ERP for Manufacturers Who Build Distinct, Countable Products.
Whether you run a job shop, assembly line, or engineer-to-order operation, discrete manufacturing demands precise BOMs, flexible routing, and real-time shop floor visibility. Business Central delivers production control that matches how your plant actually operates.
Precision Shop, Precision Numbers
What discrete manufacturers gain when BOMs, routings, and shop-floor data finally agree.
↑30%
OEE
with live shop-floor capture
1.2%
Scrap rate target
tracked operation by operation
Serial
Traceability
every unit, every component
Live
Job cost
vs. estimate in real time
The problems
Discrete Manufacturing Demands Precision
Building distinct, countable products — from assembled goods to custom-engineered equipment — requires ERP that handles complexity without forcing rigid processes.
Multi-Level BOM Complexity
Deep bill of materials with sub-assemblies, phantom items, and revision control. When BOMs change mid-production, your system needs to handle it without breaking costing.
Mixed-Mode Production
Some products are built to stock, others made to order, and some engineered from scratch. Running multiple production modes in a single system is challenging.
Shop Floor Scheduling
Balancing work center capacity, machine availability, and labor across multiple concurrent jobs while meeting delivery dates — without overloading any resource.
Engineering Change Management
ECOs affect BOMs, routings, and costing. Without a controlled change process, you end up building to outdated specs or scrambling to update multiple systems.
Accurate Job Costing
Understanding true cost per unit — materials, labor, overhead, and scrap — is essential for pricing and profitability. But capturing all inputs accurately is the hard part.
Subcontracting Management
Outsourced operations like plating, heat treating, or specialized machining need to be tracked as part of your production process with full cost visibility.
Every part is countable. Every operation is timeable. Every cost is knowable — if the system is paying attention.
From Estimating to Earnings
What changes when every part, every operation, and every cost is in one system.
BOMs maintained in spreadsheets, versions drift
Engineering-controlled BOMs with revision history
Shop floor reports labor on paper, end of shift
Barcode capture at every operation, in real time
Job profitability known weeks after the shipment
Live job cost vs. estimate with variance alerts
Subcontract operations tracked in email threads
Subcontract POs tied to the routing, costs roll up automatically
What we deliver
Discrete Manufacturing Capabilities
Business Central configured for the realities of discrete production — from simple assembly to complex engineer-to-order.
Multi-Level BOM & Routing
Multi-level BOMs with version control, phantom items, and configurable routing operations. Support for alternate BOMs and routing options based on available resources.
Production Order Management
Planned, firm planned, and released production orders with material availability checks, capacity scheduling, and real-time status tracking through each operation.
Capacity Planning & Scheduling
Finite and infinite capacity planning across work centers and machine centers. Visual scheduling with drag-and-drop rescheduling and bottleneck identification.
Quality Management
Inspection plans tied to operations, quality orders with pass/fail criteria, non-conformance tracking, and certificate of conformance generation.
Inventory & Material Planning
MRP-driven material planning with safety stock, lead time calculations, and automated requisition worksheets. Track components through the entire production process.
Subcontractor Management
Track outsourced operations as steps in your production routing. Manage subcontractor purchase orders, shipped materials, and returned finished goods with full cost capture.
From Quote to Shipped Product
A typical discrete manufacturing workflow in Business Central, configured to match your operation.
Sales Order & BOM Configuration
Receive the order, confirm the BOM configuration, check material availability, and generate production orders with calculated lead times.
Material Planning & Procurement
MRP generates requisitions for missing components. Purchase orders are created, approved, and tracked through receipt and inspection.
Production & Shop Floor Execution
Release production orders to the floor. Track progress through each routing operation, capture labor and machine time, and log quality inspections.
Completion, Costing & Shipment
Finish production orders with actual cost capture. Post output to inventory, generate shipping documents, and invoice with accurate cost of goods.
Sales Order & BOM Configuration
Receive the order, confirm the BOM configuration, check material availability, and generate production orders with calculated lead times.
Material Planning & Procurement
MRP generates requisitions for missing components. Purchase orders are created, approved, and tracked through receipt and inspection.
Production & Shop Floor Execution
Release production orders to the floor. Track progress through each routing operation, capture labor and machine time, and log quality inspections.
Completion, Costing & Shipment
Finish production orders with actual cost capture. Post output to inventory, generate shipping documents, and invoice with accurate cost of goods.
Case Study
How a Canadian Dairy Manufacturer Gained Production Control
A mid-market dairy manufacturer running on spreadsheets and disconnected systems needed real-time production visibility, accurate costing, and lot traceability. We implemented Business Central with full BOM management, production order tracking, quality control, and automated variance reporting — reducing production reporting time by 70% and improving cost accuracy to within 2% of actual.
Read the Full Case StudyFrequently Asked Questions, Answered
Can Business Central handle engineer-to-order production?
How does Business Central handle mixed-mode manufacturing?
What about serial number and lot tracking?
Can we capture shop floor data in real time?
How do you handle the transition from our legacy system?
Ready for Production Control That Matches Your Operation?
Get a free assessment from manufacturing ERP consultants who understand discrete production.