Prove Material Availability Before Production Starts
Real BOMs, real inventory, real open supply. The PoC runs the material plan for a controlled product family, compares it line by line against your current ERP or MRP result, and shows how much earlier a shortage becomes visible — and where the differences come from.
Check my material planning PoCTalk to a manufacturing engineerIs this the problem you need to solve?
- Production starts and a component is missing that the plan said was available.
- Planners re-check the MRP output by hand because they have been burned by it.
- Planned orders churn every run, so nobody can act on them with confidence.
- BOM and lead-time errors are only found when they have already caused a shortage.
Primary buyer: Material Planner · Production Planning Manager · Procurement Manager · Supply Chain Manager · ERP Manager
What this PoC will prove
Recommended pilot scope
- Selected product families with real, current BOM and routing data.
- One planning horizon that includes a genuine supply constraint.
- Current inventory, open purchase and production orders and reservations.
- Real lead times, lot-sizing rules, scrap and yield factors and calendars.
- The output of your current MRP run for the same period, as the reconciliation baseline.
What will be live during the PoC
How this PoC runs
Durations are typical, not guaranteed. What extends a schedule: missing or incomplete data, security and network approvals, hardware lead times, sample collection, installation access, the production schedule, ERP test access, and the time your team needs to review results.
No unplanned shutdown is expected. Any installation window or controlled interruption is agreed with you in advance and scheduled around production.
How success will be measured
| Metric | How it is defined | Where the number comes from | Type |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shortage detection lead time | Days between the plan first flagging a shortage and the date your team actually discovered it. | Agreed baseline measurement | Operational |
| Missing-part risk | Number of scoped orders at risk of a missing component within the horizon, with the driving material named. | MSF platform data | Operational |
| Excess proposals | Value of purchase proposals the plan generates beyond horizon demand, versus the current run. | MSF platform data | Financial |
| Planned order stability | Share of planned orders that survive the next planning cycle unchanged in quantity and date. | MSF platform data | Technical |
| Manual planner effort | Hours per cycle spent re-checking and correcting the material plan by hand. | Observation and user interview | Operational |
| BOM and data exceptions | Count and severity of master-data errors found, classified by whether they would cause a real shortage. | Your ERP or existing system | Technical |
| Reconciliation agreement | Share of materials where the MSF result matches your current MRP result, with every difference explained. | Your ERP or existing system | Technical |
Before implementation, MSF and your team agree how each metric is calculated, where the baseline comes from, what data is excluded, and what result supports a rollout decision. This page lists what gets measured; the actual targets belong in the written PoC scope, not in a marketing claim.
What you need to provide
- BOMs, routings and the product families you want covered.
- Inventory, safety stocks, lead times, lot-sizing rules and calendars.
- Open purchase orders, production orders and reservations.
- Scrap and yield factors, plus your current MRP output for the same horizon.
Who does what
Meta Smart Factory provides
- Discovery workshop and scope facilitation
- Solution configuration for the agreed scope
- Integration and connection work inside that scope
- MSF hardware listed in the proposal
- Training for the pilot users
- The KPI definitions and validation method
- Issue tracking and support during the pilot
- The final result report and rollout design
- A line-by-line reconciliation against your existing MRP result, with each difference explained.
- A prioritised master-data exception list — the records that actually cause missed parts.
You provide
- A named business owner and a named technical owner
- Timely access to users, the line, machines and approved systems
- An accurate explanation of the process and the master data
- Network, power, mounting and safety access
- ERP, PLC and vendor documentation, plus the experts who know them
- Representative samples or historical data
- Validation that the baseline is fair
- Feedback and the acceptance decision
- A planner who can confirm which differences are MSF being right and which are MSF being wrong.
- Access to the current MRP output for the same period and parameters.
Defined in the written proposal
- Panel PCs, tablets, servers and GPU servers
- Cameras, lenses, lighting and enclosures
- Scanners, printers, RFID readers, meters and sensors
- Travel, installation, freight, import duty and local electrical work
- Whether hardware is rented or purchased
- Whether any PoC fee is credited against a rollout
Commercial terms, hardware ownership, travel, integration scope and any rollout credit are defined in the written PoC proposal. They are not the same for every product, and this page does not promise them.
What you receive at the end
- A material plan for the scoped families over the agreed horizon.
- Shortage and excess report with the demand driving each line.
- Data-quality findings ranked by real shortage risk.
- Proposed exception workflow — who acts on what, and when.
- ERP integration design for a production rollout.
- Rollout recommendation and the scope of the first release.
Dependencies, exclusions and limits
This PoC depends on
- BOM and lead-time data being current for the scoped families.
- Access to your current MRP output for the same horizon and parameters.
Not included in this PoC
- Finite-capacity sequencing on machines, which is the APS PoC.
- Purchase order execution and supplier portal integration.
MRP output is only as good as the master data behind it. Where BOMs, lead times or lot sizes are wrong, this PoC reports it as a finding — it does not silently correct your data and then present the corrected result as a software improvement.
Go, adjust or stop — the decision gate
Frequently asked questions
Does this replace our ERP’s MRP?
Not necessarily, and the PoC does not assume it should. It shows where the two results differ and why. Sometimes the answer is that your ERP is fine and the real gap is data quality or exception handling — that is a legitimate and useful outcome.
How long does it take if our BOMs are messy?
The readiness step usually finds this within the first two weeks, and it becomes the headline finding. The plan is still run and still reconciled, but the honest deliverable becomes a prioritised data-cleanup work package with the shortage risk attached to each item.
Why measure planned-order stability?
Because a plan that changes every run is a plan buyers learn to ignore. Stability across consecutive cycles is what makes the output actionable, and it is measured here rather than assumed.
Can this run together with the APS PoC?
Yes, and they share data. MRP answers whether material will be there; APS answers whether capacity will. Run together they need one combined scope and a longer schedule than either alone.
Related products and PoC programs
Request this Proof of Concept
Tell us the scope you have in mind and we will come back with a written PoC plan: what gets connected, what you provide, how success is measured and what the decision at the end looks like.