ERP for Contract Manufacturing with Epicor Kinetic

Companies that take custom orders and produce the products and any needed subcontracted products or services, are known as contract manufacturers.

Fun fact: Epicor was initially developed in the early 1970s for a contract manufacturer in Minneapolis, MN. The product has undoubtedly grown over the years, but these are some of the basic yet vital industry concepts that Epicor’s contract manufacturing ERP utilizes.

• Quoting – Epicor Kinetic uses a set of quoting tables to generate cost-based estimates that can be marked up for pricing and then forwarded to the customer without affecting live/active orders.
• Part on-the-fly – In Epicor Kinetic, the item being quoted and manufactured does not need to have a part number input to build production details. Any part number can be entered for the part, and it can flow through the system, and be shipped and invoiced, without entering it in the part master.
• Engineer to order – This is another term for “one-off manufacturing.” Any assembly can be copied into the quote, then modified or adjusted, and a new price developed for a new part. Part numbering and other cross-references can be used to locate similar assemblies for this kind of job.
  • Epicor Kinetic keeps the job record as the “as-built” version of this product. In some contract manufacturing or job shops, there can be latitude on exactly how the product is made on the shop floor. Epicor Kinetic retains how the product was made and the associated costs.
• Costing – This is critical to the contract manufacturing business, and Epicor Kinetic provides real-time tracking of all material, labor, and overhead costs for every job.
• Project management – Frequently, multiple jobs can be part of a project, and Epicor Kinetic rolls up costs from multiple jobs into project stages and, ultimately, to the overall project. Epicor Kinetic also has a powerful expression builder for calculating incremental billing, such as sending an invoice when 30% of engineering and 50% of materials are completed.