SAP Production Planning and Control (SAP PP) is the central module within the SAP ERP and S/4HANA system landscape for planning, controlling and monitoring production processes. It supports manufacturing companies in designing their production processes efficiently and transparently - from determining requirements to resource planning and production execution.
SAP PP can be used to create production orders, manage production capacities, automatically determine material requirements and optimally utilize machine and personnel resources. Whether make-to-order or series production, discrete production or process manufacturing - the module offers the necessary flexibility to map various production strategies with system support.
Close integration with other modules such as Materials Management (MM), Sales & Distribution (SD), Quality Management (QM) and Plant Maintenance (PM) creates a continuous data flow from the customer order through production to delivery. Companies benefit from short throughput times, minimized stock levels and significantly increased production reliability.
Sales and shipping processes
Holistic planning along the entire value chain
SAP PP offers a variety of functional modules for holistic production planning and control. At the heart of this is the production planning process, which is divided into requirements planning (MRP), capacity planning and detailed control. When planning, the system not only takes into account material availability, but also bottlenecks in machinery and personnel as well as delivery dates and production cycles.
Automated material requirements planning based on networked master data
A key component is material requirements planning (MRP), which automatically generates requirements from parts lists, routings and stock levels and triggers purchase orders or production orders. The work plans and parts lists are central master data objects with which each production process is described in detail - including machine times, set-up processes and material consumption.
Flexible mapping of different production types
SAP PP distinguishes between different types of production - including discrete production, series production, project production or process-oriented production in combination with SAP PP-PI (Production Planning for Process Industries). The detailed scheduling and capacity planning enables companies to control their production on the basis of realistic resource availability and minimize throughput times, bottlenecks and downtimes.
Feedback and real-time transparency in the production process
The feedback of production orders - e.g. via integrated PDA systems or SAP Fiori apps - ensures that actual times, material consumption and quality data flow directly back into the system. This creates complete transparency regarding production status, costs and capacity utilization.
Technical customizability and potential of SAP S/4HANA
In technical terms, SAP PP offers comprehensive customizing options for mapping individual production processes - from document types and planning strategies to availability checks. Industry-specific enhancements can be seamlessly integrated via BAdIs and user exits. In the S/4HANA world, companies also benefit from simplified data models, improved MRP runtime (MRP Live) and modern user interfaces based on SAP Fiori.
