Case study

AGCO Closes the Loop Between Engineering and Manufacturing

How AGCO, a global agricultural equipment manufacturer headquartered in Duluth, Georgia, partnered with ArcherGrey to extend their PLM with MPMLink and connect Design BOMs to plant-specific Manufacturing BOMs through to SAP, unlocking full traceability between engineering and manufacturing changes.

Automotive & IndustrialPLM Transformation
IndustryAutomotive & Industrial
Solutions

PLM Transformation
Background

Global agricultural equipment manufacturer headquartered in Duluth, Georgia. With roots dating to 1909 and established in its current form through a 1990 acquisition, AGCO designs and produces farming equipment and technology for customers around the world. 20,900+ employees.

The inflection point

Closing the gap between Design and Manufacturing BOMs.

AGCO’s Jackson site needed complete traceability between the Design BOM and the Manufacturing BOM, including traceability to Manufacturing Changes resulting from any Design Change.

The existing PLM environment already had an Engineering Change Process integrated to SAP for transferring parts, eBOMs, and documents via ESI to SAP-PI, but the link from engineering to manufacturing wasn’t yet closed. The opportunity: extend the PLM environment to give designers full visibility into the manufacturing BOM, and create a manufacturing change process that travels alongside engineering changes from the moment they’re released.

Our approach

Extending PLM with MPMLink for plant-specific mBOMs.

ArcherGrey extended AGCO’s PLM environment to use MPMLink for managing the plant- and site-specific Manufacturing BOM, linked to the upstream Engineering BOM. We built a new Change Process for Manufacturing that’s triggered by and associated to the Engineering Change, so any modification on the design side automatically generates the corresponding manufacturing-side change. The mBOM is then transferred to the Jackson Site / Plant in SAP, completing the connection from design through manufacturing.

What we owned:

  • MPMLink configuration to manage site-specific mBOMs linked to the upstream eBOM
  • A new Change Process for Manufacturing, triggered by and associated to Engineering Changes
  • mBOM transfer to the Jackson Site / Plant in SAP via the existing ESI to SAP-PI pipeline

Business outcomes

End-to-end traceability from engineering through manufacturing.

With MPMLink in place and the manufacturing change process linked to engineering, AGCO closed the loop between design and production. Designers now have direct insight into the manufacturing BOM from within the PLM system, and every design change is paired to a manufacturing change that travels with it.

What we delivered:

  • Traceability between the engineering BOM and the manufacturing BOM
  • Traceability between Engineering Change Notices (ECNs) and Manufacturing Change Notices (MCNs)
  • Direct mBOM visibility for designers, inside the PLM system
  • A foundation for stronger collaboration between design and manufacturing teams
  • A path to better design and product quality

Ready to talk through your PLM transformation?

Tell us where you are in your PLM journey, and we’ll meet you there.

Speak to a PLM advisor →