In Baan IV, requirements for an MPS item with the order method lot-for-lot result in daily planned MPS orders.

For example, if a plan period contains 10 working days and the net requirements for an item in that period is 2000 pieces, an MPS planning run generates one planned MPS order of 200 pieces for each working day in the plan period.

In Infor LN, requirements for a planned item with the order method lot-for-lot result in one planned order per plan period.

For example, if a plan period contains 10 working days and the net requirements for an item in that period is 2000 pieces, a master planning run will generate a single planned order of 2000 pieces for the first working day in that plan period. To influence the order quantity of the planned orders, enter appropriate values in the Maximum Order Quantity field and the Order Interval field in the Items – Ordering (tcibd2500m000) session or choose a fixed order quantity.

In LN, a supplier's reliability is no longer based only on correct deliveries. The vendor rating functionality of LN is based on various objective criteria and subjective criteria that can be used to calculate the vendor’s rating.

 

The set up procedure for analyzing suppliers has changed completely compared to Baan IV.  To execute the vendor rating process, users must update the vendor ratings in the Update Vendor Rating (tdpur8850m000) session.

If users update the vendor ratings, the following stages exist in the update vendor rating procedure:

1. Calculate actual weightings

2. Calculate ratings for objective criteria

3. Calculate ratings for subjective criteria

4. Update overall vendor rating

In Baan IV, this session is called Release Commissions/Rebates to Invoicing (tdcms2201m000) and is used to set the status of the commissions/rebates to Reserved, or Closed. In Infor LN, this session is only used to set the status to  Closed. Users can reserve commissions/rebates in the Reservation and Approval of Reserved Commissions/Rebates (tdcms2202m000) session. In addition, the following fields are added to the Release Commissions/Rebates to Invoicing (tdcms2201m000) session:

▪ Commissions to Accounts Payable

▪ Rebates to Central Invoicing

In LN, the configuration of a generic item not always results into a customized item. Configured items can now be customized items as well as standard items. If users configure items without PCS projects, standard items are generated instead of customized items.

 

The sessions for generating product variant structures for sales quotations and sales orders are moved from the Product Configuration module in Manufacturing to the Sales Control module in LN. The following new sessions are available in Sales Control:

▪ Generate (Budget) Structure for Sales Quotations (tdsls1201m100).

▪ Generate (Project) Structure for Sales Orders (tdsls4244m000)

Service departments and warehouses that contain spare parts and components used for service and maintenance belong to enterprise units. To perform separate financial accounting for the service departments and their warehouses, you can assign service departments and warehouses to enterprise units that are linked to different financial companies.

 

If material, labor, or other costs are transferred between service departments and warehouses, or from one service department to another (in the case of internal subcontracting for depot repair), LN can perform the invoicing between these departments and warehouses. In the Enterprise Modeling Management module, you can define internal trade relationships with invoicing between various entities.

 

You can also record and process service operations in a multi-logistic company environment.

Tax reporting is part of the financial accounting and is restricted to one country. Therefore, the LN tax handling in a multi-company structure is similar to the tax handling in a single company environment.

Tax handling in LN includes the following:

· Tax registration

For tax registration, you define the various tax details for each country in the Taxation module. In the General Ledger module of Financials, you specify the ledger accounts for the tax amounts separately for each financial company. LN can post the tax amounts calculated for a tax code to different ledger accounts in the individual financial companies, for example, in a single logistic, multi-financial company structure.

The advantages of virtualization include the following:
 

• You get more out of your existing resources. Pool common infrastructure resources and break the legacy “one application to one server” model with server consolidation.

• You can reduce datacenter costs by reducing your physical infrastructure and improving your server to admin ratio. Fewer servers and related IT hardware means reduced real estate and reduced power and cooling requirements. With better management tools, you can improve your server to admin ratio so personnel requirements are reduced.

• You can increase the availability of hardware and applications for improved business continuity.

• Securely back up and migrate entire virtual environments with no service interruptions. Eliminate planned downtime and recover immediately from unplanned issues.

• Gain operational flexibility. Respond to market changes with dynamic resource management, faster server provisioning, and improved application deployment.

 

The disadvantages of virtualization include the following:

• Virtualization adds overhead to the CPU, memory, IO, and network.

• Virtualization adds an additional layer to the hardware and software stack. Therefore, additional complexity is introduced in the following circumstances:

In Baan IV, users define series and numbers in the Maintain First Free Numbers (tcmcs0147m000) session. In the Type of Number field, users must select the type of documents for which the series will be used. The generated document numbers are always numeric and can consist of up to six characters.

 

In LN, users must define number groups in the Number Groups (tcmcs0151m000) session and then in the First Free Numbers (tcmcs0150m000) session, define the series and numbers of each number group. Users assign the number groups to various purposes in the corresponding sessions. For example, in the Sales Order Parameters (tdsls0100s400) session, users can select the number group for sales orders and sales schedules. In the Sales Offices (tdsls0512m000) session, users can then select a series of that number group for the sales orders generated by a specific sales office. As the series codes can be alphanumeric, the generated document numbers can be alphanumeric and they can consist of up to nine characters.