Many distribution businesses generate revenue with light manufacturing. Assembling products as part of the supply chain can reduce cost price and improve customer service. Often it is a chance to innovate. Because you work closely with your customers you may spot a gap in the market or a way to make their lives easier.
Assembly is a manufacturing planning and control tool designed specifically for distribution or wholesale businesses. It uses similar functionality to Manufacturing but is simplified for assembly or light manufacturing.
It gives you the power of pull planning which is ideal for demand-driven assembly or flow production. Components and materials are ordered based on demand for the finished assembly. This allows you to manage the inventory of parts and finished products with the same precision as you manage the rest of your business.
In fact, distributors who manufacture often find they have an edge because they understand the principles of inventory control so well.
Designed especially for wholesale distribution
IBS Assembly allows you to plan and document the assembly process, and to control the production of assemblies within your distribution flow. It includes features specially designed for distributors who manufacture:
- It matches manufacturing and sales orders to speed up the shipping of assemblies.
- It allows for replanning where there is a combination of manufactured and inventory items on the sales order. It takes order priority into account.
- You can check availability all the way down from assembled items in stock to the components used to make them.
- It makes it easy to do manufacturing tear-downs: taking parts allocated to the assembly lines and allocating them back to inventory to be sold as components.