Know more about Agile PLM to SAP Design to Release PIP….

Agile Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) Integration Pack for SAP ERP connects the Enterprise PLM Product Record in Oracle Agile Product Collaboration with SAP ERP. The Agile PLM Design-to-Release integration process aids in manufacturing release process in building a ‘Design Anywhere, Build Anywhere’ business environment.

The PIP was built by reusing most of the services developed for Agile PLM to Oracle EBiz PIP. The Oracle EBiz related Application Business Connector Services were replaced by the SAP Application Business Connector Services. The Enterprise Business Services implementation was modified to suit the business process relevant to SAP.

Though some of the business processes like the Engineering Change Order implementation widely differ between SAP & Oracle EBiz but still the desired functionality requirements were met without any changes on the Agile related artifacts in the PIP. This could be achieved due to the flexible Integration framework that Oracle’s Application Integration Architecture (AIA)provides.

Another important feature about this PIP is the use of standard SAP APIs - BAPI (Business Application Programming Interface) & IDOC ( Intermediate Document). In total 12 APIs were utilized -11 BAPIs & an IDOC in the Agile PLM to SAP PIP.

How SAP PIP business process differs from Oracle EBiz PIP:-

a) Reserving of Item during the New Part Request Process (NPR) Process:- This synchronous process can be triggered on demand by the user in Agile. In case of SAP PIP ,this reserves a part number in SAP and the part number is returned to Agile

b) Use of Item templates: - In the Item Synchronization process, this PIP uses Item templates or Reference Material in SAP. The purpose of a reference material is to default all the mandatory values which are needed for creation of material in SAP, which might not be captured in the Agile system during item creation. This reference material need to be configured based on the Material type. In case if the item need to be created in more than one plant then a reference material needs to be maintained in each of the plants.

c) Posting of Change Order Data to SAP :- The sequence mentioned below is followed for the creation of Change Order Object in SAP:

1. The Change Order header is created first with the status ‘Inactive’ or equivalent status as configured by the user.
2. Item existence check: If the Item does not exists it is created, else the item is updated with the input received from PLM.
3. Item revision level creation & attachment of revision level to Item.
4. AML sync ( Not part of 2.4 Release)
5. BOM existence check: If the BOM does not exist, it is created else the BOM is updated accordingly. BOM is created or updated along with its corresponding Reference Designators.
6. Upon successful creation of the above objects, the Change Order status is changed to ‘Active’ else it remains as ‘Inactive’.

d) Global/Group BOM creation:- Customers would use this feature when they have the same product structure across plants. In case of SAP PIP this feature is enabled with setting the parameter GLOBAL_LEVEL_BOM = ‘True’ in the configuration file. In such case we create the BOM only at global level i.e. the integration shouldn’t be creating any BOMs in the plants. The BOM plant extension feature within SAP is used to extend the BOM to the associated plants. During BOM update, integration needs to update the BOM only at global level and SAP will internally replicate those changes across the associated plants.

Avinash C