Connecting the Customized Manufacturing Dots

Enterprise-wide solutions can facilitate an extraordinary degree of customization and personalization

If you’re a company that produces or manufacturers parts and products, you know there are few priorities more important today than the “customer experience.” Sometimes that customer is the end user or consumer, and sometimes it’s simply another manufacturer—regardless, manufacturers are all competing to help ensure that the customer experience is as smooth and personalized as possible.

This is why technology partners that can deliver truly comprehensive solutions that address ordering, processing, payments, scheduling, and production are in such high demand. Successful ERP and MES partners makes that happen with a range of solutions designed to deliver an end-to-end customization and personalization capability. They combine these offerings with a degree of seamless coordination and connected control that enables manufacturers like you to deliver on your most ambitious customer experience promises.

The three core, acronym-heavy layers in that process are the CPQ (configure, price, quote) software, the MES (manufacturing execution system) solution, and the ERP (enterprise resource planning) system. The CPQ is the customer-facing module that, for example, a boat manufacturer uses to take customer inputs and build an order. The ERP handles the logistics and coordination around purchasing, ordering processing, and scheduling, and the MES helps provide control over the specified degree of customization and personalization required during the manufacturing process itself.  

The connected process control solutions that you can leverage with Epicor MES react dynamically to the individual components and options in the bill of materials (BOM)—there is no need to configure product variations independently. In other words, you’ll benefit from a smart system that adapts based on each customer’s order without the need to program a new process for every customized element. This gives your business the ability to produce new models or variations on existing models with a previously unimaginable level of speed and convenience.

All too often, these three legs of the manufacturing software stool are cobbled together from different providers and different solutions. But just like with a real stool that relies on legs made from three different types of materials, there are bound to be some wobbles. And there is always a risk the whole thing could unexpectedly tip over. At a time when appreciation is at an all-time high for the technological breakthroughs and smart solutions that have made increased connectivity and coordination possible during production, it is an unfortunate irony that many manufacturers do not recognize the importance of that same connectivity across enterprise software—and how it translates to an improved customer experience and to meaningful bottom-line results.

Epicor connected solutions empower your business to manage and control the ordering, production, and shipping process every step of the way. This means that the customer experience is as seamless as possible, the production process is streamlined and efficient, and the logistics surrounding the entire ecosystem are optimized in a way that saves you money—making both your customers and your professional partners happier.

Learn how you can connect the dots to greater productivity with Epicor.