WAREHOUSE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

Warehouse Product Management Systems and the role of IT management in saudi binladin Group

Warehouse Product Management Systems and the role of IT management in Saudi Bin-ladin Group

Introduction

If a businesses stock is stored in a database that is connected to both the office and the warehouse, then at any given moment you can check your stock and update them. If this system is connected to a customer's site that is ordering from you then this will automatically update the warehouse and place the order. Furthermore, if the stock levels of a particular product go below a recorded level then the suppliers (who are also connected to the system) (Baker 2007) dispatch the required quantity of the good. When the warehouse receives the product the suppliers are informed of delivery and a notice is sent to the warehouse that updates the stock automatically (Warehouse Management Systems 2010).

So EDI basically tries to give all parties involved a real-time view of what is happening in the day-to-day running of each business. This helps when businesses are trying to optimize their supply chain to make their processes more efficient. It is also interesting to note that e-commerce has empowered suppliers to a level that allows them to operate very efficiently. Knowledge is power, as the saying goes, and with the connections between supplier and customer, due to either private networks or the Internet, (Trimi 2005) suppliers have a wealth of knowledge available at any time. This enables the supplier to anticipate demand and adjust production and delivery accordingly. They no longer have to be re-active in their approach to business; e-commerce has allowed them to be pro-active. (Travis 2000)

Literature Review

In Saudi Bin-ladin Group a composite planning process exists to determine the specific technologies and procedures required in order to produce a product or service. Typically, programs control group inputs existing or forecasted orders into a Master Production Schedule (MPS). (Sure 2005)The MPS is used to generate the amount and dates of specific items required for each order. Rough-cut capacity planning then compares production, warehouse, equipment, facilities, and labor required against suppliers/vendors capacity to provide the materials as needed.

At this point, material requirements planning (MRP) takes the end product from the MPS and breaks this data down into component parts and subassemblies to create a materials plan. This plan specifies when production and purchase orders must be placed for each part and subassembly is required to complete the orders on schedule. The MRP is then broken down into a weekly/daily schedule to specify when machines, production lines, work centers and raw materials are needed. (Saudi Bin Ladin Group 2010)The recent trends toward moving from batch-oriented processing to online transaction processing systems have allowed the role of MRP to expand. This expansion has been a natural evolution of the process to include all aspects of production. The expanded MRP has been called Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP II), (Microsoft 2003) and with the addition of the Internet into the fully integrated computer ...