Introduction

Many industries, especially Mill Products, Industrial Manufacturing, High Tech, and Engineer-to-Order (ETO) environments, rely on Product Configuration (for example, Class Type 300) to manufacture products that are uniquely configured by customers during the sales process.

Each sales order may contain a different combination of characteristics, dimensions, colors, materials, or optional features. These configuration values become critical manufacturing instructions that operators must have available on the shop floor to build the correct product.

SAP Digital Manufacturing seamlessly supports the download and integration of these product configurations from SAP ERP, making them available throughout manufacturing execution. By displaying the configuration directly inside Production Operator Dashboards (PODs), operators gain immediate visibility into the exact customer-specific requirements for the order they are executing.

Instead of relying on printed documents, external systems, or manual communication, workers can access all relevant configuration characteristics directly within their execution workspace. This helps ensure every configured product is manufactured according to the customer's specifications.

Why this matters

• Sales-order specific variability is the new normal. Customers demand individualized products; variant configuration ensures the order reflects exactly what must be built.
• Execution needs clarity at the point of work. If operators cannot see the order’s configured characteristics and related work instructions at the station, quality and throughput suffer.
• “Last-mile” integration is often the gap. Many manufacturers have VC configured in ERP but struggle to bring it into the operator’s workflow. PODs bridge this gap with real-time, contextual visibility.

How it Works

Create a Sales Order with Variant Configuration in ERP

Engineers and sales configure products using variant configuration and Class Type 300 to capture features, characteristics, and values tied to the sales order and its items. Sales Orders are then converted to Planned Orders, and afterwards to Production Orders, which are released for production and synchronized to SAP Digital Manufacturing to be produced.

Enrich Production Order Download Integration Workflow

To support the integration of the Variant Configuration characteristics, Class Type 300, the Production Engineer must customize the Production Order Download integration workflow, enabling <CustomFieldList> mapping to LOIPRO05 E1VCCHR IDOC segment, a sample is already provided.

With this customization in place, Variant Configuration characteristics will be saved to Production Orders Custom Data.

Display Variant Configuration characteristics in the Worker UI (Production Operator Dashboards, or PODs)

The Variant Configuration characteristics values stored in the Production Order Custom Data can be easily shown in PODs using different ways. Below you can find two different ways I implemented it myself.

Via Custom POD Plugin, check POD2.0-orderConfigurationData: A POD 2.0 widget that displays custom configuration data (customValues) from the selected order.

Features

• Displays order customValues in a searchable, sortable table
• Auto-loads when an order is selected
• Export to CSV/Excel
• Filtering and sorting by attribute/value

Design Time

Run Time

Via Action, check 20DisplayOrderConfigDataAction47: A POD 2.0 custom action that queries order custom data (customValues) for the currently selected order and displays it in a beautiful, searchable, sortable overlay popup modal. 

When assigned to a button in Manage PODs 2.0 app, this Action reads the selected order from the POD work list, calls the SAP DM Order API, and opens a polished dialog showing all custom key/value pairs configured on that order.

Design Time

Run Time

The action is triggered by the ‘Start' button, which loads the ‘Order Custom Data' popup after starting the SFC, exactly when the information is really needed.

Business Value

Displaying Product Configuration information inside PODs delivers significant business benefits:

• Reduce manufacturing errors by providing operators with the exact customer configuration required for each production order.
• Improve first-pass yield by minimizing misunderstandings and eliminating guesswork during production.
• Increase operator productivity by removing the need to search across multiple systems or paper-based documentation.
• Enhance quality and compliance by ensuring configuration-specific requirements are consistently followed.
• Support highly configurable products without increasing shop floor complexity.
• Improve traceability by associating customer configuration data with manufacturing execution records.
• Reduce cost of quality by having less scrap and fewer line stoppages drive down cost of quality and increase on-time delivery performance.

Value Proposition

Bringing Product Configuration directly into SAP Digital Manufacturing transforms customer-specific engineering data into actionable shop floor information.

Instead of simply executing generic work instructions, operators execute the exact product requested by the customer, with all relevant configuration details available at the point of execution.

This enables manufacturers to confidently support high-mix, low-volume production, mass customization, and engineer-to-order business models while maintaining operational efficiency, quality, and delivery performance.

Conclusion

As manufacturers continue moving toward greater product personalization and mass customization, making customer-specific configuration data available on the shop floor becomes increasingly important.

By integrating Product Configuration into SAP Digital Manufacturing and surfacing it directly within PODs, manufacturers empower operators with the information they need exactly when they need it. The result is fewer errors, faster execution, improved quality, and greater confidence that every product leaving the factory matches the customer's unique requirements.

Do you like this post? Please let me know in the comments section what you think. Any feedback is highly appreciated.
Or, if you have any questions, please check SAP Community Q&A Area, or comment down below.

Thanks,
Manoel Costa