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FOCUS AREAS: VARIANT CONFIGURATION

Manufacturing companies must manage and leverage variable product data from inception through sale and maintenance. A particular challenge for companies is the large number of variations among products, which are detailed in customer orders and pass through the entire supply chain. To help these companies manage and leverage this data SAP provides a function (integrated variant configuration) that can describe product attributes and assign them to the product master. Configurable material master records are defined for each product group, raw material, and semi-finished product group, and each material master record is assigned to a variant class. A separate product master record can be created for each production level, further increasing transparency and simplifying management of intermediate orders for planning purposes. Different production steps are linked with one another through material lists, which provide information about starting materials and required quantities, and planned material waste at every step. To assist with material planning and variant procurement, information regarding customer orders is automatically forwarded to requirements planning. In addition, the system uses planned orders to help employees determine material requirements and schedule them uniformly for all production steps.

Dickinson + Associates has the business acumen, industry knowledge and technical expertise to help you get the full potential from your SAP investment.

HOW SAP SOFTWARE CAN HELP
SAP provides the integrated variant configuration function to describe product attributes and assign them to the product master.

Variant configuration in SAP can help in multiple ways:
• Increasing transparency

• Simplifying management of intermediate orders

• Forwarding customer order information to requirements planning

• Determining and scheduling material requirements for production steps from planned orders

• Linking production steps with one another through material lists, providing information about • • • • • starting materials, required quantities and planned material waste

Of course, initial development of dependencies and other supporting configuration data is necessary, but future data maintenance becomes quick and straight forward. Minimal user training is needed and the risk of incorrect maintenance is greatly reduced. Standardization should be used whenever possible to avoid unnecessary data maintenance. For complex environments, further master data maintenance tools can be developed to perform mass maintenance and reduce the number of necessary steps.

WHY DICKINSON + ASSOCIATES
To get the most value from variable configuration, you need understanding of the configurable materials, production data and programming skills. With our variant configuration experience, Dickinson + Associates can create a model that is robust yet easy to maintain. Our consultants deliver their expertise in creating and maintaining programming code so your engineers can focus on developing successful products. Take advantage of using the full potential of your SAP investment with Variant Configuration solutions from Dickinson + Associates.

REPRESENTATIVE COMPANIES OUR CONSULTANTS HAVE SERVED:
GE Osmonics

Phonak
Tennant Company