Why two-way matters
Most companies start with one direction: CAD sends BOMs to ERP. The bigger gains come when ERP information also flows back to engineers, so they design with real cost, stock and supplier data.
| CAD → ERP | ERP → CAD |
|---|---|
| New items and item properties | Standard costs and prices |
| Engineering BOMs | Stock levels and lead times |
| Weights, materials, drawings | Preferred parts and suppliers |
| Engineering changes | Item numbers and status (active, obsolete) |
Manufacturing scenarios
Make-to-stock
Standard products with stable BOMs. Integration keeps ERP BOMs accurate after every engineering change.
Make-to-order and engineer-to-order
Each order has a unique BOM. Integration creates order-specific items and BOMs in ERP as soon as the design is released, often linked to the sales order.
Fabrication and sheet metal
Integration sends raw material requirements (sheet area, profile lengths) and flat pattern files alongside the BOM, so nesting and purchasing work from the same data.
From EBOM to MBOM
The engineering BOM follows the CAD structure; the manufacturing BOM follows how the product is built. The integration can apply rules to transform one into the other:
- Flatten phantom sub-assemblies.
- Replace machined parts with raw material plus routing.
- Add consumables, paint and packaging.
- Group parts by work centre.
Engineering change
When a released design is revised, the integration compares the new BOM with ERP, applies differences with effectivity dates and flags open orders or stock affected by the change.
The goal is simple: what engineering releases is exactly what production builds.
ERP systems we work with
SAP S/4HANA and ECC, Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Business Central, Oracle, Infor, Epicor, Odoo, Tally and custom ERPs, connected to SOLIDWORKS, Inventor, AutoCAD, Creo and CATIA.
Get started
See our CAD integration services, the technical walkthrough CAD to ERP integration: how it works, or our earlier CAD–ERP guide.