Describing the SAP Supply Chain Management Operator

Objective

After completing this lesson, you will be able to describe the SAP Supply Chain Management operator

Introduction to the Time-Series Based Constrained Supply Planning with SAP IBP

Planning operators in SAP Integrated Business Planning (IBP) for Supply Chain are used to execute calculations on a large number of key figures at the same time, either from the add-in for Microsoft Excel (Excel add-in) or from an application job template.

These operators call the SAP HANA library to execute an algorithm. The algorithms can only be modified by adjusting the parameters on the operator profile associated with the specific algorithm.

S&OP Operator Profiles

You can use the S&OP Operator Profiles app to configure the different types of time-series-based supply planning algorithms. Each profile contains different settings for the algorithm, such as settings that control the algorithm's behavior during a planning run. An S&OP operator profile must exist for each algorithm that will be in use. Once profiles are created, supply planners can call the algorithms through the SAP IBP Excel UI, found under the Application Jobs menu.

You can configure profiles for the following algorithm types:

  • TS-Based Supply Heuristic

    Available types: Infinite Without Shortages for the time-series-based supply planning heuristic, Finite Heuristics and Supply Propagation for the time-series based supply propagation heuristic

  • TS-Based Supply Optimizer

  • TS-Based Forecast Consumption

  • Check Mode

  • Local Updates

  • Compute Quotas

SOP Profile General Settings

You also make algorithm-specific settings that control the behavior of the algorithm with respect to planning features such as quota checks, source validity, and lead-time horizon. For the optimizer only, you set parameters for discretization, fair-share distribution, time-independent penalty costs, and global cost factors.

In this unit, we will focus on the algorithms that apply to Time-Series Based Supply Heuristics Planning and the parameters that apply to all algorithms. The algorithms for the time-series-based supply optimizer are covered in a separate course.

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