12 Process Manufacturing Software Requirements for Growing Manufacturing Businesses

In a recent article published by BusinessWeek, manufacturing in the United States grew in January 2010 at its fastest pace since August 2004. Despite a troubled global economy, it appears manufacturing in the United States is heading in the right direction. Given this surge in growth, there is a fairly good probability that many of these growing manufacturing companies will turn to technology to continue to streamline operations and increase bottom-line profits. For process manufacturers specifically, there are a number of key ERP software selection criteria that proposed technology solutions must meet to provide the foundation for future growth, lower operating costs, and increased manufacturing output expanding manufacturing businesses require. Below are twelve requirements every process manufacturing software solution must meet.

1. The software must provide both forward and backward lot traceability.

2. The ERP software solution must be able to track ingredient and finished good shelf lives and expiration dates.

3. The ERP system should allow the manufacturing organization to specify guaranteed minimum shelf life requirements for its customers who demand that products shipped to them have specific shelf life characteristics.

4. The system should allow the organization to establish formulas with multi-level bills of material.

5. The ERP solution should allow for multi-level manufacturing routings, which enable separate batch processing and filling operations, or “recipe cards.”

6. Proposed manufacturing software solutions should allow for scaled batch size quantities for manufacturing and recognize that there is increased volume of raw ingredients required for production.

7. The system should allow for multiple units of measure and the establishment of unit of measure conversions.

8. The ERP system must be able to identify raw ingredients and finished goods that should be put on quality hold for QC inspection immediately upon receipt into inventory and/or following production.

9. The system should have a built-in wireless warehouse management system to streamline warehouse operations and to improve the data entry process for ingredient and finished good lot numbers.

10. The system should be a fully-integrated ERP software product and deliver software functionality for order management, inventory control, warehouse management, manufacturing, purchasing, financial management and accounting, e-Commerce, business intelligence, and customer relationship management.

11. The system must be able to account for sample products that have a production cost and value in inventory but have a $0 price for customer shipments.

12. For growing process manufacturing organizations, the manufacturing software solution must be highly scalable in nature – it should allow the business to grow in revenue without a proportional expenditure on additional software functionality in the months and years following software implementation.

By selecting a process manufacturing software solution that can meet such criteria, process manufacturers can receive the technology necessary to continue to compete in a global market and continue to expand their respective businesses with increased productivity, efficiency, and profitability.