Executive Summary Optimization in SAP APO has failed in both SNP and PP/DS. There are repeated problems with cost settings, and this failure is widely censored by SAP consulting companies that prefer to bill customers for what is a dead solution. An Appraisal of the True State of Optimization in SAP APO If one looks…
Executive Summary Supply and production resources can be aggregated in SAP APO. SNP has both resource aggregation and disaggregation. There are important prerequisites to hierarchical planning. Introduction Different domains of the supply chain have different types of resources that must be modeled. For instance, trucks are a resource for supply planning, while a workstation is…
Executive Summary Planning areas must be set up to use SAP APO. To do so, it is necessary to set up the unit of measure and currency. To perform aggregation, it is necessary to understand SAP’s explanation of aggregation and aggregation types in SAP APO. Planning Area Setup To do begin the first step, it is…
Executive Summary Most aggregated planning is performed in demand planning. However, aggregated planning can be used for supply in APO and other systems.  Aggregated supply planning in APO can be performed when the supply planning load is calculated outside of the system. Introduction to Aggregate Supply Planning Aggregated planning is for supply is one of the…
Executive Summary Identifying the disconnection points. Labor pools The Time Dimension of SNP Versus PP/DS. Understanding the Standard Sequential Approach to Supply and Production Planning. Disconnection Points Between Supply and Production Planning in APO There are several disconnection areas between supply planning and production planning applications like SNP and PP/DS as a model for the…
Executive Summary Discrete optimization brings a higher level of reality to any optimization, with the cost bring longer run times and higher complexity. There is an important background to linear and discrete optimization. We cover the discrete constraints of the SNP network optimization and the deployment optimizer. Introduction to Planning Horizon in APO One of…
Executive Summary The SNP optimizer parallelization functionality has never worked. We cover the OSS notes on the fake parallelization functionality. It is important never to commingle the concepts of parallelization with decomposition. Introduction to Problem Decomposition On a recent project, I was reading through documentation that stated that the SNP optimizer’s parallelization functionality did not…
Executive Summary There are options for meeting business requirements and adopting a field on the Product Location Master and displaying the Planning Book. Introduction to the Product Location Master Frequently a company will need to have a company-specific field. This field means something to the company but does not exist in APO, to be assigned…
Executive Summary APO security goes across applications. We cover the basic model of APO security. This includes master data security and Planning Book security. Introduction to APO Security SAP security is considered “robust,” but it is quite a time consuming to understand and configure. You will learn how security works in APO. Background into APO…