKS features make your work easy and allows you to design really fast. 

There are many examples of design techniques in SOLIDWORKS we’ve seen from our customers – configurations, weldments, envelopes, quantity replacement and many others. 

It is super important not to lose them when you start your Bill of Materials preparation. Having a way to extract information intelligently is a unique value that OpenBOM provides. 

OpenBOM recognizes all these settings and makes your BOM creation process really simple. 

Check how Gates Underwater Products Uses OpenBOM To Connect Design Engineers, Manufacturing and Supply Chain Teams Together.

My favorite part of Gate’s story is the sophisticated usage of variable mappings in SOLIDWORKS. Here is what John Ellerbrock, President of Gates Underwater Products says about collaboration with OpenBOM. 

Collaboration with the OpenBOM team for new features is a pleasure.  They are not only keenly knowledgeable of CAD platforms but open and receptive to useful new features that extract CAD information directly into OpenBOM.

Their latest improvement supports the Property/Quantity substitution feature in SOLIDWORKS, which allows us to communicate exactly how much of a particular item, in inches, is needed on the assembly floor. 

Watch the video –

Conclusion 

Complex work simplified, this is what I call OpenBOM SOLIDWORKS user experience. Instead of exporting BOM to Excel, adding images, files, sending it by email and repeating all these steps over and over again each time you need to apply chains, you can do it in a single OpenBOM click.

Moreover, unique collaboration and data management features (eg. calculations, rollups, purchasing planning) automate your work and streamline the process between your team members, contractors and suppliers. 

Check out what OpenBOM can do – REGISTER for FREE and start using OpenBOM for SOLIDWORKS today. 

Best, Oleg