PPS — Production Planning and Control

Production Planning and Control (PPS), in German Produktionsplanung und -steuerung, is the discipline and the software function that plans what to manufacture, in what quantity and by when, and then steers the execution of those plans. It spans demand and production programme planning, material requirements planning, capacity and scheduling, order release and shop-floor control. In DACH practice PPS is the classic predecessor and core of manufacturing ERP; many of its methods derive from MRP and MRP II. Today PPS functions usually live inside an ERP system rather than as a standalone product.

The planning levels of PPS

PPS is organised as a sequence of planning levels that move from coarse to fine. Production programme planning sets the medium-term plan of what end products to make, based on forecasts and firm demand. Material requirements planning then explodes that programme against the bill of materials to determine which parts and materials are needed and when, generating purchase and production proposals. Capacity planning checks whether the required work centres and resources are available and balances load against capacity. Finally, scheduling and sequencing fix the timing of individual operations.

From planning to control

The control half of PPS governs execution. Once orders are released as production orders, PPS dispatches them to work centres, monitors progress through operating and machine data, and compares actual output against plan. Deviations trigger rescheduling, expediting or re-prioritisation. This feedback loop, planning then controlling against reality, is what distinguishes PPS from pure planning. In practice the boundary to a dedicated MES is fluid: detailed dispatching and data acquisition are often delegated to an MES, while PPS retains the order and material logic.

PPS, MRP and ERP

• Relation to MRP / MRP II: PPS incorporates MRP logic for material netting and MRP II for closed-loop capacity and resource planning.
• Relation to ERP: modern ERP systems embed PPS as their manufacturing module, integrating it with purchasing, inventory and finance.
• Relation to APS: an APS tool can replace simple PPS scheduling with constraint-based, finite optimisation.
• Relation to MES: an MES executes and reports the orders that PPS plans and releases.

Selecting and using PPS

Because PPS sits at the heart of manufacturing, fit to the actual production type matters more than feature counts. A make-to-stock, repetitive plant has very different needs from a make-to-order or variant manufacturer, and the planning logic must reflect that. Accurate master data, especially bills of material, routings and lead times, is the precondition for sensible results; without it, even sophisticated PPS produces unreliable plans. Organisations should evaluate how the system handles their lot-sizing, scheduling and capacity constraints, and remain neutral about whether the function is delivered by the ERP core, an APS add-on or an MES at the execution end.

Related Topics

• MRP
• APS
• MES