L-Class uses VARCHART XGantt for Resource Planning

The versatile ERP&ME System TECHNOCLASS of the Bulgarian software and consulting company L-CLASS is presently conquering the Eastern European market.

TECHNOCLASS supports to plan business processes in all sections of an enterprise by an Enterprise Resource Planning system, while a Manufacturing Executing System plans tasks and workloads of machines and staff members in production plants.>

Planning implies to visualize data in the form of charts, which allows to keep data in check in a comfortable way and to intervene if required. L-CLASS went for the VARCHART XGantt ActiveX component to graphically visualize the planning processes of its ERP&ME System. Says Mr. Nedelko Todorov, Director of Marketing and Business Development: “VARCHART XGantt is the most modern, versatile and handy Gantt control for diagrams and process optimization presently found on the market.”

VARCHART XGantt is used to visualize many different charts in the TECHNOCLASS application. A Gantt chart for example gives a clear overview of the machines and their workloads and enables the planner to simulate different planning strategies in terms of the machines' workloads: minimal load (machine is least loaded), maximum load (machine is loaded to maximum) and sequential load (machines are loaded as tasks come in). Simultaneously, it allows to choose different scheduling directions: a forward (ASAP) or backward (JIT) scheduling.

Simulation of planning strategies

The scheduling charts in the MES of TECHNOCLASS are another example of how VARCHART XGantt is used. Incoming orders of the workshop are displayed in a chart where they are allocated to machines or staff members. So the workshop manager controls the production process in real time. He easily and quickly can identify overloads or overlaps in the histogram.

Chart controlling real-time processes

The TECHNOCLASS application allows to actively adjust scheduling, in case a worker is absent or a machine breaks down. The workshop manager merely has to move a bar in the chart. This function ensures that the resource allocation always remains optimized.

The tool "MES Optimizer" optimizes the workload of the machines by scheduling their tasks that are to be worked off. The workshop manager can choose between two different planning strategies: "minimal workload of machines" or "constant load". In addition, the production process can either be optimized according to the delivery date (JIT) or according to start date (ASAP). The resource scheduling module of VARCHART XGantt is used for optimizing procedures.

Work order allocation before optimization

Work order allocation after optimization

From its beginning the TECHNOCLASS ERP&ME System demonstrated that it had a high potential on the market. The first version of the product already was awarded a gold medal on the 53rd International Technical Fair in Plovdiv, Bulgaria in 1997. Today more than 70 enterprises in Bulgaria, Russia, Ukraine and Belarus use the L-CLASS system.