Using Variant Configuration

So far, you have produced your forklift in one variant. Now, however, you are considering offering variants. Therefore, you first have an overview of existing variant products.

For example, you look at the laptop with which you are currently working. Could you buy them in different variants?

You configure a car. In which variants it is offered?

You can now continue this scenario as required.

Multivariant products have a vast selection of variants, arising from the combination of individual product features. Variant Configuration is used in the SAP system for this reason.

A product that is to be manufactured in multiple variants is described as a configurable material. This covers all possible features of the product and does not refer to a concrete article. In the SAP system, characteristics are used to describe the features of configurable products.

Now, let's focus on configuring a forklift.

This is now to be offered with different motors and power levels. Furthermore, it should be possible to select the tonnage, the color, or also the accessories.

In Variant Configuration, a class groups together the characteristics that describe a configurable material.

The features of a product are stored in the SAP system as characteristics. You define characteristic values for each characteristic and then assign these values to the configurable material.

You assign the characteristics that describe the configurable product to the class.

You assign the configurable material to the class so that you can use the characteristics of the class to configure the material.

If you are now looking at the configurable product, you need not only the configurable material master, but also a suitable BOM and routing.

In these objects, you can now define object dependencies or enter classes as BOM items.

Dependencies describe the interdependencies between different objects in a configuration. They check the consistency and completeness of the configuration. Dependencies can be used to derive characteristic values. The SAP system supports five different dependency types:

• A precondition is a necessary condition. You can control whether characteristic values can be set, or whether a characteristic can have values assigned to it.

• A selection condition is a sufficient condition. This determines that a BOM item or operation is selected, or that a characteristic must have values assigned to it.

• Procedures, like actions, can be used to derive values. A procedure is a set of instructions that is processed in the exact sequence that you define, like a program. Values derived from procedures can overwrite each other, but they must not conflict with statements from other sources (for example, user entries).

• Constraints are designed for highly interactive configuration tasks, and for tasks where the interdependencies between the characteristics of several objects are important. The main purpose of a constraint is to check the consistency of a configuration.

The Product Modeling Environment (PME) helps you to process object dependencies and the contents of variant tables (not additional master data in Variant Configuration).

The Product Modeling Environment (transaction PMEVC) supports you in editing in Variant Configuration.

If you have created a configurable material together with a BOM, further steps can be performed in the modeling environment.

In the modeling environment, you can create new characteristics or reassign existing classes.

You can/must also create a configuration profile. In this, you define whether you want to work with the standard or advanced Variant Configuration. The configuration profile also contains information about how to proceed with BOMs if, for example, a sales order occurs.

However, you can also use the product modeling environment to simulate a BOM explosion when a sales order is created, for example.

A sales order is created for a configurable product (in this example, for a forklift). In the sales order, the characteristics of the product are specified in detail. Based on the variant description in the sales order, the master data in the BOM and routing is exploded specifically for the desired variant.

In BOM maintenance, multilevel and interactive configuration is possible, and manual changes can be made.

All BOM items can be processed, including those that are not relevant to sales.

If you work with the advanced Variant Configuration, an alternative simulation interface is available in the SAP Fiori launchpad. Here, you can simulate the explosion of the BOM for the material or sales order. This enables you to recognize at an early stage which components are transferred to the planned order and production order.

Up to now, only one forklift prototype exists. Therefore, the company decides to deliver variants of this forklift. The central decision is now not to define a material and material BOM for every variant, but to use Variant Configuration, which means, only one configurable material and one supersession BOM can be used.

Product configuration modeler Kathy has defined the configurable material, the supersession BOM, and all the necessary object dependencies. Now, she wants to control these data inside the VC Modeling Environment.

Now, you have an impression of "Working with Variant Configuration".