Overview
Orchestrate Version 6 helps you to make more comprehensive plans and be more productive. For example, Version 6 includes built in constructs for planning inventory levels, demand management, and product expiration. Features such as the new shift pattern editor and a Gantt chart that automatically scrolls (to show the progress against plan) are designed to help increase productivity. We have also made Orchestrate faster than ever and, to ensure that Orchestrate remains responsive you can even archive completed tasks.
Demand Planning
When we are making an Orchestrate production plan there are now three potential sources of demand.
- Customer Orders
- The Demand Matrix
- Demand form Planned Tasks
The Demand Matrix
With the new Demand Matrix you can enter a demand for any Item by day, week or month. This is especially useful for forecast orders and situations where you have repeat demand such as a requirement to make X items per week. The Demand Matrix is ideal for longer term capacity plans.
Demand from Planned Tasks
When we add a Task to an Orchestrate plan, we can now generate demand for any materials or sub components that the planned task requires. For example in order to make product X we may have to ensure that we have also made Product Y (in line with the Bill of Materials). This means that Orchestrate’s Demand Planner can help you manage the requirement for sub components.
Managing Inventory and Expiration
The Demand Planner helps you to manage your Inventory targets and these can be specified by date. This means that if you are building inventory, for example to cover a shutdown period, then you can put the inventory build targets into Orchestrate and the Demand Planner will help you to hit the target.
Orchestrate also includes a built in Expiration for each item so that you can now take full account of product Shelf Life., with no extra work. Out of date items are automatically removed from the planned stock figures and clearly indicated in the new Task pegging report.
New Shift Editor
Shift editing has always been easy in Orchestrate, but Version 6 makes it even easier and more intuitive. If you want to take a resource off shift simply mark the appropriate tick box. If you want to change the number of operators for a particular shift, just change the grid below:
New Gantt Chart Features
There are several new Gantt chart features designed to help you be more productive. You can set the Gantt chart to auto scroll and to track the current time. This means that you can leave the plan “unmanned” and it will always show the current situation. You can also archive your completed tasks with a single click. Archiving your tasks (rather than deleting them) is good practice if you want to keep completed task information for reporting purposes.
Click here to download the 'What's New in Orchestrate V6 Flyer.pdf'.
To find out more about any of these features please contact us.
