7 Managing Customers, Commodities, and Suppliers

This chapter provides information about managing customers, commodities, and suppliers.

7.1 Collaborating with External Organizations

An organization could be a company, division, department, group, or team. These organizations participate in business processes such as sourcing, quality management, and design engineering and are involved throughout various phases and activities of a program. You can manage organizations outside your own boundaries (such as your customers, your suppliers, and your partners).

As competition increases, customers demand quality product on time and at a lower cost while the product lifecycle time decreases. Agile PLM enables you to effectively support the following business processes in which multiple organizations may be involved:

• Obtain pricing quotes and sourcing proposals for your customers.

• Send out RFQs to obtain pricing quotes from suppliers.

• Capture quality issues reported from your customers.

• Report quality issues resulting from parts or services provided by your suppliers.

7.1.1 Before You Begin

This chapter assumes that you are informed about Product Service Requests (PSRs) for managing Problem Reports and Non Conformance Reports (NCRs). For more details on PSRs, see the Product Quality Management (PQM) User Guide.

7.2 Roles Required to Manage Customers and Suppliers

The roles a user requires to manage customers and suppliers are:

• Organization Manager - create and manage customers and suppliers

• Supplier Administrator - manage the organization profile, users, RFx routings, and line cards for a supplier organization

• Compliance Manager - responsible for routing material declarations to suppliers; also create and manage PG&C objects and run PG&C reports

For more details on roles and privileges, see the Agile PLM Administrator Guide.

7.3 Managing Customers

Customers are clients of your company. You can associate product service requests (PSRs), quality change requests (QCRs), sourcing projects and RFQs, and prices with a customer. You can use the Agile SDK or the Import tool to import customers from CRM systems.

7.3.1 Creating a Customer

You must have the necessary privileges to create customers. These privileges are part of the Organization Manager role. You create a customer the same way you create other Agile PLM objects. You can use the New Object button or Save As feature in the Java Client, or the Create New menu or the Save As feature in the Web Client.

To create a customer object in Java Client:

1. Click the New Object button.

   The New dialog box appears. Agile PLM remembers what type of object you created last and displays that type in the Type field.

2. Select a customer type from the Type list.

3. In the Customer Number field, type a number, or click the AutoNumber button to enter a system generated number.

4. In the Customer Name field, type a name. Click OK. The customer is created and the General Info tab is displayed.

5. Complete the fields on this tab. For more information about the Customer Name, and other fields, see customer General Info tab fields table in "Customer Fields and Attributes."

   You can attach files and URLs to the customer from the Attachments tab. To attach a file, click the down arrow next to the Add Folder Reference icon, and click Add File. To attach a URL, click the down arrow next to the Add Folder Reference icon, and click Add URL.

To create a customer object using the Save As feature in Java Client:

1. In an open customer, right click anywhere on the dialog and choose Save As.

   The Save As dialog box appears. Java Client automatically fills in the Type and Customer Number fields as they appear in the original customer.

2. If required, select a different customer type from the Type list. Click OK. The customer is created.

3. You can change the information in the fields as necessary. For more information about the Customer Name and other fields, see "Customer Fields and Attributes."

   In Java Client, these buttons are available at the bottom of the customer window:

   • The Save button saves modifications made to the fields in the active window.

   • The Refresh button updates the window to show the latest information from the Agile database.

   • The Close button closes the active window.

To create a customer object in Web Client:

1. Click Create New Customers > Base Class from the main toolbar. The Create New Customers Base Class dialog appears.

2. Select a customer type from the drop-down list.

3. In the Number field, use the automatically system-generated number or type a new number. Alternatively, you can click the AutoNumber button, if set up by your Agile administrator, to get a system generated number.

4. In the Customer Name field, type a name.

5. Click Save. Web Client creates the customer and displays the customer with the General Info tab on top.

6. Click the other tabs to add additional information about the customer.

To create a customer object using the Save As feature in Web Client:

1. In an open customer object window, choose Actions > Save As. The Save As dialog appears.

2. In the Customer Number field, type a number or click the AutoNumber button to get a system generated number. The Web Client may automatically fill in both the Customer Number and the Type fields.

   
   

   Note: The way your Agile administrator has set up your system affects how things work in this step. You may be able to modify both fields, if needed.

   
   

3. Type a new Customer Name.

4. Click Save. The newly created customer appears.

   In Web Client, use the Edit button on the General Info tab on the customer page to edit the general customer information.

7.3.2 Customer Fields and Attributes

The following table lists and describes the fields in the customer General Info tab in Web Client.

Field	Completed...	Contains...
Customer Number	When created; type the number or use the AutoNumbers button. Customer is uniquely identified by the number. (Required)	The number assigned to the customer when you create it.
Customer Type	Manually (Required)	drop-down list of the customer types.
Customer Name	Manually (Required)	The name of the customer.
Description	Manually	The description of the customer. The maximum number of bytes is set by the Agile administrator; can be up to 1023 bytes, including space and carriage returns (which count as two bytes).
D-U-N-S Number	Manually	The industry standard Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number.
Address	Manually	The mailing address of the customer.
City	Manually	The city where customer is located.
Zip Code	Manually	The zip code of the customer.
Contact	Manually	The name of contact person from the customer side.
Email	Manually.	The email address of the customer.
Phone	Manually	The customer contact phone number.
Fax	Manually	The customer fax number.
URL	Manually	The URL of the customer Web site.
Lifecycle Phase	Manually	The lifecycle phase of the customer. For example, the customer is Active or Inactive in this lifecycle phase.

7.3.3 Editing a Customer

After you have created a customer, you can go back and edit the customer's information at any time.

To edit a customer:

1. Open the customer you want to edit, and display the General Info tab.

2. In Web Client, click the Edit button, and fill out the appropriate fields.

   In Java Client, change the information in the fields as necessary.

   See "Customer Fields and Attributes" for details.

3. Click Save.

   Customers are not under change control. Anyone with the necessary privileges can edit a customer at any time. The changes take effect immediately.

7.4 Creating Commodities

A part group can be one of the following:

• Commodity - used only in PCM

• Part Family - used only in PG&C

• Item Group - used only in PC

In PCM, commodities let users categorize parts for sourcing and analysis processes. Commodities are associated with items (parts and documents). It is a way of grouping similar types of items. By associating each item with a commodity, your users can distribute RFQs to suppliers based on the commodities they offer.

Commodities can be active or inactive. Unlike other Agile PLM business objects, commodities do not have workflows. They are used to categorize groups of items.

If your company has a Product Governance & Compliance (PG&C) license, you can use commodities to collect information on restricted substances for part families. For more details on how to use Commodity objects for PG&C, see the Product Governance & Compliance User Guide.

When creating a commodity, there is a Make Available As attribute that enables you to decide how the commodity should be treated. The options are:

• Commodity Only - only for PCM

• Part Family Only - only for PG&C

• Commodity and Part Family - used for PG&C & PCM

• Item Group - only for PC

Note: If the part group is only for PCM, the part group cannot have compliance information. If it is only for PG&C, the part group cannot be used for RFQ dissemination.

You can create commodities using Web Client. You can search for commodities in Java Client but not create them.

Note: To create commodities, you must have the create privilege for commodities. If needed, contact your Agile administrator to obtain privileges.

To create a commodity in Web Client:

1. Choose Create New > Part Groups from the global menu bar. The Create New Part Groups dialog appears.

2. In the Type list, select Commodity. Other types of Part Family subclasses may also be available.

3. Specify a unique commodity name, which can be a short abbreviation (such as "Trans" for Transistor). The name is not case-sensitive.

4. Note Specify how you want the commodity to be treated using the Make Available As option.

5. Click Save. The new commodity appears with the General Info page.

6. Click Edit. Enter general information, such as a description. Make sure the Lifecycle Phase field is set to Active. The weight field is optional; it is only relevant for Product Governance & Compliance. Click Finish.

7. Click the other tabs to add additional information about the commodity.

Note: You cannot delete an item that is associated with a Part Group, or in other words, an item that appears on the Parts tab of a Part Group object. If the Commodity field is populated, the Actions > Delete command is disabled.

7.4.1 Commodity Tabs

Commodities have the following tabs:

• General Info - provides general information about the commodity

• Parts - lists the parts that belong to this commodity category

• Compliance - lists the Specifications and Compositions of the commodity

• Suppliers - lists the suppliers who supply this commodity

• Attachments - lists the attached files for the commodity

• History - shows the history of events related to a commodity

Note: The Compliance tab is used only for Product Governance & Compliance (PG&C). If your company does not have the PG&C license, this tab may be hidden.

7.4.2 Associating Items with Commodities

A commodity's Parts tab lists all items that are associated with it. This association between commodities and items is important because it determines which parts a supplier will be asked to quote on when an RFQ is disseminated by commodity.

Note: In the Title Block tab of a Part, the Part Family or Commodity attributes indicates which Part Group this part is associated with. Either of these attributes can be enabled. Both are read-only.

To associate an item with a commodity in Web Client:

1. Open the commodity you want to work with and select the Parts tab.

2. Click Add. A new row appears in the Parts table.

3. Click the Search button and search for existing items.

4. Select items by double-clicking them or dragging and dropping them into the Parts table.

If not successful, any errors or warnings appear in the error message bar on the Parts tab. If there is no error, the added items appear as rows in the Parts table.

7.5 Managing Suppliers

An organization manager checks in the organization's PSRs and sets up global supplier groups that can be leveraged by users with the appropriate roles. They can obtain pricing quotes and sourcing proposals for your customers and send out RFQs to obtain pricing quotes from suppliers.

7.5.1 Supplier Types

There are five out-of-the-box supplier types (but you can add more to your Agile PLM system):

• Component Manufacturer - sells individual parts or components

• Contract Manufacturer - manufactures products but does not necessarily own the engineering design

• Distributor - purchases and resells products

• Manufacturer Representative - direct customer representative for a manufacturer

• Broker - responsible for the supply of goods and services to trading partners

7.5.2 Partners and Suppliers

Suppliers may be either partners or suppliers. A partner receives the complete bill of material (BOM) of the items in the RFQ, and the supplier receives only the assigned parts. The Agile administrator creates partners. The administrator can also create supplier groups, which permit you to select multiple suppliers during the RFQ process.

7.5.3 Supplier Lifecycle Phases

The lifecycle phase of the supplier can be either Active or Inactive.

Status	Description
Active	The supplier is currently active and able to receive RFQs.
Inactive	The supplier is currently not active. In this status, the supplier cannot be included in new RFQs or price objects.

7.5.4 Creating a Supplier

Use the Supplier Creation dialog to create a supplier organization.

To create a supplier in Web Client:

1. Choose Create New > Supplier from the global menu bar. The Create New Supplier dialog appears.

2. In the Type list, select the appropriate supplier type, for example Broker. Once selected, all of the required fields will be displayed in the dialog.

3. Specify a unique supplier Name.

4. Enter details for the remaining fields, including flex field details.

   See "Supplier Fields and Attributes" for descriptions of the fields that appear in this dialog.

   
   

   Note: In the Number field, use the automatically system-generated number or type a new number. You can also click the AutoNumber button to get a different system generated number, if needed.

   
   
   
   

   Note: Your Agile administrator may have altered the way the Number field is populated.

   
   

5. Click Save.

   To edit fields of a supplier, click the Edit button. You may not be able to edit the contents of some fields.

   Click the other tabs, including the Contact Users tab, to add additional information about the supplier. See the corresponding sections in this chapter for information.

7.5.4.1 Supplier Fields and Attributes

As with other Agile objects, information about the supplier is displayed on a series of tabs. Each tab contains information about, or related to, that supplier.

Note: Some tabs may not be enabled by your administrator.

By default, the General Info tab contains the fields listed in the following table. Agile administrators can add custom class and subclass fields to the General Info tab.

Field	Description
Name	Name of the supplier.
Supplier Type	The following are the out-of-box supplier types: Component Manufacturer Contract Manufacturer Broker Distributor Manufacturer Representative This field is configurable in the Java Client. More supplier types can be added, if needed.
Lifecycle Phase	Indicates if this supplier is Active or Inactive. Note: Only active Suppliers can participate in product sourcing activities.
Number	The supplier number assigned to the supplier when you create it.
DUNs	The industry standard Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number.
Display Name	Indicates the display name
Description	Text that describes the supplier. The Agile administrator sets the maximum length.
Web Supplier	Indicates if this supplier logs in to the Web Client (Yes or No). If No, they receive offline communication.
Corporate Currency	The default currency for this corporation. By default, RFQs will be responded to in the assigned corporate currency. Supplier users can set their own default currency.
Address	Address
City	City
Postal/Zip Code	Postal or zip code
Phone	Phone number
Fax	Fax number
URL	URL for supplier Web site
Maximum number of Contact Users	The maximum number of supplier users that can be created for this supplier
Maximum Number of Licensed Contact Users	The maximum number of supplier users that can be assigned a concurrent user license
Maximum Number of Power Contact Users	The maximum number of supplier users that can be assigned a power user license
Default RFQ Recipient	The user in the supplier organization who gets the notification when an RFQ gets sent to the supplier.
Default Declaration Recipient	The user in the supplier organization who gets the notification when a declaration gets sent to the supplier.

7.5.4.2 Buttons on the General Info tab

The General Info tab contains the following buttons:

• Edit - appears when the General Info tab is not in edit mode. To edit the General Info tab, click Edit.

• Save - appears when the General Info tab is in edit mode. To save the changes that you made to the tab while it was in edit mode, click Save.

• Cancel - appears when the General Info tab is in edit mode. To undo the changes that you made to the tab while it was in edit mode, click Cancel.

The following sections describe the additional tabs.

7.5.5 Supplier Identification

Sometimes, an organization may have more than one supplier with identical names. The system does not stop you from giving a name to a supplier that already exists, as internally, they are differentiated by their unique identification numbers. As a user, however, it is difficult to distinguish the desired supplier from a list of identical supplier names.

In Agile PLM, the supplier listings display their identification numbers, in brackets, next to their names. You can notice this in Responses and Analysis tabs in a Sourcing Project, in Supplier Response Export files and in Supplier search results.

When you wish to sort a suppliers list in ascending or descending order, it sorts first on supplier name and then its number.

For example, if a list has supplier Agile1 (SJ001), Agile1 (AG015), Agile1 (sup001), Agile1 (A0001), the ascending order will appears as:

Agile1 (A0001)

Agile1 (AG015)

Agile1 (SJ001)

Agile1 (sup001)

7.5.6 Adding Contact Users

The Contact Users tab defines which users can log in to Agile PLM to represent a supplier. Supplier users have restricted privileges to the Agile PLM system that allow them to respond to RFQs.

To create a supplier user in Web Client:

1. Open a supplier and click the Contact Users tab.

2. Click the Add button.

3. Click the Create New button. The Create New dialog appears.

4. Enter the Username. Type the Login Password, and retype it to confirm.

5. Enter the Approval Password and retype it to confirm.

   
   

   Note: To use the same password as the Login Password, select the Use Login Password for Approval check box. This will disable the Approval Password fields.

   
   

6. Enter user details: First Name, Last Name, and Email.

7. Click Add.

   Once the contact user is created, you may consider changing some of the following contact user fields:

   • Status - Make sure the status field is set to Active.

   • Role - The user's role assignments. This property determines a user's access to the objects in Agile PLM from the point of discovery forward.

   • User Category - Agile PLM has three types of user licenses: Power, Concurrent, and Restricted. Restricted users are people outside your company (such as suppliers) who are given limited access to the Agile PLM system. Power users are not subject to concurrency counts and can therefore log in at any time. Both Restricted and Power users can respond to RFQs, but only Power users can generate and view reports.

   • Sites and Default Site - Sites are used for distributed manufacturing, and indicate all of the company's locations where the user is involved. Default Site is the user's main base of work.

   • Authorized Ship To and Home Ship To - The Authorized Ship To field indicates all company locations where the user can initiate sourcing activity. The Home Ship To location is the primary location where the user is responsible for sourcing activities.

To add an existing PC Supplier as a PCM Supplier in Web Client:

1. Assign the desired restricted Supplier role to the User.

2. Open the Supplier.

   
   

   Note: Power Users can be added to the Contact Users tab only if the Maximum Number of Contact Power Users field has been set to other than 0 (or blank) on the General Info tab of the supplier. Otherwise, only users with a Restricted user license can be assigned to a supplier.

   
   

3. If you know the first name, last name, or user ID, enter it into the User ID field, which auto-completes as you type. Instead of using the auto-complete feature, you can search for the user and add it to the Supplier's Contact Users tab.

4. If applicable, on RFx Routing tab, select the user as the Default Recipient.

5. Under the Users Preferences - Display Preferences change Response Edit Mode to either Advanced Wizard Edit or Basic.

   
   

   Note: If the Response Edit Mode is set to Basic, the user will not have access to PC related tasks.

   
   

To add an existing user to a supplier in Web Client:

1. Open a supplier, and then click the Contact Users tab.

2. Click Add.

3. Search for an existing user by first name, last name, or username.

4. Add the user by double-clicking the row you want to add or by using the drag and drop feature.

Note: Power Users can be added to the Contact Users tab only if the Maximum Number of Contact Power Users field has been set to other than 0 (or blank) on the General Info tab of the supplier. Otherwise, only users with a Restricted user license can be assigned to a supplier.

7.5.7 Creating and Modifying RFx Routing Rules

The RFx Routing tab defines which supplier contacts are responsible for which RFQs. You can specify which supplier contact will respond to RFQs coming from a given ship-to location. These routing rules are geography-based.

When you specify a routing rule, you associate a supplier contact user with a geographic location. That contact user is then responsible for RFQs coming from ship-to locations in the specified geography. Geographies are defined as a Continent, Country, and Region. A rule can be specified broadly, by continent, or specific to a region.

When you create a supplier, the first contact user you add becomes the default RFQ recipient. The default recipient receives any RFQs that could not be routed based on a routing rule. You can change the default recipient at any time.

To add a new routing rule:

1. Open a supplier, and then click the RFx Routing tab.

2. Click Add. The Add Routing Rule dialog appears.

3. Select a user from the Contact drop-down list.

4. Specify the Geography by selecting the continent, country/area, and state/province/region to associate with the contact user.

5. Click Add.

To edit a rule:

1. Select the routing rule that you want to modify on the RFx Routing tab.

2. Make required changes by directly editing the fields within the table.

3. To save the changes that you made to the RFx Routing tab, click Save. To undo the changes that you made to the RFx Routingtab while it was in edit mode, click Cancel.

To delete a rule:

1. Open a supplier, and then click the RFx Routing tab.

2. Select the routing rule that you want to delete.

3. Click Remove button.

To change the default recipient:

1. Open a supplier, and then click the General Info tab.

2. Click Edit.

3. Select the Default RFQ Recipient from the list of contact users.

4. Click Save.

7.5.8 Defining Manufacturer and Commodity Offerings

Each supplier can have different manufacturer and commodity offerings.

• Manufacturer offerings are used to map a manufacturer, whose goods a supplier carries, to a specific geographic location where those goods are available. This is a way for suppliers to indicate the manufacturers whose goods they are franchised to offer in certain geographic regions. For example, a supplier called ACME might sell Motorola and Kemet products.

• Commodity offerings define the product categories that a supplier sells. For example, a supplier called ACME might sell commodities such as fuses, integrated circuits, and resistors. The commodity offerings map each commodity a supplier carries to a specific geographic location where those goods are available.

RFQs can be sent to suppliers based on the type of manufacturer or commodity offerings they have.

The ratings for manufacturer and commodity offerings also determine which suppliers receive RFQs. The out-of-box supplier ratings provided with Agile PLM are:

• Approved

• Strategic

• Offered Active

• Offered Inactive

Note: Agile PLM administrators can define additional supplier ratings. There is no implied order to the supplier ratings. When you disseminate an RFQ, you can select multiple supplier ratings.

Note: You can filter manufacturer and commodity offerings based on criteria that you specify, for example, to see only the offerings for a particular region.

7.5.8.1 Creating a New Manufacturer Offering

You can specify general information about the manufacturer offerings that you are creating from the Manufacturers tab. Each manufacturer line card definition is a unique combination of manufacturer, supplier, and ship-to locations. A supplier can have multiple lines for one manufacturer, each line associated with a different ship-to location. If there are changes to the geographic locations where the goods are offered, the supplier manager can edit the manufacturer line cards for the supplier organization.

If you choose to add a manufacturer offering by Geography, rather than Ship To location, an offering is only added if there is a Ship To location defined in that particular region.

For example, assume that the following are the only Ship To locations defined in the system:

• Santa Clara, CA, USA

• Los Angeles, CA, USA

• Bangalore, India, Asia

If a user uses the Geography option and selects San Jose, CA, USA as the geographical location, the system does not add any rows to the Manufacturers table, because there are no Ship To locations defined for that specific location. If the user selects CA, USA as the location, however, the Santa Clara, CA, USA and Los Angeles, CA, USA Ship To locations are added, because those locations are included in the broader region of CA, USA.

To create a manufacturer offering in the Web Client:

1. Open the supplier you want to work with, and click the Manufacturers tab.

2. Click Add.

3. For Manufacturers, click the search button to select one or more manufacturers. You can add manufacturers by using the drag and drop feature or by double-clicking the row of the manufacturer to be added.

4. Select the appropriate option to base the offering on the geographic location or ship-to locations

5. Follow either step 5.a or 5.b, depending on the option you chose in the previous step.

   a. If you selected Ship To option, click the button next to the Ship To field to select the locations.

   b. If you selected the Geography option, click the button to select the geographical area.

6. Select a supplier rating (for example, Approved or Offered Active).

7. Click Add. The new manufacturer line card definition appears in the list.

7.5.8.2 Creating a New Commodity Offering

Before you can specify commodity offerings for a supplier, commodities must be defined in your Agile PLM system. See "Creating Commodities."

From the Commodities tab of a supplier object, you can specify information about the commodity offerings for that supplier. Each commodity line card definition is a unique combination of commodity, supplier, and ship-to locations. A supplier can have multiple lines for one commodity, each line associated with a different ship-to location. If there are changes to the geographic locations where the goods are offered, the supplier manager can edit the commodity line cards for the supplier organization.

Similar to manufacturer offerings, if you choose to add a commodity offering by Geography, rather than Ship To location, an offering is only added if there is a Ship To location defined in that particular region. See the example in "Creating a New Manufacturer Offering." for more information.

To create a commodity offering in Web Client:

1. Open the supplier you want to work with and select the Commodities tab.

2. Click Add.

3. For Commodities, click the search button to select one or more commodities. You can add commodities by using the drag and drop feature or by double-clicking the row of the commodity to be added.

4. Select the appropriate option to base the offering on the geographic location or ship-to locations

5. Follow either step 5.a or 5.b, depending on the option you chose in the previous step.

   a. If you selected Ship To option, click the list button next to the Ship To field to select the locations.

   b. If you selected the Geography option, click the list button to select the geographical area.

6. Select a supplier rating (for example, Approved or Offered Active).

7. Click Add. The new commodity line card definition appears in the list.

7.5.8.3 Updating Manufacturer and Commodity Ratings

Each line on the Manufacturers tab and the Commodities tab represents the combination of a supplier, manufacturer or commodity, ship-to locations, and ratings. You can change ratings one line at a time, or you can change multiple lines at once.

Note: You can rate the manufacturer or commodity offerings only when ship-to locations are specified and the type is Rating.

To update manufacturer and commodity ratings in the Web Client:

1. Open the supplier you want to work with, and click the Commodities tab or Manufacturers tab.

2. Click in the Ratings column of the row that must be updated.

3. Select a new rating from the drop-down list.

4. If desired, select any other rows that need to have their rating similarly updated. Use the Fill-up/Fill-down options by clicking the More button.

7.6 Working with the PSRs Tab

The PSRs tab of a customer or supplier lists all product service requests reported by a customer. It can help gauge customer satisfaction with your products. This tab is read-only and is automatically completed whenever this customer is added to a PSR.

PSRs can be closed (promoted to their Complete type status) in the following ways:

• The Agile administrator can set up the system so that a problem report closes automatically when the related issue closes.

• The Agile administrator can set up the system so that a PSR (problem report or issue) closes automatically when the related PSR closes.

• An organization manager or supplier administrator with the appropriate privileges can manually close a PSR.

Refer to the Product Quality Management (PQM) User Guide for more details on PSRs, including initiating and managing PSRs.