Basel, CH – December 2018
Cycle-Based Production – The New Livestock Production Module
The newly developed module Cycle-Based Production (CBP) represents an important milestone in the field of livestock production. However, as the name suggests, this module can also be used for other areas as well.
In an extensive phase of analysis and evaluation, the numerous factors that play a crucial role in breeding facilities, hatcheries and finishing farms were identified and condensed. This is what allows us to break down this extremely demanding type of production in its complexity and rich variety in order to arrange it in a well-organized and clearly structured way and make it operable, thus creating the basis for a tailor-made and at the same time-efficient livestock management tool.
The module is composed of a limited number of components and presents itself in an intuitive and coherent way to the user. The SAP Project System (PS) helps to quickly and easily define the organization of the business areas. Only three levels are required for this:
- Business areas: The business areas at the topmost level are generally independent of stock type, suited for eggs, poultry, fish, cattle, etc.
- Sites: This organizational unit comprises the level of sites, plants, farms, ranches, etc.
- Facilities: At the lowest level you will find the facilities, i.e. the fattening houses, basins, ponds, tanks, incubators, etc.
Great importance was also attached to keeping the maintenance effort as low as possible. For instance, the individual organizational units can be easily combined and maintained as a group.
The actual production process takes place in the facilities for which one or more types of production as well as the capacity can be configured. The various production types are stored as production definitions, which in turn contain an activity plan and are linked to a production catalog.
In the production catalog, the standard expectation values for production, such as growth, mortality or feed consumption rates, are stored. This can be done either chronologically, non-dimensionally (pieces) or in various dimensions (e.g. weight) and dimension units (KG) – an example of why this module is so extremely flexible.
All this information allows the CBP module to calculate production cycles both in reverse (pull) and forward (push), i.e. supply- or demand-oriented. All planning data, called expectation values, are thus automatically calculated for a complete production cycle and scheduled.
After entering actual data to be valuated, the module can determine forecast data and indicate any changes to dates or production results, which can then be fixed as a new plan. All these data are the basis for a variety of key performance indicators (KPIs) such as average weight gain, feed consumption, feed conversion or mortality.
The “Principle of One”, of course, also applies to the CBP module, i.e. exactly one solution is available for a business requirement in the SAP HANA system or in an overall SAP system landscape. As a result, existing functionalities or standard objects in SAP were not replaced, but rather supplemented with relevant industry-specific data. Standard SAP objects such as planned orders, production orders, goods movements, etc. can be easily integrated into the activities of a production cycle.
Further useful tools are planned for future releases of the module, which will support the coordination of the flow of goods, the production rotation of the sites or plants and the distribution of quantities between the various business areas.
In addition, standardized process interfaces are planned that automate and harmonize the exchange of information between standard SAP objects and Softproviding’s Cycle-Based Production module.
The most important advantages of this module at a glance:
- Customized adaptation of organizational structures using the SAP project system
- Minimization of the maintenance effort by a broad range of grouping options for the production units
- Extensive configuration possibilities for production types and production catalogs allow both forward and reverse calculation of planning data for an entire production cycle.
- Determination of forecast data as a basis for important key performance indicators and statistics
- Seamless integration into the SAP system landscape, e.g. also with GEO framework
- Standardized process interfaces
- Completely integrated into the CO module
- Dynamic BOM, very flexible
- Allows the calculation of the output
- Cycle can be varied; simulations possible
- Reaction to quantity changes possible at anytime
If we have piqued your interest with this article, please do not hesitate to contact Mr. Stephan Kronbichler (Business Development) if you would like more information: e-mail, telephone: +41 (0)61 508 21 42.