Material Control

The Material Control component presents the material status at the level of items and warehouses. Material links are an important element and are created during material synchronization. In the Material Workbench, you can perform aggregation across several items and warehouses.

On the Primary behavior tab, you can select these elements:

• Report view
• Items
• Shortage status filter
• Demand types filter
• Supply types filter

On the Secondary behavior tab, you can define a more detailed item selection, the link status, and the item type.

On the Sorting behavior tab, you can select how items are sorted in material control.

On the Shelf life behavior tab, you can select the shelf life threshold criteria.

Four report views are displayed as tabs:

• The Items tab contains, at aggregated item or warehouse level, this information:
  • Shortage status
  • The types of demands, supplies, and material links that exist in the plan
  This tab is useful to provide an overview at item or warehouse level. This tab can be the starting point for drill down on detailed information for each item and warehouse.
• The External Requirements tab contains, for each external requirement, this information:
  • Shortage status
  • The type of demand
  • The material links that exist in the plan
  This tab is useful to identify how many and which external requirements will not be delivered on time. For example, you can identify how many and which customer orders will be delayed.
• The External supplies tab contains information, for each external supply,
  • Quantity
  • Due date
  • Delay
  • The orders
  This tab is useful to identify how many external supplies will not be delivered on time. For example, you can identify how many and which customer orders will be delayed.
• The Shelf life tab contains information items with life span problems. The tab is useful if monitoring durability is vital internally in the production. The tab is also useful at end-item level to avoid unsellable items.

Shortage Status

Material shortage is determined for each material link. Shortages arise when demand cannot be met on time because production orders or purchased components are not available when required. Two types of material shortages exist:

• Time shortage, where supply is later than demand. This shortage type is temporary.
• Quantity shortage, where no supply can cover demand. This shortage type is permanent.

The material lead time defines when a material can be replenished. Therefore shortage outside the lead time is less critical. Consequently, each material link can have one of these four shortage status:

T

Time shortage

TL

Time shortage outside lead time

Q

Quantity shortage

QL

Quantity shortage outside lead time

Shortage Status At Item Level

The shortage status at item level is the aggregation of the shortage status of all the material links for this specific item. Therefore, an item can have several shortage statuses at the same time.

Late External Supply

Simulation allows calculating the latest start and end for all the orders and the operations. Thereby simulation allows calculating also the latest demand time for all the demands. If an external supply is later than the latest demand time, then a material issue exist. The late external supplies are marked in reports and you can define the scoreboard records that identify the late external supplies.

Scoreboard Record

Scoreboard records display the KPIs that are defined by the planner. These examples show how KPIs can be used:

• How many items have shortage inside the lead time
• How many items must purchase department handle, for example, create new purchase orders to cover demands
• How many purchase orders cause delays to end-item orders

Symbols and Buttons

See the symbol and button tooltips in the application.