BOM & Item Import Tips for New ERP Implementations
What are the Tips for BOM & Item Import for new ERP Systems?
Bills of Material (BOM) refers to any base functionality that can be used to establish production modules within ERP systems. Manufactured Items are made up of components that are used to develop the products through production operation. Essentially, the principal role of the Bill of Materials is to describe product structure of a manufactured end item. BOMs are vital because they help manufacturers to manage and oversee resources effectively. BOMs also help companies to select materials which mitigate wasteful utilization of available resources.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is an essential business software that is used to manage all aspects of an enterprise by incorporating data from different departments such as accounting, inventory, sales and marketing, production and human resource into a single database that is easier to manage. Manufacturers often use ERP systems as process management software which allows them to use a system of assimilated applications to manage the enterprise whilst still automating numerous back-office functions. Manufacturers keep their software over extended periods (10 to 15 years), and this software often accumulate volumes of data, particularly data defining items, inventory, Bills of Materials, and routing, Manufacturers who then opt to adopt new ERP systems, must be able to import these data into the new ERP system successfully.
Owing to the fact that ERP systems are unique, the process of importing existing data into the new ERP system almost always requires significant manual effort by a very technical resource in the engineering and/or IT who decide how to move this data. The process of BOM & Item importation to new ERP systems often takes weeks or months throughout the ERP implementation process.
Import/Export Module on ERP Systems
Most ERP software have an Import/Export module which provides with the necessary tools to transfer data into and out of selected tables to the ERP application and database to a broad category of the other systems, programs, and tools. Import functions of ERP offer a means to replace or update data that exist in an organization’s ERP database or add information that originates from other sources. The exports work to offer a means of copying data from the ERP database to an output file such as CSV files which can be used to add data, replace data, or update data to another database. During the initial implementation of a new ERP system, the Import/Export module can be used to transfer current financial and manufacturing data to the ERP database without having to re-key the data. This has been instrumental because it helps manufacturers to save time. In addition to this also helps to reduce numerous common data entry errors.
How to Transfer data to new ERP Systems
The process of importing BOM & Item to a new ERP systems will often take weeks or even months to complete. To curb this, manufactures have developed different ways to speed up the process. The steps needed to import BOM and Items into a new ERP system effectively are detailed below.
The first step is to export existing data from the outdated or old ERP version and save it in CSV format for imports to the new ERP. During this stage, manufacturers must ensure that they are able to export all the core data from all the departmental units of the company. Examples of core data which should be exported include data defining items, inventory, bill of materials, and routing.
The next step is to review and fix the exported data. This step helps to validate the data files before importing them to the new ERP system. Validating data files is an integral step because some of the data from the outdated ERP system may have contained errors that stemmed from human mistakes that were made through the years. Reviewing this data helps in correcting mistakes where necessary, or adding missing data elements where appropriate. This is a necessary step that will ensure the data contained in CVS is of the required quality before proceeding to import it into the new ERP systems.
The third step involves the use of import utilities (if available) from the new ERP vendor in order to import volumes of data from the CSV files. If this approach is successful, then it can save on time; however, most import utilities on ERP systems are difficult to use and are often limited in the kinds of data they can support.
CADTALK Streamlines ERP Implementations
Manufactures can choose to adopt CADTALK as an alternative since it is designed to exclusively work with the exchange of data between dissimilar data sources. The CADTALK BOM Import may be used to import data directly from existing CSV files, CAD models, PLM or PDM systems, and even outdated ERP systems itself and then leverage AI (artificial intelligence) to convert the data into new records for data defining items, inventory, Bills of Materials, and routing in the new ERP system.
This process is extremely fast, and it often reduces the time spent on the importation of BOM and Items into new ERP systems from months to weeks or even days. This, in turn, implies that the manufacturer will be able to set up the new ERP system faster, which will, in turn, save money for the organization.
It is essential to note that ERP resellers are able to leverage CADTALK throughout the ERP implementation process in order to reduce their implementation cost. This helps to make the ERP proposals much more competitive, which helps to increase their chances of getting new ERP jobs. To most ERP resellers, CADTALK helps to improve competitive advantage, particularly when organizations have to transfer big data from outdated ERP systems into new ERP systems.
