Jack Burnett and Smith Cooley at Epicor Insights

TwinEngines leverages the power of APIs to integrate Prophet 21 into manufacturing workflows.

If your business process or workflow doesn’t easily fit into Prophet 21, you can leverage its APIs to manage your workflows.

That’s the message TwinEngines and Conklin Metal delivered at Epicor Insights.

Tighter integration with business operations – In a seminar designed for IT employees and business analysts, participants learned how Prophet 21’s APIs can be leveraged for tighter integration between manufacturers, their partners, and customers. 

Smith Cooley, VP of Operations for Conklin Metal Industries, and Jack Burnett, Digital Transformation Lead for TwinEngines, Inc. demonstrated the API toolset and shared a case study on how Conklin Metal Industries streamlined operations by connecting Prophet 21’s APIs to external Web applications.

Using APIs to solve operational issues – Jack Burnett explained how APIs can solve a range of operations issues when Prophet 21 doesn’t fit a business process. These include:  

• eCommerce integration
• Lot attributes tracking
• Unique distribution workflows
• Manufacturing/Scheduling
• Avoiding transfer backorders
• Bulk Price and Cost updates
• Pricing and Claim back contracts
• Unique field operations

API Example – The Challenge with Receiving

Smith Cooley explained how Conklin Metal is able to use APIs to receive shipments of steel coil lots from the dock into Prophet 21.

• Before – Trucks would unload various sized coils of steel to the warehouse. The front office would then create a purchase order receipt and receive each coil manually into Prophet 21. The manual process consumed time and introduced errors. [click image to open]

• Solution: An Interactive API Web App – TwinEngines created an Interactive API Web app to automate the process. The Bill of Lading from the mill is imported directly into the Web app with all lot details. Lots are created and labels are now printed at the dock for each coil as it is unloaded. The Interactive API also creates the PO Receipt. The P21 inventory is updated directly [click image to open]

“Prophet 21 plays a powerful role for manufacturers and supply chain businesses, but there are times when it can’t handle proprietary processes or the way you do business,” Jack Burnett explained. “Building job-specific external Web apps and linking them to the ERP through the APIs can extend the functionality of Prophet 21, increase productivity, and boost your competitive advantage.”