One of the major elements of the ECR process is the incorporation of a fully automated materials planning system that uses scientific methods to automate and optimise stock replenishment planning from a retail perspective. Or from the manufacturer’s perspective, enabling product stocks and sales figures to be monitored and providing automatic replenishment. The benefits of incorporating fully automated materials planning are cost-optimised stock, reduction of out-of-stock situations and a drop in surplus stock in branches and distribution centres.

• Avoiding out-of-stock situations
• Reducing warehouse and handling costs
• Exploiting supplier conditions and discounts
• Putting logistic restrictions in place to reduce logistics costs
• Reducing the amount of handling work performed by staff
• Reacting quickly to changes in sales figures
• Optimising the logistics chain
• Reducing and optimising stock
• Improving planning and monitoring for new products and sales promotions
• Rapidly withdrawing products that are performing badly from the market

The solution developed by ORBIS is needed to integrate the fully automated materials planning into existing SAP R/3 software.