Serialized Items
A serialized item is a physical occurrence of a standard item with a unique serial number. This enables the tracking of the individual item throughout its lifetime, for example, through the design, production, testing, installation, and maintenance phases. A serialized item can consist of other serialized components.
In Service, a serialized item can be a customer or owner specific installation. Installation groups are a group of installations or serialized items such as photocopiers, computers, air conditioners, forklifts, lathe machines, and even aircraft.
A serialized item is identified by the combination of the item code and the serial number. You can set up the mask used to generate the serial numbers in such a way that the serial number includes some fields of the item data, such as the item group and the manufacturer.
In a multicompany structure, the companies can share the serialized item data. All the service departments in the various companies can refer to the same serialized items.
The serialized item can originate from a sales order or a project. The details of a serialized item indicates the origin, for example, by using specific sets of serial numbers for items that originate from sales orders and from projects. Serialized items can also originate from an as-built structure or directly from the production bill of material in Manufacturing.
In Service, serialized items can start the respective life cycles in As-Built mode or As-Maintained mode. Each serialized item, with or without the installation group, can be covered by a service contract or a warranty.