Master Planning, Demand Fulfilment and ATP & Production Planning and Scheduling

Abstract

A strong coordination (i. e. the configuration of data flows and the division of planning tasks to modules) of APS modules is a prerequisite to achieve consistent plans for the different planning levels and for each entity of the supply chain. The same data should be used for each de-centralized planning task and decision. APS can be seen as "add-ons" to existing ERP systems with the focus on planning tasks and not on transactional tasks. In most cases an ERP system will be a kind of "leading system" where the main transactional data are kept and maintained. The data basis of APS is incrementally updated and major changes on master data are made in the ERP system. This task will be called integration of APS with ERP systems. The coordination between the different planning modules described in Part II of this book is very important to derive dovetailed detailed plans for each supply chain entity. Section 13.1 will show which guidelines are given, which data are shared and how feedback is organized. Furthermore, one can see which modules are normally used centrally and de-centrally, respectively. As we have already seen in Chap. 5, some decisions and tasks are left to the ERP system. These tasks and data which are used by APS but are kept in ERP systems are described in Sect. 13.2. The definition of the interface between ERP and APS has to determine which ERP data are used in APS and which data are returned. Moreover, Data Warehouses which keep important historical data and are mainly used by Demand Planning build interfaces to APS (see also Chap. 7). A detailed knowledge of the status of supply chain operations and the occurrence of events within the supply chain is getting more and more important. Thus, the concept of Supply Chain Event Management to effectively manage the different catergories of events occuring in a supply chain is discussed in Sect. 13.3. Modules of APS that support collaboration of supply chain entities as well as external customers and suppliers are part of Chap. 14 and will not be discussed in this chapter.