Bill of Materials software is typically used by manufacturing firms. It is generally a subset of manufacturing and inventory systems. Bill of materials (BOM) is a list of specific items used in the manufacture of a particular item.
BOM software should allow a business to:
- Easily produce bill of materials
- Manage inventory and production
- Track Costs
- Implement process reduction
- Link product documentation to items in BOM
- Interface with other applications such as AutoCad,
Software used to track Bill of materials and other inventory concerns should generally be purchased as a complete package for manufacturing and inventory. If purchased as separate components, the integration costs would likely be too high. These systems need to operate together to allow efficient reporting and business decision making.
Major vendors in the Manufacturing/Inventory software arena include:
- SAP
- DBA Manufacturing
- Almyta
- MatStream
In selecting the proper Bill of Materials package for your business, consider the following:
- Limitations – many software solutions are too simplistic for large complex market driven packaging schemes
- Training: Getting everyone up to speed quickly on a new software package is critical, especially for small business owners,
- Interface to other existing business systems : How will the new solution integrate with or be moved to by your old software? Is data from the new solution readily available to extract and use it in your own spreadsheets, databases, etc?
- System resources: Not usually an issue, but sometimes small business environments are on over-taxed hardware already.