Factory OS Docs
New product development

Set up items and products

Create the materials a product uses, then the product record, its workspace tabs and its sales prices.

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A product is made from items (materials and components) and sold at a price. Engineering owns the technical product record. Sales owns the price, quantities and packaging. The store keeper (Farah Hanim) owns the item list, and purchasing (Lim Wei Jie) can edit it too. The engineer (Daniel Tan) creates the product.

Item types and units Materials and items Product (Draft) Bill of materials and method Sales product and prices
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%% title: What you set up, in order
flowchart LR
  A["Item types and units"] --> B["Materials and items"]
  B --> C["Product (Draft)"]
  C --> D["Bill of materials and method"]
  C --> E["Sales product and prices"]

The setup forms help you as you go. Every field has an (i) that says what it is, gives an example and what happens if you leave it blank. Long forms are split into steps named by what they hold, such as The operation, Quality checks and If a part fails for an operation, and each step starts with one line on what it is for.

Create a material or an item

Open Inventory and choose Items (/inventory/invItems). Choose Add.

Fill in the Description and, if your team has one, the Internal reference (your old item code). The Item code is assigned on save, for example ITM-0012. Choose the Inventory type: Purchased or Customer consignment. For consignment stock choose the Owner (consignment).

Choose the Type, the Unit, the Picking rule (FEFO takes the lot that expires first, FIFO the oldest received) and the Storage condition.

Set the Shelf life (days) and the Min. shelf life at issue (days) if the material expires. Add the Purchase spec and the Supplier if you know them.

For a compound tested at incoming inspection (item type CoA + tests), copy its limits from the purchase spec into Incoming hardness min (Shore A), Incoming hardness max (Shore A), Incoming cure time min (s) and Incoming cure time max (s). Each grade has its own: incoming inspection judges every lot against them, and cannot accept a lot of a silicone compound that has none.

Save. On hand, Available and Quarantine / hold fill in by themselves from the stock lots. You cannot type them.

The item Type decides how incoming material is inspected. Item types (for example a resin or a printed carton) carry one of CoA + tests, AQL sampling, CoC only or None. See Inspect incoming material.

Materials and items

The item list with stock figures calculated from the lots.

Inventory Items list with item code, description, type, unit, on hand, available and quarantine columns
  1. Add opens the new item form.
  2. Item code (assigned on save) and description.
  3. On hand, Available and Quarantine / hold come from the stock lots.

Units and unit conversions

Quantities use the units in Units of measure. If you buy in drums but stock in kilograms, add a unit conversion: open Inventory and choose Unit conversions (/inventory/uomc). A conversion names the Item, the Base unit, the Transaction unit with its pack size (for example drum (25 kg)), the Factor and the Precision. The item must exist first, so add the item under Materials & items (with its base unit) and then its pack conversion. A new conversion is Pending approval. Someone other than the person who created it, for example QA or purchasing, chooses Approve conversion, a signed step that uses their e-signature (if they sign for a delegator, the delegator must not be the creator either). Until it is approved, transactions in that unit are refused. If you change an approved conversion, it goes back to Pending approval.

Create a product

Open Engineering and choose Products (/engineering/engineering). Choose Add.

Fill in the Name, the Part no. (the customer's or your engineering part number) and the Rev. The Product ID is assigned on save, for example PRD-0007, and the part number can be changed later. Choose the Customer if it is known. Set the Shelf life (days) if the finished product expires: each finished lot then gets an Expiry that many days after it is made. Leave it blank for a product that does not expire. Add the customer drawing number if you have it.

Under Bill of materials, add one line for each material or component the product uses: pick the Material or component from your materials and enter the Qty per 1,000 pcs. Choose Add a line for the next one. The first line becomes the product's main Material. The lines are saved with the product as the bill of materials of its primary production method, so a product that uses two materials has two lines. You can change them later on the bill of materials.

Save. The product starts in Draft and stays editable. Example: PROD-A is a Draft product, General-SDS-01 is Released. Products made before numbering keep their part number as their ID. Pickers show Name · Part no., and you can search by either.

Products

The engineering product list. Add creates a Draft product.

Engineering Products list with part number, name, revision, customer and status columns
  1. Add opens the new product form.
  2. Product ID, name, part number and revision.
  3. Status: Draft, In review, Released or Obsolete.

The product workspace

Open the product (for example /r/PROD-A). The tabs are Engineering, Sales, Purchasing, Production, Quality, Logistics and Attachments. Drag a tab to reorder them for yourself; Reset order restores the default.

  • Engineering has two views: Setup (the production method, its operations, components, machine options, work instructions, parameters and the inspection plan) and Revisions & ECN (approvals, revision history and the change notes).
  • Sales, Purchasing, Production, Quality and Logistics show what other departments hold for this product: prices, quotations, orders, vendor prices, manufacturing orders, moulds, process validations, the inspection plan, first article reports, stock lots and delivery orders. Choose Open list to go to the full list.
  • Attachments holds the customer drawing and specifications. The default category is Drawing / specification.

A Draft product

The product workspace for PROD-A, with its tabs and the Engineering Setup view.

Product page for PROD-A showing the status Draft and the tabs Engineering, Sales, Purchasing, Production, Quality, Logistics and Attachments
  1. The part number, revision and status.
  2. The workspace tabs.
  3. Setup and Revisions & ECN switch the Engineering view.

Sales product and prices

Open Sales and choose Products (/sales/salesProducts). Add a sales product for the engineering part. Enter the List price (RM), MOQ (pcs), Lead time (days), the Unit of Measure (UoM) and the Packaging. UDI-DI (GTIN) is optional. Website & catalogue is Published or Unpublished (give an Unpublish reason when you unpublish).

  • Price breaks give a unit price from a quantity (From quantity (pcs) and Unit price (RM)).
  • Customer prices give a customer a price, with their Customer part no., Valid until and an Agreement ref.

Sales owns these numbers. Engineering owns the revision and drawings and changes them under change control.

If the system refuses a step here, see Product development: why the app refuses.

Next steps

Build the bill of materialsList the components the product uses per 1,000 pieces.

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Start a development item

Track a new product from feasibility to qualified, close its specification gaps, and see the first article reports.

Build the bill of materials

List the components a product uses per 1,000 pieces, link them to operations, and see how release locks them.

On this page

Create a material or an itemUnits and unit conversionsCreate a productThe product workspaceSales product and prices