Demand flow - Sales order to production - MD04 - Schedule line - Requirement type / Class - Strategy

[RaghavanKathamuthu]

Introduction

Production people must know how the demand will flow from sales to the PP area. Most of the time we will create materials with strategies 20 and 40. Running MRP will create the Planned order.

SAP tries to determine the requirement type based on below hierarchy

1st  Based on the strategy group from the material master record.

2nd Based on the MRP group from the material master record.

3rd Based on the material type from the material master record.

4th Based on a combination of the item category & MRP type.

5th Based on the item category itself.

Here we will see the below

1. Strategy group in MRP3 view of Material master via requirement type
2. Item category group in basic data 1 view of Material master via schedule line category in sales order
3. Based on a combination of the item category & MRP type.

Overview:

Scenario 1: Demand is transferred to MD04 by the strategy in the material master.

Here the system finds the demand requirements type KE (under the Procurement type tab title on the Sales Order screen ) because of the strategy group 20 in material master.

Scenario 2: Demand transferred by Item category group in material master. 

Here the system finds the schedule line category CP - MRP and item category TAN because of the item category group NORM in materials master.

Main Part:

Let us see the two configurations in detail

Configurations 1: - Strategy group in MRP3 view of Material master via requirement type

Requirement class (OVZG) > Requirement type (OVZH) >  Strategy (OPPS) > Strategy Group (OPPT) >Material (MM02)

The requirement Class is assigned to requirement type which in turns assigned to Strategy which in turns assigned to Strategy Group. At last the strategy group will be assigned to Material master.

Let us go by top to bottom approach on configuration. i.e. Requirement class

OVZG - Requirement Class
Requirements classes  control the creation and execution of PIR, Sale Order & Stock consumption and decides whether the "transfer of requirement", "availability check", etc. needs to be done for the Sales order.

The following is determined by the requirements class,

• the consumption of independent requirements by sales orders
• how warehouse stock is taken into account (net or gross requirements planning)
• inventory management and cost allocation (make-to-order or make-to-stock production)
• the release of the planned order (planning without final assembly)
• requirements distribution (configuration)
• MRP to be planned or only displayed or not planned
• Allocation Indicator - consumption of customer requirements with PIR

OVZH - Requirement Types
Requirement type is only description that uses the requirement class. (Don't know why the need this mapping)

OPPS - Strategy

SIMG - Production - Production Planning - Demand Management - Planned Independent Requirements - Planning Strategy - Define Strategy

If you see inside the strategy 20 the requirement class 40 is automatically fetched and requirement type KE is assigned to it. 

OPPT - Strategy Group

It groups together multiple strategy. 1 Strategy is mandatory. But you can add 7 more.

This one we assign it to Material master and this will decide weather the sales order to be considered for MPR or not.

Configuration 2: - Item category group in basic data 1 view of Material master via schedule line category in sales order

Requirement class (OVZG) > Requirement type (OVZH) > Maintain Item category (VOV7) >  Assignments of Requirement type to transaction ( against item category and MRP Type) (OVZI) > Item category Group (OVAW) > Assign Item Categories (Against sales order type and item category group)  (VOV4) > Material (MM02)

OVZG / OVZH - Requirement class / types are maintained as above.

VOV7 - Maintain Item Category
An item category is used to define if an item is suitable for billing or pricing. It defines the additional control functions for a sales document.

OVZI - Assignment of Requirement types to Transaction

Its just a mapping that maps Item category against the MRP type and Requirement type.

OVAW - Item category Group

Its just a name which is used to group together the item category. So it maps list of requirement types.

Hope this itself maps the requirement class directly to the Material master and pass the demand. But we can map it via sales order type also via VOV4.

VOV4 - Assign Item Categories

Its just a table for mapping sales order type to item category group and item category. Also more Item categories can be assigned.

At last we have to assign the item category group to our material. This will pass the requirements to the material directly via the sales order document type. 

You may ask here itself the requirement is passed then why we need to configure the schedule line. Because there we maintain the availability check of sales order. 

Scenario 3: - Based on a combination of the item category & MRP type.

Schedule line category (VOV6) > Item category (VOV5) > Item category Group (OVAW) > Material (MM02)

VOV6 - Maintain schedule line categories 

The Schedule line is assigned to Item category which in turns is assigned to Item category Group which it terms assigned to Material master. 

Here the availability and req assembly is checked. Which decides whether the sales order to be considered in MRP or not. If this is not checked then the sales order will not be displayed in MD04.

VOV5 - Assign Schedule Line Categories

SIMG - Sales and Distribution - Sales - Sales Documents - Schedule Lines - Assign Schedule Line Categories

This is just a table where we can map the item category with multiple schedule line categories.

Requirement Type will define whether the sales order to be considered for MRP or not but much more
Schedule Line will decide whether the delivery to consume the sales order or not.

Conclusion.

Check these two configurations if your sales order is not creating the planned order in addition to other parameters like available stock, Delivery...

I hope this may help you on knowing the Demand flow from sales to production. Would like you guys to see more relevant things using the link: Strategy 20 & Link.  I would appreciate your comments and suggestions below.