While a standard SAP ERP system works with material, the SAP EWM system requires a product (an SAP ERP Retail system does not work with materials, but with articles, but for EWM that would not make a difference).
In a decentralized system environment you copy each material in the SAP ERP system that is relevant for Extended Warehouse Management to the SAP EWM system using the Core Interface, an ALE distribution model, or the Data Replication Framework (depending on the SAP EWM release). In an SAP S/4HANA embedded EWM scenario, this is not required, the product is simply created in the background when you create a material.
You can access the product using the Maintain Product transaction in the EWM menu, at Extended Warehouse Management → Master Data → Product → Maintain Product. Data in the global data view of the product is applicable to all warehouses in which the product is stored. The data is organized under the following tabs:
Properties: contains general information related to the product such as description, weight, volume, grouping codes
Units of measure
Packaging data: contains packaging data only for product masters that represent packaging materials
- Storage: contains fields that can control the behavior of the product in all warehouses
Up to SAP S/4HANA 2023 fields which could be used by EWM and that had to be maintained in the product are the Product Group Type and the Product Group (Product Group Type and Product Group can be used for certain determinations in production integration, value added services, or direct deliveries. Opportunistic Cross-Docking is controlled by the product group type).
This has changed with SAP S/4HANA 2023. From this release on, the product can not be changed anymore in the system, the fields Product Group Type and Product Group are now part of the material master. While this means that for embedded EWM you can maintain all none-warehouse specific data in the material master, a customer needs to consider these options in a decentral deployment:
- In case of SAP S/4HANA 2023 or later as ERP backend, the master data can be maintained in the ERP system. But this requires that the definitions of product group types and product groups must be maintained in both systems and that the master data transfer includes these fields.
- If the data is not transferred from the ERP backend (either because the information can not be maintained due to lower releases or it is a customer decision not to maintain it there), the material maintenance transaction (MM02) in the EWM system should be setup in a way that only these fields can be changed. This can be done by using a transaction variant or by defining a special Screen Sequence.
Warehouse Product
After a product is created in SAP EWM, you can create the warehouse product. The warehouse product is the warehouse number dependent view of the product, and comprises all the properties of a product that relate to its storage in a certain warehouse, such as the putaway and removal control indicators. When you create a warehouse product, all the various indicators on the Whse Data tab, along with the slotting data, and storage type replenishment parameters related to a product can be used within the SAP EWM system.
In general you do not need to create a warehouse product to use a product within the warehouse (that is a big difference in comparison to the classic ERP WM, where the warehouse views for a material had to be created, before you could do anything with the material in a warehouse). However, there are a lot of fields which enable a product specific handling in the warehouse. Most replenishment processes are based on data maintained in the warehouse product.
You can create, change, or display the warehouse product data using the Maintain Warehouse Product transaction on the EWM Index screen, at Extended Warehouse Management → Master Data → Product → Maintain Warehouse Product. You have to enter data in the Warehouse No. and Party Entitled to Dispose fields, because the warehouse number-dependent data of this product is uniquely defined by the warehouse number and party entitled to dispose.
Other options to create the warehouse product are the following:
- The Warehouse Management Monitor
In the Warehouse Management Monitor you can create, change, and display the warehouse product. Furthermore, a mass creation or change is possible.
- The Fiori app Manage Product Master
This app is especially interesting when using embedded EWM, as the complete material / product master can be processed here. It is the only "integrated" option where the warehouse product can be maintained together with non-warehouse specific data.
- Slotting
The slotting process can create and update warehouse products by using condition records.
- Customer specific solution
The SAP Note "3081583 - Automatic Creation of Warehouse Product when creating Products" describes a customer specific solution using BTE (business transaction events) to automatically create warehouse products.
The warehouse product also shows data which is global and transferred from SAP ERP, and therefore can not be changed in SAP EWM.
Storage Data
You see global, warehouse number-independent data related to the storage of the product on the Storage tab. The Storage tab is also displayed in product maintenance.
Note
In a standard SAP Business Suite ERP system, most of the fields visible on the storage tab are not visible in the material in ERP because they have no relevance in ERP. To make them maintainable, you have to configure the material master accordingly. For details see SAP Note "1304710 - Material Master: Add. fields on client level for SPM". In SAP S/4HANA this is not required.
Warehouse Data, Slotting, and Storage Type Data
The warehouse number-dependent data on the warehouse product is found on the Whse data, Slotting, and St. type tabs in the maintenance function for warehouse products as follows:
Warehouse data:
On this tab, you maintain data for the warehouse in which the product is stored. In this view, there are a number of indicator fields that are used in storage type and storage section determination during the putaway and picking processes.
Slotting:
On this tab, you have parameters that are used in the slotting and rearrangement processes.
Storage type data:
On this tab, you maintain data that is specific to a particular storage type in which a product can be stored. This data generally consists of indicators used in replenishment and storage bin management.