Advanced Topics

This chapter covers the following topics:

Customizing Demand Planning hierarchies

Oracle Demand Planning supports nine dimensions: product, time, geography, ship from location, sales channel, sales representative, demand class, user defined dimension 1, and user defined dimension 2. Hierarchies and levels for the first seven dimensions are preseeded, while they need to be defined for the two user defined dimensions.

This whole Oracle Demand Planning structure consisting of dimensions, hierarchies, and levels is very flexible and can be easily altered. The steps to exploit this flexibility are presented in this section. The first feature pertains to the one time setup related changes in the basic Oracle Demand Planning structure. The second feature relates to the ongoing and routine changes.

For details about the preseeded dimensions, hierarchies, and levels, see: Setup Demand Planning Dimensions and Setup Demand Planning Hierarchies.

Manipulating hierarchies

Every business is structured differently and it may be required to match the respective business processes while implementing Oracle Demand Planning. During the normal course of business also, it is often necessary to restructure the hierarchies. Such restructuring may include changing the names of levels or hierarchies, or defining new hierarchies.

When the six dimensions with preseeded levels and hierarchies are not adequate, two user defined dimensions can be used. When the preseeded levels and hierarchies are not adequate, new levels and hierarchies can be defined.

To define a new Hierarchy using the existing levels:

For this example, My Geo Hierarchy is the name of the new hierarchy to be represented as: Ship to Location - Country - All Geography.

  1. Choose the Demand Planning System Administrator responsibility.

  2. To open the Demand Planning Hierarchies window, select Setup > Hierarchies from the Navigator.

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  3. Add a new record to enter a new hierarchy by completing these fields: Name, Description, and Dimension.

    Field Value
    Name My Geo Hierarchy
    Description Test New Hierarchy
    Dimension Geography
  4. To open the Demand Planning Hierarchy Levels window, select Setup > Hierarchy Levels from the Navigator.

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  5. Enter a new record. As an example, you can complete the fields with the following information:

    • Select My Geo Hierarchy for the Hierarchy column.

    • Select Country for the Level column.

    • Select All Geography for the Parent Level column.

    • Enter MSD_SR_COUNT_ALL_V for the Relationship View column. Any view name on the same pattern can be specified.

    • Enter the same values in all the remaining columns as already specified for existing hierarchies.

  6. Repeat steps 5 through 10 to enter the second relationship. Enter the second relationship from Ship to Location to country as shown above (the row below the highlighted entry). For example:

    Field Value
    Hierarchy My Geo Hierarchy
    Level Ship to Location
    Parent Level Country
    Relationship View MSD_SR_SHIPTO_COUNT_V
    Level ID Column LEVEL_VALUE_PK

    The Relationship Views entered in the previous steps are the source views that steer the aggregation of levels collected from the source applications. For any new set of relationship between levels, these relationship views, which are source views, must be defined.

    The SQL commands that create one of the new views, MSD_SR_SHIPTO_COUNT_V is presented below to impart some understanding of the view's definition. The purpose for this view is to map the values and primary keys of levels and parent levels to the source data. For example, the following table shows what will be achieved by creating this view:

    Level Level Value Primary Key for Level Value Parent Level Value Primary Key for Parent Level Value
    1 Detroit 101 United States 1001
    2 East Bay 102 United States 1001
    3 San Jose 103 United States 1001

The following section contains the SQL commands that created this view:

MSD_SR_SHIPTO_COUNT_V

To define new Levels and Hierarchies:

The process of defining new levels and creating hierarchies using these new levels is described below for user defined dimension 1. The same process is applicable for user defined dimension 2 and other regular dimensions such as product, geography, ship from location, sales channel, and sales representative. Assume that the user defined dimension 1 should be set up such that it consists of two user defined hierarchies:

Manipulating the level values and associations

Level values, such as, Western distribution center and southwest distribution center, for a level can be viewed and changed after collecting them from the sources applications. The routine business changes in the level value associations can also be accomplished. Forecasts for the lower levels can roll up to the corresponding higher levels. For example, consider the reassignment of a particular customer site (AU Dodge - CDET) from the Michigan sales region to the Ohio sales region. Forecasts for AU Dodge - CDET need to roll up under the Ohio sales region instead of the Michigan sales region.

To change Level Value associations:

  1. Choose the Demand Planning System Administrator responsibility.

  2. To open the Find Level Values window, select Dimension Values > Level Values in the Navigator.

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  3. Enter the Dimension, Hierarchy, and Level of the child level value in the Find Level Values window.

  4. Select Find. The Level Values window is populated with all the values of the selected hierarchy level.

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  5. Select the appropriate value on the Level Values window and select Associations.

    The Level Associations window appears.

  6. You can change the Parent Level Value from the list of values.

  7. Select OK.

Or you can go directly to the Level Associations window with the following steps:

  1. To open the Find Level Associations window, select Dimension Values > Level Associations in the Navigator.

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  2. In the Find Level Associations window, enter the Dimension, and other details such as Level Name that will take you to the Level Associations you want to change.

  3. Select Find. The Level Associations window is populated based on the selections you made in the Find window.

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Multiple Step UOM Conversion

In Oracle Demand Planning, the forecast for an item is presented in its primary unit of measure (UOM). When the forecasts of several items are rolled up to a higher level, such as product category in the product hierarchy, the forecast numbers are converted from the base units of measure to a common unit of measure that has been selected by the user for the demand plan. Without such conversion, the rolled up numbers would be meaningless, since a single aggregate number could include quantities in different units of measure. The conversion can be accomplished whether the demand plan unit of measure belongs to the same or different UOM class for the various items. The UOM conversions across UOM classes are based on items. With this feature, the available conversion factors are analyzed and used by the system.

Some examples of units of measure are: gallon, quart, inch, yard, kilogram, case, box, unit, acre, cubic foot, and each. For example, a single unit of a product. Some examples of UOM class are: length, mass, volume, and package. Different units of measure can belong to different UOM classes. Feet belong to the length class, and pounds belong to the weight class. Conversion between two units of measure is done using a conversion factor or coefficient.

Two and three step UOM conversions

When a direct conversion from a given item's unit of measure to the demand plan unit of measure is not available, Oracle Demand Planning does a two-step or three-step conversion.

A two-step conversion is a conversion from one unit of measure to the base unit of measure of the UOM class, then from that base unit of measure to a final unit of measure. So, a two-step conversion involves the use of two different conversion factors. For example, when the item specific unit of measure of widgets is boxes and the plan unit of measure is kilograms, the boxes of widgets is converted to the base unit of measure of each (one unit), and is then converted to kilograms.

A three-step conversion is an interclass conversion between a unit of measure A in class 1 to a unit of measure B in class 2, where neither unit of measure A nor unit of measure B is the base unit of measure of its class. The conversion path is:

  1. From unit of measure A to the base unit of measure of class 1.

  2. From the base unit of measure of class 1 to the base unit of measure of class 2.

  3. From the base unit of measure of class 2 to unit of measure B.

Analyze the available UOM conversion factors

To perform a multiple step UOM conversion, the available conversion factors are searched in the following order:

These conversion factors are analyzed and a conversion path is determined. The required steps are identified for each item separately. If none of the above is found, the conversion factor defaults to 1.

Aggregate the forecast by appropriate UOM conversions

The diverse units of measure of various items are converted to one demand plan unit of measure to roll up the forecast numbers along the product hierarchy. This is accomplished using the appropriate conversion factors for the conversion path, such as, steps. The user is able to create and view the forecasts that include items whose units of measure are of UOM classes that are different from the UOM class of the demand plan, and items whose conversion coefficients are item dependent. The actuals (for example, bookings and shipments) are also rolled up the hierarchy in the same manner.

Example 1 How conversions are accomplished

In the following example, Quantity is one UOM class. Each and Dozen are the different units of measure while Each is the base unit of measure of Quantity UOM class. Weight is yet another UOM class. Pound and Kilogram are the different units of measure while Pound is the base unit of measure of Weight UOM class. The following table shows item dependent UOM conversions across these two UOM classes:

From UOM Class From UOM To UOM Class To UOM Item Conversion Rate
Quantity Each Weight Pound Motor casing 2
Quantity Each Weight Pound Head casing 1.5

This table shows UOM conversions within the same UOM class:

From UOM Class From UOM To UOM Class To UOM Item Conversion Rate
Quantity Dozen Quantity Each All 12
Weight Pound Weight Kilogram All 0.4536

In Oracle Demand Planning, the unit of measure has been selected as Kilogram and the primary unit of measure for the two items: Motor Casing and Head Casing, is Dozen. The forecast generated by Oracle Demand Planning for the two items: Motor Casing and Head Casing, is 1000 and 2000 respectively for August, 2002.

For the August, 2002 forecast for the Casing product category, to which these items belong, the conversion steps are:

The Motor Casing forecast conversion calculation is 1000 * 12 * 2 * 0.4536 = 10886.4 kg.

The Head Casing forecast conversion calculation is 2000 * 12 * 1.5 * 0.4536 = 16329.6 kg.

The forecast for the Casing product category is 10886.4 + 16329.6 = 27216 kg, and appears in Oracle Demand Planning as 27216 kg.

To apply UOM conversions:

Two things must be done for UOM conversions to take effect:

  1. You must collect UOM conversion data from the source instance.

    For details, see: To collect Currency Conversion or UOM Conversion data:.

    A quick summary of the steps you need to perform are:

    1. Choose the Demand Planning System Administrator responsibility.

    2. Use the following navigation to open the Collection Utility window and Parameters window:

      In the Navigator, select Collections > Collect from Oracle Systems > UOM Conversion.

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    3. Select an instance.

    4. Select OK.

    5. Submit the request.

  2. You must specify a base unit of measure for the demand plan.

    For details, see: About defining a Demand Plan.

Using Sales Forecasts and Opportunities

Sales organizations can identify potential opportunities from their contacts and leads with the customers, and a portion of these opportunities end up as firm customer orders. These sales opportunities with varying degrees of probabilities of success are used to forecast sales. Demand analysts can compare sales forecasts with history based statistical forecasts and other forecasts such as manufacturing forecasts. Analysts may also use portions of the sales forecasts in their final forecasts.

You can use the sales forecast from Oracle Sales Online in Oracle Demand Planning. Out-of-the-box collections enable you to bring into your demand plan best case sales forecast, most probable sales forecast, worst case sales forecast, weighted sales pipeline based on win probability, and best case sales pipeline numbers for the specified time period. You can specify the sales forecasts that you want to bring into Oracle Demand Planning.

Sales representatives and sales managers estimate the sales forecasts on opportunity and product category worksheets for their part of assignments. These worksheets present the summary of sales opportunities by customers and interest types, respectively. The sales forecast numbers on these worksheets can be modified and saved. After completing their estimation of future sales, the sales representatives and managers submit these worksheets through Oracle Sales Online. You can choose to collect sales forecast data into Oracle Demand Planning for any time period from any of these worksheets. The sales forecasts are compared to statistical manufacturing and customer forecasts in Oracle Demand Planning. The comparative trends as well as the upside and downside misses are used to estimate the true picture of future demand. Once agreed and approved, the resulting consensus forecast is used for planning operations.

Oracle Sales Online supports a hierarchical reporting structure of sales representatives and managers and sales groups.

Sales forecast data enters Oracle Demand Planning for not only the top level sales group that was collected, but also for the next level sales groups if the top level sales groups have not submitted the sales forecast. In Oracle Demand Planning, you can also allocate the data based on some other data stream that has data at desired levels, such as Booking History.

Sales information can be brought in from Oracle Sales Online as well as other external customer relationship management applications. Data mapping information is provided so that sales opportunity data from external sources can be brought into the Demand Planning Server.

In Oracle Demand Planning, there are two ways to get sales information:

Sales forecasts

There are five seeded data streams to hold the five types of sales forecasts: Sales Forecast - Best Case, Sales Forecast - Worst Case, Sales Forecast - Probable Case, Sales Forecast - Pipeline, and Sales Forecast - Weighted Pipeline. The forecast data can be brought at following levels: All Sales Representatives for the top most sales group only, All Sales Channels, and All Organizations. The dimension levels for Product, Geography, and Time dimensions are kept flexible to match the levels allowed in the Oracle Sales Online worksheets.

You can also use flexible data streams to store both the parent and child data. The history of the dependent demand and of the model should be in the same data stream, either booking history or a custom data stream, for the system to calculate the planning percent.

During data collection from Oracle Sales Online, you specify a stream designator to identify the collected set of data. For example; if you name the collected data as Q1Q2-FY03, the five data streams holding just that set of data will become: Sales Forecast - Best Case: Q1Q2-FY03, Sales Forecast - Worst Case: Q1Q2-FY03, Sales Forecast - Probable Case: Q1Q2-FY03, Sales Forecast - Pipeline: Q1Q2-FY03, and Sales Forecast - Weighted Pipeline: Q1Q2-FY03.

The dimension levels at which the sales forecasts are used in Oracle Demand Planning depend on the type of worksheet used in Oracle Sales Online. The dimension level mapping to sales forecasts is flexible only for three dimensions: Geography, Product, and Time. Flexibility refers to the ability to accept sales forecasts at different levels in different collection runs. However, the dimension level has to be the same for a set of collected data. The seeded collection programs in Oracle Demand Planning determine the dimension level, depending on the selection of a data source from the following choices:

To collect sales forecasts from Oracle Sales Online:

The two prerequisites to collecting sales forecasts from Oracle Sales Online are:

  1. Choose the Demand Planning System Administrator responsibility.

  2. In Navigator, select Collections > Collect From Oracle Systems > Sales Forecast.

    The Sales Forecast Collection window appears.

    For details, see: To collect Sales Forecast data from Oracle Sales Online to the Demand Planning Server.

  3. Complete the collection parameters:

    • Start Date and End Date: specify a date range for which you want to collect sales forecast numbers.

    • Forecast Category: an interest type can roll up to two or more forecast categories. In such situations, you should specify a forecast category to avoid double counting. You need to know and specify the exact forecast category. If this field is left blank, sales forecast numbers for all the forecast categories are brought over to Oracle Demand Planning.

    • Bucket Type: for sales forecasts (at various time levels such as, fiscal month and fiscal quarter). You must select a bucket type from the list of fiscal calendar level values. Typically, all the sales representatives will use only one type of bucket, such as fiscal month or fiscal quarter, to forecast sales and you should specify that bucket only.

    • Source of Collection: you must select the type of worksheet from where the seeded collection programs in Oracle Demand Planning will bring the data. For example, Product Category Worksheet, or Forecast Worksheet.

If you have set up your data collections to be a two-step process by setting the profile option, MSD: ONE-step collection to No, you need to pull the sales forecast data from the Demand Planning staging tables to the fact tables.

  1. Choose the Demand Planning System Administrator responsibility.

  2. In Navigator, (to pull sales forecasts) select Collections > Pull Data > Sales Forecast.

Upgrade Considerations for Integrating with Oracle Sales Online

Currently you have two options in Oracle Sales Online:

  1. Oracle Sales Online (ASF): Oracle Demand Planning does not collect interest types. Instead, top-level product categories from default Product Catalog hierarchy are collected as interest types into the existing "Interest Type" hierarchy. Product category forecast is translated to top level product category.

  2. Oracle Sales Online (ASN):

    1. Oracle Demand Planning does not collect interest types. Instead, top-level product categories from default Product Catalog hierarchy are collected as interest types into the existing "Interest Type" hierarchy. Product category forecast is translated to top level product category.

    2. Oracle Demand Planning does not collect data based on opportunity worksheet, as this worksheet cannot be created in Oracle Sales Online.

For details about the Oracle Sales Online, see: Oracle Sales Online User's Guide.

To use Sales Forecasts in Oracle Demand Planning:

  1. Choose Demand Plans. Use the Find Demand Plan window to select a demand plan.

  2. From the Demand Plans window, select the Input Parameters tab. You can include the collected sales forecast numbers into your demand plan by selecting them as input parameters.

    For details about Input Parameters, see: Input Parameters.

  3. Complete the demand planning cycle by running the Demand Planning Engine batch processes, as necessary. For details, see: Workflow Processes Within the Demand Planning Cycle.

  4. Compare sales forecasts to other forecasts in a worksheet. For details, see: Arranging and Viewing Data in Worksheets.

You can convert the sales dollars to sales volume using a specified price list and compare the sales forecast to statistical, manufacturing, and customer forecasts. You may combine the two forecasts using formula measures functionality in Oracle Demand Planning, or modify a forecast by manual edits.

You can display and manipulate data in a demand plan using multiple time hierarchies. You can bring sales forecast at month or quarter level in fiscal calendar, and view the forecasts at week or period levels in manufacturing calendar. Generally, the sales forecasts and manufacturing forecasts are expressed in different calendars and product categories. Oracle Demand Planning will do appropriate conversions to facilitate their comparison.

The sales forecast numbers will be allocated down from fiscal quarter or month levels to the day level and aggregated up to the hierarchies on other calendars. For example, manufacturing weeks and periods in manufacturing calendar.

Sales opportunities

Once the sales opportunity data is in the demand planning server, the Sales Opportunity data stream can be used as an input parameter for a demand plan in Oracle Demand Planning the same way as described above for Sales Forecasts. Demand planners can then use this valuable information for forecast analysis and update.

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To import sales opportunities:

Since Oracle Demand Planning does not provide any collection programs, the sales opportunity data needs to be loaded into the Oracle Demand Planning staging tables via flat files.

The following diagram is a Data Model that shows how sales opportunity information is imported:

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For details on how to collect sales information from Oracle Sales Online, see: To collect Sales Forecast data from Oracle Sales Online to the Demand Planning Server.

Sales opportunity mappings

After populating the data, the customer can use the view MSD_OPPORTUNITY_DATA_V to verify that populated rows are valid. Records that have valid information are visible via this view. The following table explains the mapping for MSD_CS_DATA table columns for populating Sales Opportunity data:

Column Name Comments
CS_DATA_ID Unique Key, Use MSD_CS_DATA_S sequence to generate unique key.
CS_DEFINITION_ID This is the associated Custom Definition ID of Sales Opportunity. Fetch it using following SQL statement. Select cs_definition_id from msd_cs_definitions where name = 'MSD_SALES_OPPORTUNITY'.
ATTRIBUTE_1 Instance.
ATTRIBUTE_2 Product Dimension Level ID.
ATTRIBUTE_3 Source Primary Key of Product Level.
ATTRIBUTE_6 Geography Dimension Level ID.
ATTRIBUTE_7 Source Primary Key of Geography Level.
ATTRIBUTE_10 Organization Dimension Level ID.
ATTRIBUTE_11 Source Primary Key of Organization Level.
ATTRIBUTE_14 Customer Level ID.
ATTRIBUTE_15 Source Primary Key for Customer.
ATTRIBUTE_18 Sales Rep Dimension Level ID.
ATTRIBUTE_19 Source Sales Rep PK.
ATTRIBUTE_22 Sales Channel Dimension Level ID.
ATTRIBUTE_23 Source Sales Channel PK.
ATTRIBUTE_34 Time Level ID (FND Lookup - MSD_PERIOD_TYPE).
ATTRIBUTE_41 Quantity.
ATTRIBUTE_42 Amount.
ATTRIBUTE_43 End Date. Store in YYYY/MM/DD format.

All dimension data is mandatory. For dimensions that are not used, please use the top dimension level as a dummy value. For example, if the Sales Channel dimension is not used, then use Level ID 33 (for example, All Sales Channel). The primary key value for the dimension should be set to -777. This corresponds to a preseeded level value of OTHER, which is present for all preseeded dimension levels in Oracle Demand Planning.

To find the level ID for a particular dimension level:

  1. Choose the Demand Planning System Administrator responsibility.

  2. To open the Demand Planning Levels form, select Setup > Levels in the Navigator.

  3. Select the Dimension level you would like to examine.

  4. To open the Examine Field and Variable Values form, select Diagnostics > Examine from the Help menu.

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  5. In Block, select LEVELS.

  6. In Field, type LEVEL_ID.

  7. Press the Tab key.

    The value for the LEVEL_ID appears in the Value field.

  8. Select OK.

Forecasting for Service Parts

Service parts forecasting allows you to forecast service parts demand based on:

  1. Maintenance schedule of products.

  2. Usage (consumption history) of service parts to repair products.

Forecasting based on Maintenance Schedules

Oracle Demand Planning is integrated with Oracle Complex Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul to provide consumables material planning capability for fleet maintenance operators. Example of fleet maintenance operators include companies in the aerospace and defense industries. Oracle Demand Planning considers consumables requirements for near-term and longer-term scheduled (routine or planned) maintenance as well as unscheduled (non-routine and unplanned) maintenance. The near-term schedule is for maintenance that has been scheduled and sourced to a specific repair facility, and the longer-term schedule is based on maintenance plan. For details about Oracle Complex Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul and the unit maintenance plan, see: Oracle Complex Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul User's Guide.

Oracle Demand Planning collects material requirements from Complex Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul based on the consumption or usage of service parts. It collects the future material requirements from scheduled visits and unit maintenance plans, and the history of routine and non-routine material requirements. The collected data are available as separate data streams in Oracle Demand Planning.

To collect complex maintenance, repair and overhaul data into demand planning:

  1. Choose the Demand Planning System Administrator responsibility.

  2. In the Navigator, select Collections > Collect from Oracle Systems, and select on of the four data collection programs for streams for complex maintenance, repair, and overhaul data:

  3. Material usage history - Unplanned maintenance

  4. Material requirements - Planned maintenance

  5. Material usage history - Planned maintenance

  6. Material requirements - Scheduled visits

    For details on these data streams, see: Input Parameters.

    The table below shows the default data stream definitions for the Oracle Demand Planning Complex Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul.

    Level/ Data Stream Product Ship From Time
    Material Requirements - Planned Maintenance Item All Organizations Day
    Material Requirements - Scheduled Visits Item Organization Day
    Material Usage History - Planned Maintenance Item Organization Day
    Material Usage History - Unplanned Maintenance Item Organization Day
  7. The Custom Stream Collection window appears. For details on how to complete this window, see: Procedure for Collecting Data.

  8. Select Submit. Or select Submit and Schedule.

  9. Select OK.

Once the data is collected, you can set up your demand plan and complete your planning cycle activities to create two separate forecasts:

These two forecasts can then be fed as separate forecast scenarios to Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning. Alternatively, the two forecasts can be added to form an integrated forecast of material requirements and then fed as a single forecast scenario to Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning.

The forecasts can also be fed to Oracle Inventory Optimization in the same manner. In addition, forecast errors can be fed to Oracle Inventory Optimization. The forecast errors of the material requirements for unscheduled maintenance are created during the statistical forecasting, but the forecast errors of material requirements for scheduled maintenance need to be created by comparing the prior period forecast versions to the actuals.

To forecast complex maintenance, repair, and overhaul data in Oracle Demand Planning:

  1. Build or select your desired demand plan. For details about how to setup your demand plan, see: Procedure to define a Demand Plan.

    In the Demand Plans window Input Parameters tab, include the input parameters you want to be used in forecasting. For details about Input Parameters, see: Input Parameters.

  2. Run the stages of the demand planning cycle (as necessary), including populating the forecast measure.

    For details, see: About the Stages in the Planning Cycle. And for details on how to populate measures, see: Populating Measures (Stage 2).

  3. Compare the forecast to reference data. For example, you can use the Material Requirements - Scheduled Visits data to adjust the Material Requirements - Planned Maintenance forecast in a worksheet.

  4. Adjust and edit the forecast. For details, see: (LINK TO DPE CHAPTER).

  5. Publish forecast(s) to Oracle Inventory Optimization and/or Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning. For details, see: Publishing Forecast Data Back to the Source.

    Oracle Inventory Optimization generates optimal time-phased safety stock recommendations for all maintenance facilities and warehouses based on specified service level and budget constraints.

    Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning separately collects the material requirements for scheduled visits and uses it as committed sales order demand to consume the material forecasts published by Oracle Demand Planning. Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning then generates recommendations for moving or procuring material based on the consumed forecast and safety stock demands.

Usage Forecasting

Usage forecasting of service parts is applicable to service organizations when the historical usage or consumption history of the service parts is available and is adequate to estimate future demand. Service parts usage can occur when a product is repaired at the customer site (field service) or at the repair depot when a product is returned for repair. For field service, a field service engineer is assigned to carry out necessary repairs at the customer's site. After repairs are done, she completes the service part usage and return transactions via a debrief process. For depot repairs, a repair order and non-standard discrete repair jobs are created. For details about field service, see: Oracle Field Service User Guide. For details about depot repair, see: Oracle Depot Repair User Guide.

To forecast for service parts:

  1. Collect service parts usage history.

    For details, see: To collect Service Parts Usage History: for the consumption of service parts used. You collect service parts usage history from Oracle Field Service as well as from Oracle Depot Repair.

  2. Define supersession events in Oracle Demand Planning. For details about supersession events, see: Life cycle and supersession based new product introductions.

    Supersession events allow you to transfer the consumption history of the superseded service parts to the up-item. You can then create a forecast of the new item based on the combined histories of the new item and the superseded items. You can also read supersede item-relationships into Oracle Demand Planning, and automate the process of modeling supersessions and creating forecasts for new items.

  3. Define your demand plan, adding the input parameters and events you need. For details about defining your demand plan, see: Procedure to define a Demand Plan.

  4. Create your desired forecast based on the collected data for service parts usage history. For details on forecasting methods, see: Creating Forecast Measures.

  5. The service parts usage history is forecast by directly projecting the part usage history. Generally during the maturity phase of product life cycle, the historical usage or consumption history of service parts is adequate to estimate future demand. The assumption in usage forecasting is that the consumption of a service part summed across different products eliminates the need to consider its consumption patterns by the age and operation of individual products.

  6. Apply the service part supersession events. For details about applying events to your forecast, see: Applying Events to Measures.

  7. Modify your forecast to arrive at final service parts demand.

  8. Now you can publish your service parts demand forecast to Oracle Inventory Optimization or Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning. Your forecast is used in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning as supply schedule to estimate the supply of service parts. For details about the supply plan, see: Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning Implementation and User's Guide

Example

With usage forecasting, the service parts forecast demand is based on the direct projection of the service parts usage history. You collect into Oracle Demand Planning the usage history of service parts from Oracle Field Service and/or Oracle Depot Repair.

Lifter 234 Dec 2002 Jan 2003 Feb 2003 Mar 2003 Apr 2003 May 2003
Usage history 300 300 200      

Then your output from Oracle Demand Planning is a forecast of service parts.

Lifter 234 Dec 2002 Jan 2003 Feb 2003 Mar 2003 Apr 2003 May 2003
Projected usage       250 300 250

The demand planning forecast methods for usage forecasting recognize both the intermittent nature of service parts usage patterns and the possibility that outliers, such as spiked periods of usage, could be present in the usage history patterns.

For example, the automatic best-fit forecast method runs algorithm to find out the best forecasting method for a history profile. This eliminates the need to perform manual simulations. For intermittent demand forecasting and for detecting outliers, Oracle Demand Planning employs Moving Period Total data adjustments. The service parts for which the results of best-fit forecast method are not satisfactory can be re-forecast using other forecast methods.

Both long-term and short-term forecasts can be created in Oracle Demand Planning with no restriction on the number of history or forecast periods. Also, your forecast numbers can be specified and edited on a worksheet.

Once your forecasts are created, forecast accuracy can be calculated and tracked. You can define alerts to notify planners on the basis of tracking signals or control limits. For details about alerts, see: Defining Alerts.

Line of Business-Specific Demand Plans

You may specify separate demand plans for different lines of business such that planners and planning managers can just look at the demand data pertaining to their respective line of business. The forecast for each line of business is fed into a global demand plan that represents the entire demand space to consolidate the lines of business forecasts into one corporate-wide forecast.

A line of business specific demand plan refers to limiting the scope of a demand plan to include only those level values, such as items, organizations, customers' ship to locations, and sales representatives, that pertain to that line of business. A line of business specific demand plan allows for the creation of a demand plan per line of business, such that the planners and managers for a line of business can view the demand data specific to their line of business.

There are a few ways to do this:

  1. Restrict the demand plan scope to only those items for which data exist in a data stream. All the other level values are automatically filtered based on the items in scope. Thus, all the parent level values, including product families, product categories, or custom product groups in those product dimension hierarchies are included in the demand plan. Also, all the organizations for which the items are enabled are included in the demand plan. And all the parent level values, such as business groups, legal entities, and operating units of those organizations are included in the demand plan.

    For example, let's say there is a sales history data stream that contains data for Printer-XT and Printer-AB in the Newark distribution center organization. If Printer-AB is enabled in the Detroit distribution center organization, then the Detroit distribution center organization is also included in the line of business demand plan, but the planners will see the values NA (no data) for the sales history pertaining to the Detroit distribution center organization. If other data streams of this demand plan have data corresponding to the Detroit distribution center organization, then the planners will be able to see that data.

  2. Restrict the demand plan scope to a level value in the ship from location dimension or to a level value in the product dimension. All the other level values are automatically filtered based on the selected level value. Specifically:

    • If you restrict the demand plan scope to a business group in ship from location dimension, then all the legal entities, operating units, and organizations of the business group are included in the demand plan. All the items and their parent level values that are enabled for the organizations of the business group are included in the demand plan.

    • If you restrict the demand plan scope to a product group in the product dimension, then all the items of the product group are included in the demand plan. All the organizations for which the items are enabled and all the parent level values of those organizations are included in the demand plan.

  3. You can restrict by both 1 (items in a data stream) and 2 (level values). If you scope the demand plan by both 1 and 2, then only those items that are allowed by both the methods are included in the demand plan. However, the organizations are restricted only by method 2 (level values).

    You can also automatically scope by other dimensions based on operating units. For example, you can scope by:

    • Sales representative dimension, which includes sales representatives that belong to the selected operating units.

    • Geography dimension, which includes ship to locations that belong to the selected operating units.

    • If sales representative or geography dimensions are included in the line of business demand plan, then the sales representatives and ship to locations for these dimensions are restricted to the line of business depending on the operating units in scope.

      All the parent level values of the sales representatives and ship to locations are also included in the demand plan. Limiting the demand plan scope has no impact on the other four dimensions: sales channel, demand class, user defined dimension 1, and user defined dimension 2. All the level values for these dimensions are always included in the demand plan.

      Note: Users can optionally stripe by Ship From Location dimension even when the Ship From Location is not a dimension in the demand plan. This may be useful if you want to create different demand plans for different lines of business, but you do not explode your forecast and you do not want to see the organization dimension in the demand plan.

You can include new products in the demand plan by using the new product introduction events. The new products are automatically included in the demand plan if the base products are in scope.

If you are calculating dependent demand based on model bills of material, the items in the scope must include all the models, option classes, and options on a model bill.

To be able to use this feature, you must:

  1. Ensure that the demand planning hierarchies align to lines of business. Since the demand plan scope can be restricted only to one level value in ship from location or product dimension, you may need to customize demand planning hierarchies to align them to your lines of business.

    For example, if your line of business covers two or more product categories, you will add another level, such as product line, above the product category in the product category hierarchy so that the product categories of the line of business roll up to one product line.

  2. Ensure that the required relationships are available in Oracle Demand Planning. The Lines of Business-specific demand plan's functionality is dependent on the following three relationships:

    • Item-Organization

    • Sales Representative-Operating unit

    • Ship-to-Location-Operating unit

      These relationships can be set up in the source E-Business suite instance and are automatically collected into Oracle Demand Planning during the level values collection based on the setup. You use the level values collection program to collect these three relationships into Oracle Demand Planning.

      For data sources other than Oracle ERP, these relationships can be loaded via flat files using legacy integration feature of demand planning. If a relationship is not provided, all the level values corresponding to the missing relationship are included in the demand plan. For example, if the Sales Representative-Operating unit relationship is missing, all the Sales Representatives will be included in the demand plan.

      Note: If an item is assigned to a new organization between planning cycles, you must completely refresh the existing plan to reflect the change in relationship.

To use lines of business specific demand plans:

  1. Verify or enable the items in the organization of line of business. If you choose to restrict the demand plan scope, it always applies to both items and organizations based on the items that are enabled in the organizations of your line of business.

  2. Set up the profile option MO: Default Operating Unit before specifying the ship to and the sales rep.

    Level values for sales representative and geography dimensions are restricted depending on the operating units to which they are associated.

    The sales representatives and ship to locations that were defined after setting this profile, are automatically associated to the operating unit selected for this profile.

  3. Specify the demand plan scope.

    For details, see: Scope.

    You can specify the scope by:

    • Restricting by line of business. This refers to method 2 explained above. The demand plan is scoped by a level value in the ship from location dimension or product dimension. The levels and level values available for selection are independent of the product or organization dimensions/hierarchies included in the demand plan.

    • Restricting to items based on the data stream. This refers to method 1 explained above. The demand plan is scoped by items in a data stream. The data streams available for selection are not limited to those which are included as demand plan input parameters.

      Once this demand plan is built in the demand planning engine, the scope cannot be changed until the demand plan data is completely purged and the demand plan rebuilt.

      Also remember that the demand plan dimensions should be selected to align with the demand plan scope. Specifically,

      • Product dimension is mandatory and must be included in the demand plan. It will always be striped per the scope of the demand plan.

      • Ship from location dimension will always be striped per the scope of the demand plan, even if not included in the demand plan.

      • Sales representative and geography dimensions will be striped, only if these dimensions are included in the demand plan.

        When the user stripes a demand plan with organizations that have no relationships to the ship to locations, the sales reps, or the products, then all level values will be included in the stripe.

    • Selecting one or more internal organizations whose sales orders you want to consider in scope. This refers to method 2 explained above. All internal sales orders for the specified destination organizations will be included. This allows lines of business that run demand plans and fulfill demands from internal organizations to recognize the history of those demands, and create forecasts.

  4. Create and upload the line of business forecast.

    After defining the scope of the demand plan in the planning server, line of business-specific demand planning process is run in the demand planning engine to arrive at the final line of business forecast. Then this is uploaded to the Planning Server.

    For details, see: About Measures.

    If you need to consolidate the Lines of Business-specific forecasts into a corporate-wide forecast, you should feed the Lines of Business forecasts into a separate global demand plan after the forecasts are uploaded to planning server. A global demand plan is a demand plan where the scope is not restricted to a Line of Business.

Forecast by Demand Class

Forecast by demand class allows you to analyze and forecast sales history by different demand classes in Oracle Demand Planning . Then the demand planning forecast can be fed to Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning and consumed there by demand classes. Oracle Demand Planning can publish forecasts to Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning at demand class level and receive supply plans/constrained forecasts from Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning at demand class level.

A demand class may represent a particular grouping of customers, type of demand, or different sources of demand. You use demand class to segregate demand and supply into independent groups. This allows for tracking and consuming by group and allow you to flexibly model business processes.

Forecasting by demand class can also be used to analyze demand by segments, such as existing and emerging market segments. Forecast by demand class also allows you to manage and analyze demand for different types of customers or for different market segments by modeling the customer type and market segments as demand classes.

Data analysis and forecasting by demand classes is possible in Oracle Demand Planning only when the demand class is recorded in sales orders. You associate sales orders with demand class in Oracle Order Management. For details, see: Oracle Order Management User's Guide. The Oracle Demand Planning forecasts can be published to either Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning or e-Business source instance for consumption by sales orders scheduled to be shipped on or after the forecast horizon start date for the same demand class. The following combinations are possible:

The forecast output level must be demand class to publish and consume forecasts by demand classes to Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning and e-Business source instance.

The forecast consumption process has not changed.

Sales orders that have an associated specific demand class consume either the forecasts with matching demand class or the forecast that do not have any demand class. Sales order demand without demand class consume either the forecasts with the organization's default demand class or the forecast that do not have any demand class. If the forecast consumption process does not find forecasts with associated demand class, it consumes forecasts without demand class. When there is no demand class is associated to a sales order, then Oracle Demand Planning created a level value called 'Other' in the new demand class dimension. The forecasts with the demand class 'Other' are treated as forecasts without demand class in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning.

Forecast consumption by demand class in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning is allowed for organization-specific and global forecasts as long as the forecast scenario has been uploaded from Oracle Demand Planning at demand class level.

For details, see: Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning Implementation and User's Guide.

The Demand Class dimension has only two hierarchical levels: Demand Class is the lowest level and All Demand Classes is the highest level. You can run promotions and new products by demand class. You can also vary prices by demand class. Sales history and forecasts are displayed by demand classes and are aggregated to All Demand Classes.

If there is no demand class is associated to a sales order line, then Oracle Demand Planning designates a pseudo demand class 'Other' to that sales order line. All the 'Other' sales order lines for a SKU will be aggregated within the selected bucket.

For example, if you are under a contract with some of your customers to supply goods at a specified rate, quantity, price, or quality. The customers order some material under that contract and the sales are recorded as 'contract' sales. The customers may also order the same material over the contract quantity. This extra sales is recorded as 'spot' sales and may not need the extra finishing process required in the contract.

In this scenario, the forecast by demand class process will be to first define two demand classes, Contract and Spot. Once you record the sales history by these demand classes, you can analyze the sales history using the demand class dimension. You need to forecast by demand class to deduce specific trends and growth curves. Then you can apportion the forecast per your business objectives. For example, you may want to always meet your contract demand and in spite of the relative higher upward trend for spot demand, you may want to apportion a higher percentage to the contract demand.

You should restrict the forecast consumption by the sales orders of the same demand class in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning so that the 'contract' forecast is not eaten away by the 'spot' sales orders and that you can plan supplies per the extra finishing process. Finally, you can promise orders against the supplies with the same demand class in Oracle Global Order Promising.

How to collect and analyze sales order data by demand class:

Pre-steps outside of Oracle Demand Planning

Define new demand classes as necessary:

  1. Choose Manufacturing and Distribution Manager responsibility.

  2. Select Supply Chain Planning > Setup > Demand Class.

Record Sales Orders by Demand Classes:

  1. Choose Manufacturing and Distribution Manager responsibility.

  2. Select Order Management > Orders, Returns > Sales Orders.

  3. Create a new sales order and lines, specifying item, quantity, etc.

  4. Select Shipping tab.

  5. Select Folder > Show Folder > Demand Class.

    The demand class field will appear on the sales order lines screen.

  6. Select a demand class for order lines as appropriate.

    It is not necessary to specify demand class for every sales order line. If no demand class is associated to a sales order line, Oracle Demand Planning will designate a pseudo demand class, 'Other' to that sales order line.

Steps inside of Oracle Demand Planning

Collect level values and planning data into Oracle Demand Planning:

  1. Choose Demand Planning System Administrator.

  2. Select Collections > Collect from Oracle Systems > Level Values.

    Demand classes are collected as a part of level values collection.

  3. Select Dimension Values > Level Values > View Hierarchy Planning Data by demand class.

    After collecting level values you can view demand class hierarchy and level values.

  4. Choose Demand Planning System Administrator.

  5. Select Collections > Collect from Oracle Systems > Booking Data, Shipment Data, Order Backlog, or Promotional History.

    Various collection programs can bring data in by demand class from ERP systems.

Define a Demand Plan:

  1. Choose Demand Planning System Administrator.

  2. Select Demand Plan.

Define a Scenario Output Level:

  1. Choose Demand Planning System Administrator.

  2. Select Demand Plan > Scenarios Tab.

  3. Select a scenario and click Output Levels.

    In order to consume the forecast by demand class in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning, the scenario output level must be set to 'Demand Class'.

Perform Demand Planning Cycle:

  1. Build the demand plan in Demand Planning Engine.

  2. Analyze the sales history and other data and create a forecast.

  3. Demand planners manipulate the forecast and submit.

  4. Demand managers finalize forecast and upload to planning server.

Forecast consumption by demand class in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning is allowed for both organization-specific and global forecasts as long as the forecast scenario has been uploaded from Oracle Demand Planning at the demand class level. To select forecast scenario and consumption level in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning plan options:

  1. Choose Advanced Supply Chain Planner responsibility.

  2. Select Supply Chain Plan > Options > Organization Tab.

  3. Select an organization-specific forecast under Demand Schedule/Name field or a global forecast under Global Demand Schedule/Name field.

  4. Select a Ship to Consumption Level.

    The list of values for consumption levels will depend on the forecast scenario output levels from Oracle Demand Planning. For example, the forecast scenario in the above screen shot was uploaded from Oracle Demand Planning at Item, Customer, and Demand Class Level.

View consumption by Demand Class details in Oracle Advanced Supply Chain Planning:

  1. Choose Advanced Supply Chain Planner responsibility.

  2. Select Supply Chain Plan > Workbench.

  3. Select the desired organization, plan, or item. Open the Supply/Demand window.

  4. Select a forecast line. Select the right mouse option: Consumption Details.