Manufacturing overview

  • 6 minutes

Manufacturing is the creation of new products by using (raw) materials, components, labor, and machines.

To manufacture a new product, you need the following elements:

  • Components to create the new product (Production BOM)

  • Capacity of people and machines (work centers and machine centers)

  • Step-by-step instructions (routing)

To help illustrate the manufacturing process, the following example describes the process of making scrambled eggs.

To make scrambled eggs, you'll need the following items:

  • Components:

    • Eggs

    • Butter

    • Pepper

    • Salt

  • Capacity:

    • Person to make the scrambled eggs

    • Bowl

    • Whisk

    • Spatula

    • Frying pan

    • Stove

  • Step-by-step instructions:

    • Step 1: Break the eggs into a bowl.

    • Step 2: Beat the eggs with a whisk.

    • Step 3: Melt the butter in a frying pan.

    • Step 4: Poor the egg mixture into the pan.

    • Step 5: Stir the eggs with a spatula and cook until they're set.

    • Step 6: Add salt and pepper to taste.

As shown in this example, to create a new product, you'll need components, labor and machines, and instructions on how to create the new product.

You can also assign labor and machines to each instruction step and specify how long the step should take. For example, for Step 5 in the preceding example, you need a person and a stove, and it takes about five minutes before you can go to Step 6.

By specifying labor, machines, and time, you can calculate how many plates of scrambled eggs you could make on one day with the capacity (how many bowls, stoves, and so on) that you have available.

Of course, making scrambled eggs in your kitchen doesn't require manufacturing software. However, that factor changes when products and manufacturing processes become more complex, such as the process for assembling bicycles.

Diagram identifying a bicycle's components.

The preceding image shows that a bicycle has many components. To create a new bicycle, several production workers and machines are required to carry out all operations. Because a bicycle production company wants to produce hundreds or thousands of bikes each day, it's no longer possible to manage these processes without proficient manufacturing software.