How to work the value of an expansive view of BOMs in a business function

In previous column, we explained about the “What is a BOM”, “Type of BOM” and the relationship of multiple BOMs between business application. In this column, we would like to explain about the expansive view of BOMs in a business functions or organizations.

In the manufacturing company, product information is shared and communicated across the product life cycle from engineering to production engineering, manufacturing, procurement, maintenance that includes BOM and engineering deliverables such as drawings (2D and 3D), specifications etc. BOM is commonly used across the product development process as master information because it provides all of the product’s key information from both the engineering chain and supply chain side. However, sometime BOM needs to be managed separately according to the purpose and use of application for each process and department.

While managing BOM separately, it becomes essential to make the accurate BOM according to the purpose and use of application and also align it with engineering BOM whenever engineering change occurs because there is a high possibility that engineering changes are not reflected accurately from engineering BOM to other separately managed BOMs. Therefore, it is vital for collaborative development. It can be said that aligning BOMs which are managed separately according to the purpose and use of application with engineering BOM at the time of engineering changes is the biggest factor that obstructs the collaborative development.

As a typical example for the difference between an engineering BOM (E-BOM) and a manufacturing BOM (M-BOM), the engineering department creates a BOM focusing on the function, design and structure, whereas the manufacturing department rearranges the BOM according to the inventory control, ordering and how a product is assembled. Under these circumstances, if an engineering change occurs, it becomes very difficult to reflect the changes made at the E-BOM side to the M-BOM side in a timely and accurate manner.