Microsoft Dynamics NAV and VARCHART XGantt for Production Planning
Helios-IT developed an add-on solution with VARCHART XGantt for their client Boucherie.
Helios-IT, located in Belgium and The Netherlands, is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner with focus upon the implementation and the support of ERP software, BI solutions, CRM software and EAI solutions based on Microsoft technology. Besides traditional implementations, Helios IT focuses on the automotive and beverage industry with an industry specific add-on.
| Boucherie is a manufacturer of machines for making brooms as well as household and industrial brushes. They have grown to one of the world´s largest suppliers of automated brush manufacturing machines. Today, Boucherie is, amongst others, a global manufacturer of leading technology toothbrush production cells. They have developed one of the largest machine shops in Europe to support the machine and mold building requirements. |  |
For an efficient planning of the extensive and diverse machine shop for the toothbrush production cells a graphical scheduler became critical. Helios-IT replaced the existing ERP system with Microsoft Dynamics NAV. The production and resource planning charts within Dynamics NAV are realised with VARCHART XGantt. As these Gantt charts can be customized by using a VARCHART XGantt license from NETRONIC Software GmbH, Helios could easily extend the graphics in order to fulfil the requirements of the Boucherie machine shop.
The two main requirements for the scheduler are:
1. Planning complex production orders:
One production order can contain up to 100 semi-finished products and up to 1000 different operations, virtually using the entire machine shop. Visualizing the production order planning in a comprehensive way really is a must have for the planner at Boucherie.
2. Micro planning the shop floor
Tasks assigned by the planner to work– or machine centers must be fined-tuned in a resource planning.
Today Boucherie realizes their complex production planning with Microsoft Dynamics NAV, visualized by VARCHART XGantt:
Graphical view:
In the graphical representation the planner now has an excellent overview of the production orders and their operations.
For resource planning the planner can also switch from the Microsoft Dynamics NAV planning screen to a Gantt chart:
Graphical view:
In the resource view the planer can fine-tune the resources. If e.g. the Gantt graphic shows overlaps the planner can solve these planning issues by dragging the task to another moment in time, or choosing another approved machine.
The Microsoft Dynamics NAV system in combination with a customized Gantt Chart enables Boucherie today to make better planning decisions and work more efficient then before.