SmartFlow APS
Production scheduling
Finite-capacity production scheduling: an interactive Gantt and a sequence optimizer on one screen, writing back to standard production orders.
On Microsoft AppSource (opens the marketplace listing in a new tab)
Industries / Manufacturing
Business Central for manufacturing — one install, configured for how you actually make things.
Discrete, process and batch are not three different ERPs. They are three configurations of the same Business Central install, and getting that configuration right is most of the project. Twenty-five-plus manufacturing implementations, run by the engineers who ship a finite-capacity production scheduler.
- Manufacturing implementations
- 25+
- Production efficiency gain
- 40%
- Quality compliance rate
- 90%
- Inventory reduction
- 30%
Sub-models
Which manufacturer you are changes the build
The four we implement, and what each one actually changes in the configuration.
Discrete
Countable units, production orders against a versioned BOM and routing. The configuration question is routing depth and how much of the shop floor reports back.
Process and batch
Formulas, yields and by-products rather than a clean parts list. Output rarely equals input, so scrap, yield variance and by-product costing have to be modelled before the first order posts, not reconciled afterwards.
Mixed-mode
Standard product lines and engineered one-offs on the same shop floor, from the same capacity. The trap is running two planning regimes against one set of work centres.
Make-to-order and project manufacturing
Demand arrives as a sales order or a project, not a forecast. Planning is driven from the order, and the cost has to stay attached to it all the way to invoice.
The processes, by name
If your planner uses the word, we implement the thing.
In standard Business Central wherever standard Business Central has it, and extended only where it genuinely does not.
- 01
Multi-level BOM and routing
Versioned production BOMs with real sub-assemblies, and routings with serial and parallel operations, setup and run time separated. Version dates matter: a BOM that changed in March must still explain what an order costed in February.
- 02
MPS and MRP
Master production schedule and requirements planning run against real demand — forecast, sales orders and safety stock — with the planning worksheet producing actionable, accountable suggestions instead of a wall of noise nobody carries out.
- 03
Capacity that reflects the shop
Work centres, machine centres and shop calendars set up to say what the plant can genuinely do on a Tuesday. Business Central plans infinite capacity by default — that is the single most common reason a promise date is wrong, and it is a configuration decision, not a defect.
- 04
Lot and serial tracking
Item tracking configured where it earns its keep, with expiration dates and FEFO picking where shelf life is real — so a trace runs in minutes, not in a week of spreadsheets.
- 05
Production costing that ties out
Standard or actual costing, with material, capacity and overhead variances landing where a controller can explain them. If the shop floor and the general ledger disagree at month-end, the implementation is not finished.
The part that gets tested
Traceability, when someone asks
The test of a manufacturing implementation is not the demo. It is the day a customer or a regulator asks where a lot went.
Forward and backward trace
From a received raw-material lot to every finished item and shipment that consumed it, and back again from a customer complaint to the lot behind it.
Shelf life and FEFO
Expiration dates carried on item tracking and enforced at picking, so the oldest stock that is still good leaves first — by configuration, not by discipline.
Quality holds
Stock that must not ship is blocked where the picker meets it, not flagged in a report someone reads on Friday.
Our apps that earn their keep here
Software we already ship for manufacturing work.
Software we already ship for this work.
WarehouseQ
Receiving, put-away, picking and counting
A mobile barcode WMS that runs inside Business Central. Scanner-driven receiving, put-away, picks, moves and counts — posting through BC’s own codeunits, so the ledger is the only source of truth.
On Microsoft AppSource (opens the marketplace listing in a new tab)
ContainerQ
License plating and container handling
License-plate management for pallets and containers: build, split, merge and move whole plates instead of line-by-line quantities.
On Microsoft AppSource
Disassembly BOM Manager
Disassembly and by-product yield
Disassembly BOM management and warehouse picking — break a finished item back into its components and post the yield correctly.
On Microsoft AppSource (opens the marketplace listing in a new tab)
Every app above is implemented by the team that built it — one contract, one accountable engineering group.
How we deliver
FitShipRun- 01
Fit to standard first
Most requirements are configuration, not code.
- 02
Build like it ships
Custom work held to our marketplace bar.
- 03
Run it with you
We stay through your first month-end close.
Straight answers
What manufacturing buyers actually ask us.
Including the ones where the honest answer is that we are not the right firm.
Can Business Central really schedule a shop floor, or do we need a separate system?
Standard Business Central plans capacity infinitely — it will happily load a work centre to 300% and report the date as achievable. That is the honest answer, and it is why finite scheduling is the one gap we filled with a product of our own rather than a configuration. For many shops the standard planning worksheet is enough; where it is not, the gap is specific and nameable, not a reason to buy a second ERP.
We run process manufacturing. Everyone tells us Business Central is discrete-only.
It is not, but it is discrete by default, and a process configuration that was set up as though it were discrete is the most expensive kind to unwind. Yields, by-products and formula scaling need deciding in the fit phase. We would rather tell you in week two that a sub-model is a poor fit than in month nine.
How much custom code will a manufacturing implementation need?
Less than you have been quoted, if the fit phase is done properly. Most of what gets built as custom in manufacturing projects is standard functionality nobody switched on. What genuinely needs building, we build to the same bar as our marketplace apps.
Our BOMs change constantly. Will that break the costing?
Only if versions are not used. Production BOM and routing versions with starting dates are standard, and they are what lets February’s order keep February’s cost after March’s engineering change. Getting teams to use them is a training problem; building the system without them is an implementation problem.
Can you migrate our production history from NAV or an older system?
Open orders, items, BOMs, routings and balances, yes. Full transactional history is usually the wrong thing to move — it is slow, expensive, and the old system can answer historical questions perfectly well in read-only. We audit what actually has to move during the fit phase and price it.
Who runs the project — a consultant or an engineer?
The same engineers who build our products. There is no separate delivery team to hand you to after the scope is signed, which is the point of being one team.
Next step
Talk to an engineer who has scheduled a real shop floor.
Thirty minutes, not a deck. We’ll tell you whether standard Business Central covers it, whether one of our apps does, or what a build would honestly take.
sales@dynamicspro.ca · Serving North America · 416-843-6575