Getting Started With PeopleSoft Product Configurator

This chapter provides an overview of PeopleSoft Product Configurator business processes and discusses:

Click to jump to parent topicPeopleSoft Product Configurator Business Processes

PeopleSoft Product Configurator is a rules-based system that enables you to sell, order, and manufacture complex items and products. You can:

Note. You must set up business units, setIDs, items, and products before using PeopleSoft Product Configurator.

The following graphic lists the PeopleSoft Product Configurator business processes:

PeopleSoft Product Configurator business processes

We discuss these business processes in the business process chapters of this PeopleBook.

Click to jump to parent topicPeopleSoft Product Configurator Integrations

PeopleSoft Product Configurator is tightly integrated with the following PeopleSoft applications:

We cover integration considerations in the implementation chapter of this PeopleBook.

Supplemental information about third-party application integration is on the PeopleSoft Customer Connection website.

PeopleSoft Order Management

PeopleSoft Order Management directly invokes PeopleSoft Product Configurator to take advantage of order management functions. Entering configured orders is not much different from entering normal orders. When a customer places an order for a configured item, the distribution configuration process begins when you click the Configure button on the order entry page. At that time, the system processes the distribution configuration rules and displays and validates all of the corresponding pages.

PeopleSoft Cost Management

PeopleSoft Product Configurator automatically generates standard configuration costs within PeopleSoft Cost Management once configured production orders are created in the system. In addition, the PeopleSoft Product Configurator is integrated into the standard PeopleSoft Cost Management procedures—cost roll-up and updating production cost by cost type and cost version.

PeopleSoft Manufacturing

The production configuration process takes the detailed configuration information captured during order entry in PeopleSoft Order Management and sends requirements to PeopleSoft Manufacturing. The production configuration rules enable you to dynamically specify the components and operation elements without having to create standard bills of materials or routings for each specific configuration. The production configuration process generates configured production IDs, component lists, operation lists, and configured costs. You can use the PeopleSoft Product Configurator’s Production Comparison inquiry to manage changes to the configured sales orders once production is already in process.

In addition, you can generate production orders in PeopleSoft Manufacturing directly without entering a sales order. This is a useful feature if you are not in a completely make-to-order environment, and you produce configured items for stock.

Finally, the PeopleSoft Product Configurator can access master routings and bills of materials from PeopleSoft Manufacturing. The PeopleSoft Product Configurator enables the use of any existing routings and or or bills of material defined in PeopleSoft Manufacturing. As previously mentioned, you can also create dynamic bills of material in the PeopleSoft Product Configurator leveraging any existing bills of material. After running the configuration process, you can use the Configured Cost Exploded Bill Of Material inquiry to view fully exploded and costed bills of material for configured items as well as their configured subassemblies.

PeopleSoft Inventory

PeopleSoft Product Configurator identifies unique configurations in inventory for reservation, picking, and costing with configuration codes. These configuration codes tie to lot numbers within PeopleSoft Inventory. You generally enter configured inventory by receiving a configured production ID. You can also enter it into the system through an inventory adjustment. You can then track configured inventory through the system by using the lot control features in PeopleSoft Inventory.

PeopleSoft Purchasing

The PeopleSoft Product Configurator can automatically generate purchase requisitions in PeopleSoft Purchasing. It also can dynamically create product kits based on configuration rule definitions for fulfillment in PeopleSoft Inventory and or or PeopleSoft Purchasing.

PeopleSoft Planning

PeopleSoft Demand Planning converts configured items along with their dynamic bills of material into dependent demand within the forecasting process. PeopleSoft Supply Planning has full visibility to the configuration code and dynamic bills of material and routing for configured items and subassemblies.

PeopleSoft CRM

The PeopleSoft Product Configurator is integrated into both the PeopleSoft Financials and Supply Chain Management (FSCM) and PeopleSoft Customer Relationship Management (CRM) databases. Within the CRM database, the PeopleSoft Product Configurator integrates with the PeopleSoft Order Capture and PeopleSoft Order Capture Self-Service product offerings. Configured orders within PeopleSoft Order Capture and PeopleSoft Order Capture Self-Service within CRM can be seamlessly integrated with PeopleSoft Order Management within FSCM with a single configuration rule set. In addition, PeopleSoft Product Configurator provides a full publish and subscribe mechanism in order to facilitate the synchronization of all configuration setup records between PeopleSoft Financials and Supply Chain Management (FSCM) databases and PeopleSoft Customer Relationship Management (CRM) databases. The following application messages can be used to synchronize configuration data between FSCM and CRM databases:

See Synchronizing PeopleSoft Product Configuration Data.

Click to jump to parent topicPeopleSoft Product Configurator Implementation

PeopleSoft Setup Manager enables you to review a list of setup tasks for the organization for the products that you are implementing. The setup tasks include the components that you must set up, listed in the order in which you must enter data into the component tables, and links to the corresponding PeopleBook documentation.

Other Sources of Information

In the planning phase of the implementation, take advantage of all PeopleSoft sources of information, including the installation guides, table-loading sequences, data models, and business process maps. A complete list of these resources appears in the preface in the PeopleSoft Application Fundamentals for Financials, Enterprise Service Automation, and Supply Chain Management PeopleBook, with information about where to find the most current version of each.

See Also

PeopleSoft Enterprise Application Fundamentals PeopleBook Preface