Analysis of a material and capacity requirements planning system in a footwear company

Production planning process is an important issue for manufacturing companies, taking a special shade of meaning for those companies whose production is based solely on customer orders. This is the case of Roveda Srl.; a company specialized in the manufacturing of high quality shoes produced for big clients, in which due to particular customer defined specifications and a general customization of the product, it has been highlighted the need of implementing a more efficient and reliable production planning system to encourage a proper planning of all its resources. This study aims at analyzing the current materials and capacity requirements planning system used in the company and from the criticalities revealed through this analysis, a proposal should be generated on how to address the issues. Performing the analysis of the current materials and capacity requirements planning system and identification of the main planning tools were done as well as the procedures to carry it out were examined. In the same way, an analysis of the performance of the production against what it was planned during the last 6 months was carried out. Through the result this finding and in the light of the current reality of the company, the suggestions for improvement were proposed. The results showed that the main criticalities are related to the lack of coordination among the departments both upstream and downstream, inefficiency in managing all the information and lack of complete specifications for the products already approved from engineering department. The suggestions to overcome these criticalities are focused mainly in improving the communication and coordination by managing more efficiently the tools already existing and by implementing new ones. Also by performing engineering and production activities in a more concurrent way; looking at the improvement of the specifications of the product.