Process manufacturing refers to the processing and combination of raw materials and ingredients to create finished products like food, beverages, plastics and more. These manufacturers typically use manufacturing software that aligns with process manufacturing operations. Process manufacturing software automates workflows to meet clients’ needs sooner.
Compare Top Manufacturing ERP Software Leaders
This article will discuss top benefits, key features and the best ERP manufacturing process flow solutions.
Table of Contents:
- What Is Process Manufacturing Software?
- Discrete vs. Process Manufacturing
- Primary Benefits
- Key Features
- Best Process Manufacturing ERP
- Final Thoughts
What Is Process Manufacturing Software?
Process manufacturing software is a system that manages raw materials and produces products with sequential steps or formulas. It also offers features that reduce spoilage and input expiration dates.
Because different governments heavily regulate companies in sectors such as food and beverage and pharmaceuticals, process manufacturing systems often have legal compliance in mind.
Additionally, if your company is a national business, the system may have global regulation compliances too.
Process manufacturing software centralizes your daily business processes into a master database that syncs vital elements related to the shop floor, finances, customer relationship management (CRM), warehouse, distribution and human capital management (HCM). The integration of these critical functions can boost productivity and increase revenue.
You’ll likely come across ERP and manufacturing software as prospective options when looking for a software solution that supports process manufacturing operations. So, what is the scope of these solutions, and what do they actually entail? ERP stands for enterprise resource planning and is a solution that centralizes business information and facilitates both front- and back-office operations.
These programs can handle everything from human resources management to material requirements planning. On the other hand, manufacturing solutions are more steeped in the needs of manufacturing businesses. Some vendors are differentiated by whether they support process or discrete manufacturing, but some support both.
In the next section, we’ll review the differences between discrete and process manufacturing so you can decide what specific solutions would best serve your business needs.
In general, manufacturing solutions are especially adept at handling distribution, warehouse, inventory and supply chain management.
Discrete vs. Process Manufacturing
Unlike discrete manufacturing, where you make specific products in separate facilities, process manufacturing creates batches of goods you divide into barrels or bottles. You chemically transform ingredients and raw materials into the finished product. You can’t take these goods apart or recycle their materials like you can with discrete manufacturing.
These unique characteristics of process manufacturing make it difficult to manage. First, the fact that the production process cannot be reversed forces process manufacturers to be more careful when planning product recipes and operations. Product delivery can also present a difficult challenge for process manufacturers as their finished products have a greater potential to impact the health of both consumers and employees.
Plant managers require an ERP process manufacturing solution to handle complex tasks. This solution deals with safety laws and regulations, consumer demands and everyday functions such as careful product recipe planning, accounting, customer management, sales and purchasing.
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Primary Benefits
Although the actual functionality depends on which vendor you go with, it’s critical to assess capabilities that are typically most beneficial to businesses in the manufacturing industry. Factors such as deployment method, industry and company size affect which solutions may adequately serve your company’s manufacturing requirements.
Regardless, you must consider the top features you need in your process manufacturing software.
1. Offers Better Quality Management
Quality management capabilities are one of the most vital aspects when selecting process manufacturing ERP software. Yes, efficiently producing an item is essential, but the point is moot if it doesn’t adhere to necessary governmental regulations and industry standards.
Because process manufacturers have a unique and significant need to meet regulations, it’s essential that the ERP or manufacturing software you go with supports these endeavors.
Additionally, because many manufacturing companies have global operations or sell their products to international customers, it’s helpful for a program to support laws and regulations from various geographical areas. This feature can help you avoid legal issues such as product recalls, which occur when an industry or safety standard gets overlooked.
Ideally, the quality management function in your software solution will also include capabilities that generally support product quality. Because process manufacturing is so detailed, it can easily experience pollution or bacterial contamination hazards. Therefore, quality management is an essential part of a solution as it protects your customers, your revenue and your brand.
2. Optimizes Supply Chains
As you likely already know, many moving pieces are associated with supply chain management. Managing this process without a solution can seem overwhelming, so supply chain optimization is one of the essential functions of process manufacturing ERP.
One of the key benefits of this feature is vendor relationship management, which helps ensure that you are using high-quality materials to create your product at a reasonable price point. Vendor relationship management includes tracking costs, performance and transaction history.
Process manufacturers also have unique transportation needs due to the delicate or potentially hazardous nature of the products they create. For example, a pharmaceutical manufacturer might need to transport chemicals in a tanker, or food manufacturers might need a refrigerated vehicle to prevent food and other goods from spoiling during the distribution process.
This workflow faces further exacerbation by national regulations often affecting how to transport chemicals. Software for the manufacturing process can ensure efficient material distribution that’s also reasonably affordable.
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3. Manages Recipes and Formulas
There’s little to no room for errors when crafting products via ERP process manufacturing. Formula and recipe adherence are vital must-haves in this methodology. Recipe and formula management is a capability that ensures quality success and helps save money by reducing the creation of ineffective products.
It can be very complex to fix defective products. But a proper recipe or formula management accessory reduces defects and includes substitutions to improve products or deal with unavailable materials during the manufacturing process.
When using a substitute to develop an item, keeping track of potential adverse chemical reactions when adding new ingredients not included in the original recipe is essential to employee and client safety.
An example of a recipe management tool.
This manufacturing type requires that you complete specific products or processes under particular conditions related to elements such as humidity, temperature or light exposure. Additionally, a material’s concentration or potency during manufacturing can affect the recipe and how chemicals react during development.
Process manufacturing software accounts for all of these aspects so that you can ensure safety and quality when developing your products.
4. Tracks Costs and Profitability
Ensuring your efforts generate revenue is the bread and butter of business ownership. With cost tracking and profitability measurement tools, you can use the often complex information regarding the cost of materials for recipes and formulas to measure revenue and other financial factors. ERP Process manufacturing software should track ingredient costs based on chemical characteristics such as potency and the utilized quantity.
Additionally, the program should measure and calculate wasted ingredients and raw materials. These calculations enable companies to track actual costs per unit and compare this metric with sales prices to determine profit margins and adjust them as needed.
Additionally, costs are associated with the unique storage conditions required for sensitive materials, such as temperature-controlled storage spaces and vehicles. It’s essential to keep these factors in mind to gauge the total item-producing costs accurately. Items may also have multiple units of measure, which makes costs difficult.
For example, you might ship a product in a vial for a particular customer but in a different container for someone else. You should also use your process manufacturing software to track expiration dates and lot numbers to reduce spoilage and wasted money.
5. Adapts To Different Market Types
With government regulations constantly changing, process manufacturers need to stay ahead of the curve to reduce the probability of compliance issues. An example of a regulatory change that process manufacturers had to account for occurred in 2000 when the EPA issued a hexane emissions restriction for American producers of crude vegetable oil and similar products.
New and changed regulations can be tough to track for operating facilities in diverse regions.
Other market considerations include packaging and labels. If you traveled internationally, you might have noticed that food labels can vary from country to country. Government regulations determine what labels need. When reviewing packaging, size preferences also change.
For example, the large soda size at a fast food joint in America could differ from the same order at the same establishment in China due to customer demands or expectations. With this differentiation in labeling, packaging and regulatory requirements across regions, companies can benefit from process manufacturing software by staying abreast of developments and market demands in various areas.
ERP process manufacturing systems can also facilitate product changes as market preferences and regulations change over time.
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6. Reduces Waste
Waste is a sad but true component of process manufacturing, mainly because creating a formula or recipe for a product that produces no waste is challenging. Therefore, most process manufacturers will have a percentage of waste in their final output. Additionally, waste can be caused by changing product recipes to account for increased demand or shortages of essential raw materials and ingredients.
A preview of a waste management dashboard.
Reducing and eliminating waste is difficult, but software for the manufacturing process can help you keep track of produced waste and compare it to your estimated waste. The answer to this calculation discovers issues with the production process.
Another reason that waste occurs is terrible planning. For example, if you don’t effectively track the expiration dates of your raw materials, they may expire before you use them. Additionally, expirations cause unnecessary downtime and deplete employees’ time.
Therefore, production planning is a critical feature for process manufacturing ERP platforms.
7. Boosts Production Agility
It’s common for process manufacturers to produce multiple products and variations of each product. Considering every item created has a different recipe or production method, transitioning between cycles can be extremely difficult. Process manufacturing software with agile production capabilities can help you plan and adjust planning to improve productivity and efficiently utilize the equipment.
As a process manufacturer, you’ve likely had to replace planned production cycles for a product with a different workflow for another finished product. These differences can happen because a good’s quality is compromised, requiring an adjustment to proceed. A flexible application will help ensure that these adjustments are efficient and timely while providing high-quality goods.
8. Improves Product Development and Go-to-Market Strategies
While most product developments flow under product lifecycle management (PLM) software, process manufacturing ERP software can gather product data to streamline the lifecycle process. A system might collect different data types, including returns, sales volume and customer satisfaction.
With this information, you can easily see successful products. When creating finished merchandise, these platforms manage incurred costs and time variations. This monitoring enables you to produce high-quality products at a lower price.
Additional ways to leverage historical information include identifying trends in customer behavior that may affect your company’s revenue. With constant changes in the market, it’s essential to quickly adapt your current offerings, discontinue unprofitable items and release new products to adhere to customer demand.
Sometimes process manufacturers will even sell or release products with low short-term profitability in exchange for their potential for long-term revenue generation. This production method has risks, but with process manufacturing software, these potential risks are more measured and well-informed, increasing the probability of success.
9. Enhances Environmentally-friendly Practices
Recently, one of the ways consumer taste has significantly shifted is through the desire to purchase products from environmentally conscious companies that source their materials without hurting the environment. Although it’s currently complicated, if not impossible, to reach net-zero, there are still steps that companies can take to reduce emissions and have less of an impact on the environment.
An example of a compliance management dashboard.
Even after considering basic quality standards and safety laws during the production cycle, you must also account for factors such as conflict minerals. People sell conflict minerals to perpetrate violence or war in the countries that sell them.
With the rise of technology and increased consumer knowledge, it’s become increasingly common for customers to boycott organizations that use conflict minerals or practices that they deem not environmentally friendly.
Process manufacturing ERP can reduce your company’s reliance on harmful resources so that you can boost your consumer reputation and come off as a socially responsible organization.
10. Stays Ahead of Inventory
A process manufacturing system can determine what materials to purchase based on current inventory levels, historical demand and forecasted demand. This capability helps ensure that you have the ingredients required for item production on hand when you need them and that they are of optimal quality.
You can track raw materials from start to finish and monitor any mandated expiration dates associated with your products. You can improve profitability by ensuring you’re not ordering too many or too few materials. Tracking and maintaining a database of expiration dates can also help reduce spoilage in the form of products that you can no longer legally or ethically sell.
11. Reduces Production Theft, Variances and Losses
Do you know exactly how much product you should be able to make from your supplies? With process manufacturing ERP software, you can calculate just how much merchandise each batch has historically yielded during production and how much it should be able to produce when operations are at the highest level of functionality.
This transparency helps you identify better production goals for your team, isolate the factors that result in losses and detect sudden disappearances of stock that require further investigation.
12. Meets All Compliance Regulations
Lot management and batch tracking capabilities can make every aspect of the production cycle fully traceable. Therefore, you can instantly generate reports and schedules, allowing your business to pass inspection without fearing non-compliance with legal regulations.
A preview of batch tracking tools.
13. Adjusts Faster Order Capacities
A process manufacturing solution can assist in ciphering the amount of material and labor required to meet the needs of a fluctuating number of clients. Automation lets you pinpoint precisely how big your next batch must be to fulfill your current orders without waste. It can also calculate when you will take on more orders and reach your maximum production capacity.
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14. Protects Secrets During Reporting
Initially, it can seem dicey to input your ingredient lists or recipes into a software solution, especially if your product is trademarked. Fortunately, both on-premise and cloud-based process manufacturing vendors can encrypt your data for better security. They can also help you encode your unique ingredients within documents such as your bill of materials.
15. Expedites Merchandise Production
Customers have higher expectations from vendors due to the steady increase in industry competition that is occurring now. Process manufacturing software can help reduce order fulfillment timelines and build a more significant customer base. You achieve these outcomes by tracking the time spent on each production step.
When you’re aware of the most time-consuming processes, you can more aptly plan for increased demand so that your company’s delivery times don’t slow down when it gets hectic.
An example of a manufacturing ERP using AI.
16. Prepares for Unexpected Supply Shortages and Demand Changes
Sometimes you won’t have all the required materials to produce an order on time. This program allows you to create built-in backup plans to develop substitutes. These backup plans include the number of other materials or ingredients you could use to create a product when you don’t have the available goods.
You can also take your business one step further by customizing orders for people with specific allergies or essential preferences. With this software, you can compare the cost per batch of each customized order and analyze the product ingredients in greater depth, which is hugely beneficial when you need to make quick decisions about changing vendors or reaching out to new suppliers.
This system can also ensure that it is financially beneficial to produce customized products.
17. Increases Competitiveness
You can boost your company’s competitive position by leveraging process manufacturing software. Through benefits such as optimizing production, ensuring compliance and presenting a more environmentally conscious brand to your customers, you can attract more clients and gain revenue through increased efficiency.
When browsing for a process manufacturing solution, you might want to speak to other businesses that used your ideal vendor to see how it affected their bottom line and customer base.
Automation capabilities and reduced spoilage are just a few factors that can make your day-to-day processes easier while optimizing revenue opportunities.
Key Features
The benefits outlined above are made possible through crucial features in process manufacturing software. Before you make a software selection, you should create a list of features that would be most helpful to your business and ask potential vendors whether or not they include this functionality in their programs. Here are some of the tools that you might wish to have in your software solution:
Production Management
The production management module allows you to manage the shop floor. It is often integrated with computer-aided design (CAD) and PLM solutions to help deliver real-time data regarding the product lifecycle. This integration may also assist in communicating and making unified product changes along the supply chain.
Production management can also provide labor and time management visibility. This supervision helps to ensure efficiency and consistency. Cost estimation, creation of competitive quotes, capacity planning and scheduling are other vital functions this module offers.
Manufacturing Accounting
Financial tools are some of the most commonly sought-after features. These tools often contain essential accounting requirements such as accounts payable, accounts receivable and a balance sheet.
However, manufacturing accounting tools might offer more catered features such as budgeting and forecasting based on actual company data. Other functions include billing, invoicing, sales tax calculation, project-based accounting and analytical accounting.
Get our Manufacturing ERP Software Requirements Template
Supply Chain Management
Supply chain management features can help you determine which suppliers are the best value for your business needs. Additionally, this tool can help with product reviews, demand forecasting and automatic quote processing. Some manufacturing software vendors might also provide requests for proposal (RFPs) support.
Additional features include a web-based platform where customers can configure unique products online, the management of raw material bids, and a program where you can access inventory details such as requests for quotation (RFQ) and purchase orders (PO).
Transportation and Logistics
Internet of things (IoT) connectivity is a new technology that benefits transportation and logistics. A transportation and logistics tool might connect a fleet of vehicles to manufacturing software via IoT. These connections allow you to track the movement of items through GPS. Transportation modules can map out the best routes, monitor mileage and forecast inventory levels.
Asset Management
Managing fixed assets is vital for many businesses. Enterprise asset management (EAM) tools can track factors such as energy cost and fluctuation in value. It may also maintain service records and other related documents for acquiring or owning fixed assets. Tax information related to your fixed assets is another significant component of this module.
Project Management
Project management tools help you allocate resources such as time and labor. Some of these tools use Agile methodology to streamline and optimize operations. Other features may include seeing how a project has moved throughout the design lifecycle, the ability to see project ownership history and the visualization of project schedules and timelines.
Best Process Manufacturing ERP Software
The process manufacturing ERP software market is a mix of vendors focusing exclusively on this manufacturing type. Prominent ERP vendors with a diversified portfolio often provide diverse solutions for discrete and process manufacturing.
Compare Top Manufacturing ERP Software Leaders
When selecting software for manufacturing processes, you’ll want to monitor for factors such as whether the vendor offers cloud or on-site deployment, what industry they primarily serve, which functionalities they provide and the size of the businesses that use the program.
Let’s dive into our analyst-compiled list of the best process manufacturing software vendors on the market today.
ProcessPro
ProcessPro is a multi-deployment process manufacturing ERP built for batch process manufacturers to settle problems with lot control, management and compliance of complex formulas and recipes. It’s intended to be a robust system for the entire manufacturing and accounting workflows from start to finish.
An example of ProcessPro’s sales analysis module.
Top Benefits
Provides Centralization
Obtain a centralized hub for system development, sales, installation and support. Live and dedicated client help are also available.
Offers Advanced Analytics
Garner interactive images, reporting and data analysis from mobile devices or PCs in any location. Implement graphing, sorting and drilling for vital business data. Access pre-set files, metrics and KPIs for business analyses.
Utilizes Blogging
Utilize this process manufacturing software’s blog module to gain topic area details.
Leverages Industry Insights
Review numerous industry insights that have crucial information and guidance.
Primary Features
Production Scheduling
The production scheduling module possesses a nifty automatic schedule generator that allows you to color-code work order statuses and even a drag-and-drop rescheduling tool. You can select and reschedule multiple batches simultaneously. Find every step a group takes in its production route via the scheduling tool.
FDA Validation and Compliance
Installation Qualification (IQ) assesses new machinery’s accommodations and materials. Operational Qualification (OQ) tests if your machinery meets your functional requirements. Lastly, a Performance Qualification (PQ) challenges your equipment to determine if it can operate well in various conditions.
This compliance accessory creates test scripts for each test and extends electronic signatures, approval and audit trails that guarantee you comply with the FDA.
Warehouse Management System (WMS)
This module manages data accuracy for your receipts, movements, transfers and more. Get immediate real-time inventory transactions on a Wi-Fi network with barcode scanning.
Lot Traceability
ProcessPro makes lot traceability a cakewalk because you can promptly view and track your raw ingredients and finished goods from receipt to shipped sales orders. You can also generate recall information at any time.
CRM
The CRM tool permits you to study and manage marketing, sales and customer care activities across all focal points of contact. This ability allows you to grow your outreach by finding new customers, closing deals and developing sustainable relationships throughout your channels.
Limitations
Although this system offers multiple benefits and features, it has some drawbacks. These disadvantages include:
- It doesn’t provide built-in group or composite tax depreciation accounting.
- It doesn’t link to manual operations, external workflows or group and individual solutions.
- The interface is not user-friendly.
Platform:
Company Size Suitability: S M L
Fishbowl Manufacturing
Fishbowl Manufacturing is a solution that meets the inventory management needs of small and medium manufacturers, wholesale distributors and eCommerce companies. Order management, reporting, and part tracking are vital accessories.
A preview of Fishbowl Manufacturing’s dashboard.
Top Benefits
Implements Free Trials and Live Chats
Access a 14-day free trial with live chat if you need to speak with Fishbowl representatives.
Provides Web Demos
Utilize a web demo through a trained representative’s desktop via GoToMeeting for personal product and feature explanations. Demos typically last from 10 minutes to one hour.
Employs Integrations
Merge this system with accounting, eCommerce, shipping and other solutions. It is available for Android, Mac and Windows devices.
Authorizes Asset Tracking
Superintend several warehouses, track shipments, assess expiration dates and automate reordering materials. Track every part’s quantity and location for reordering. Trace merchandise according to lot, serial, revision and tag numbers.
Primary Features
Major Integrations
This process manufacturing ERP integrates with eCommerce, shipping, CRM, EDI, merchant services and accounting software such as QuickBooks, Xero, Reckon and Avalara. This accounting integration checks for data accuracy and alerts if duplicate data appears.
Park Tracking
Easily Track products by lot, serial, revision and tag numbers with the part tracking tool. You can oversee part levels and quickly reorder them when they get low. This component also allows you to locate the whereabouts of parts in your warehouse with elaborate maps.
Reporting
The reporting tools and plugins assist in generating barcodes and constructing sales and inventory data into organizable graphs. These features can deliver reports on accounting, inventory availability, bill of materials and more. You can pinpoint gross sales by product and person and predict incoming inventory needs.
Inventory Management
Following your inventory has never been easier, thanks to the inventory management accessory. It traces products en route to your customers and develops reorder points for every item in your facility. Its capabilities include managing numerous locations, tracking shipments, automatically reordering products and converting various units of measure.
Order Management
Fishbowl Manufacturing’s order management tool initiates purchase and sales orders and manages your inventory. It records products received at your warehouses and enables your workforce to choose, gather and deliver products to customers. You can also track supplies from source to destination and configure automatic reorder points for parts and products to avoid overstock and shortages in your inventory.
Limitations
Although Fishbowl Manufacturing offers multiple features and benefits. But it also comes with a few limitations. These flaws include:
- Not offering out-of-the-box accounting tools.
- Lacking report customization options.
Platform:
Company Size Suitability: S M L
SYSPRO
Syspro’s ERP software is designed for manufacturers and distributors to blueprint, execute and control productions. In addition to inventory management, sales analysis and lot traceability, this software offers self-service reporting, sales tax reporting and a customer portal.
An example of the Syspro ERP’s master data accessory.
Top Benefits
Leverages Pricing Strategies
The prices differ according to chosen features, user numbers, cloud or on-premise deployment and current data’s quantity and quality. It offers a pay-as-you-go model.
Implements Analyst House Opinions
IDC, Technology Evaluation Centers, Aberdeen Group, Mint and other analysts gave SYSPRO high evaluation scores.
Governs the Developer Community
Access a plethora of software experts to create tailored systems that merge with SYSPRO with an SOA framework.
Provides a Partner Network
Partner with more than 1,600 resources throughout 60+ countries for training, support, sales channels and marketing tools.
Showcases Architecture
Since this program runs on Microsoft .NET with XML and HTML5 standards, the Microsoft SQL database safeguards information. SYSPRO runs on one code base developing around several code objects, blocks and components that need particular business rules and processes.
Primary Features
Order Management
Wish you had a tool that offers simple cooperation between you and customers? Wish granted. This feature automates order-to-delivery methods and implements complete operational transparency. The sales order module also presents order processing and fulfillment.
Sales Analysis and Pricing
The sales analysis and optimal pricing feature studies trends and geographic purchasing sequences to immediately present reports with top-notch business graphics.
The product profitability component notifies you of your pricing strategy, whether cost-based, performance-based, market-based or a mixture of all three.
The pricing capability permits you to set numerous pricing levels for various customer groups with local and foreign pricing practices.
Lot Traceability and Serial Tracking
Syspro’s serial tracking and lot traceability grant you transparency of all destinations, such as origin, production and customer, of products and batches. This tool allows you to trace and review where defects started.
The engineering change control module provides complete tracking of modifications to product designs. The return merchandise authority component also delivers constant product returns processing and analyzes data for improvement programs.
Inventory Management
Kiss expired stock goodbye thanks to this feature’s precise product rationalization, obsolete provisioning and specific slow-moving and expired stock promotions. You can diminish forecast flaws and meet customer service targets with decision-making and graphical output accessories.
The analytical and predictability components improve decision-making with information on order policies, lead times, safety stock and replenishment planning.
Product Information
Syspro has different capabilities to record and notify you about various products within your facility. The numerous units of measure per stock module accurately document and track stock quantities. The elaborate master data feature defines purchasing, sales and manufacturing transaction benchmarks.
The blanket sales order tool simplifies call-off schedule updates for original equipment manufacturer (OEM) clientele and contains coherent OEM accommodation features.
Limitations
This ERP process manufacturing system comes with lots of features and perks. But possesses a few limitations. These drawbacks include:
- Lacking a user-friendly interface.
- Common data needs plenty of customizations.
- Adjusting rights for specific features is challenging.
- It’s hard to run and pull customized reports without IT support.
Platform:
Company Size Suitability: S M L
DELMIAworks
In need of an ERP process manufacturing system that encompasses every nook and cranny of your facility’s operations on one database? DELMIAworks could be your ideal software. In addition to material management, sales and order management, customer relationship management and other features, this solution provides on-site, internet and virtual training classes for customers.
An example of how DELMIAworks operates.
Top Benefits
Offers On-demand Webinars
Watch on-demand webinars for different topics such as quality, compliances and more.
Provides a Thorough Resource Center
Gain access to a resource library full of system data, resources, realistic examples, manufacturing experts and more.
Primary Features
Forecasting
The forecasting accessory offers clarity of current and proposed orders and measures their impact on past, present and future annual sales. The time-phased planning component updates each material requirements planning (MRP) performance in real time.
You can also view/sort estimates by customer, part or manufacturing facility. The software compares proposed transactions and quantities by month, customer, order or workpiece.
Project Management
The project management tool employs user-defined tasks and project templates for thoroughly tracking any type of assignment, from quote generation to work order completion. This tool has DELMIAworks’ quoting, inventory, purchasing and PLM tools.
It provides a complete history of orders, labor distribution and inventory management. It offers concise reporting lists for all jobs, statuses and costs on one computer screen.
Outsource Central
Gain clear visibility over your supply chain. You’ll have clarity on supply chain characteristics related to product assembly, planning, shipping and tracking of sub-contracted products either wholly or partially manufactured by outsourced vendors.
This tool also generates work and ship orders for items that need transferring to suppliers based on demand. You gain status tracking on products such as inventory in-transit location details, rejects, ship orders, supplier-specific pricing and more.
Shipping Management
Shipping management promptly automates the shipping process, including receiving sales orders and capturing shipment information, inventory locations and quantities. The advanced shipping notice (ASN) quality delivers prior notice of shipment details such as packing slip information, shipping destination, terms of payment, carton/weight information and more to your customer.
CRM
Your customers and suppliers are essential to your manufacturing practices. DELMIAworks’ CRM accessory offers the right components to sustain effective relationships with your customers and suppliers. This module operates all business support communications and records information on calls, meetings, notes and tasks.
Limitations
DELIMIAworks offers several features but comes with some limitations. These shortcomings include:
- The inability to change or edit invoices.
- Lacking back dates for inventory transactions.
- The asset management tools don’t align with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) audit requirements.
Platform:
Company Size Suitability: S M L
SAP Business One
SAP Business One is a process manufacturing ERP that caters to small and medium enterprises. It’s intended to maximize business processes, deliver real-time information and supervise business performance. Its top features are financial management, sales and customer management and business intelligence (BI).
A preview of SAP Business One’s dashboard.
Top Benefits
Presents Different Deployment Options
Work with cloud or on-premise deployment. You may also access this solution on mobile devices.
Furnishes an Interactive Community
Converse and connect with peers and industry experts to obtain information and share implementation and practical experiences.
Exhibits Extensibility
Obtain self-service customization, extensions and service-layer development. Craft extra fields, tables and forms without IT support.
Emphasizes the SAP Learning Hub
Review learning materials, presentations, case studies, quizzes and more through the SAP Business One Academy’s learning hub to learnSAP Business One’s ins and outs.
Allocates Learning Content Language Support
Manage training materials in nine languages from English, Spanish and French to Korean, Chinese, German and Portuguese.
Primary Features
Financial Management
The financial management accessory handles essential accounting methods from ledger entries to accounts payable and receivable. It oversees cash flow, traces fixed assets, manages budgets and observes project costs.
This tool can also cipher reconciliations, bank statements and payments through checks, cash and bank transfers. The virtual function diminishes repetitive manual data entry because it simplifies fixed asset management. The financial management tool lets you develop standard or customizable reports from primary data to boost your business planning and audit review methods.
Analytics and Reporting
Employ analytics and reporting tools to create intuitive hands-on dashboards and reports that answer your crucial questions. You can promptly see and correct any arising issues, evaluate the performance of your facility and track cash flow, costs and revenues. Immediate robust analytics make information easily accessible and can streamline data searching.
Sales and Customer Management
The sales and customer management component shadows all your sales opportunities and lead activities from initial contact to closing a deal throughout the sales cycle. This tool can store your critical customer data in one place by managing and synchronizing customer contacts stored in your Microsoft Outlook account.
You can craft and supervise warranty contracts and service agreements and quickly enter and respond to service calls.
Purchasing and Inventory Control
The purchasing and inventory control tool offers immediate updates of goods, receipts and inventory levels in your warehouse to implement purchase planning hassle-free. You can instantly create accounts payable and invoices from a purchase order or receipt.
A convenient platform combines all of your purchasing processes with manageable data. You can seamlessly review your account balance and purchase analyses while sustaining detailed purchasing information such as price lists and taxes.
BI
Bid farewell to uninformed business decisions thanks to the BI accessory. The robust data visualizations feature lets you make better business choices with detailed data analytic charts and graphs.
In-depth analytics and key performance indicators fully visualize your cash balance and sales performance. You can also access data from numerous sources, draft new reports and tailor existing ones in multiple layouts.
Limitations
Although this process manufacturing ERP software has perks and modules that streamline processes, it has some drawbacks. These limitations are:
- Having a complex interface.
- Navigation is unclear.
- The overall design isn’t user-friendly.
- It requires maintenance and expertise to upload data.
Platform:
Company Size Suitability: S M L
Final Thoughts
There are many process manufacturing software solutions capable of supporting these objectives in several different industries. While a wide variety of options is ultimately good, choosing a system or combination of applications is complex.
Most vendors create ERP solutions to help companies across the entire supply chain. However, process manufacturing software can help manufacturers gain greater visibility of operations, reduce waste, increase efficiency and more. For more manufacturing systems and features, look through our detailed comparison guide.
What process manufacturing software do you use? Let us know why in the comments below!
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