AX 2012 R2 CU6 - Legacy sales history / demand.
Seasoned experts, I am looking for some comments, thoughts on the following idea I have.
A little history:
To create suggested replenishment orders using AX MRP for the 1st few months after a 'go live date', I need to be able to rely on historic sales history demand from a legacy system. I have read bits of various articles, blogs and forums, most suggest that this isn't advisable to migrate historic sales history demand into AX , as per this article for example.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/jj225596.aspx and this bit "We recommend that you not import transactional data or historical data into Microsoft Dynamics AX". After talks with developers, I am tasked with finding an alternative solution albeit with a little development work. The import file is a .CSV file that contains the item number along with total sales demand for previous periods, e.g Month 1, Month 2, Month 3 etc, for 12 months
My thoughts are: - (I have done this manually for several items and I will be asking for this to be created automatically as part of our data migration requirements, subject to any comments I receive)
In the released product form > Plan > Forecast > Demand forecast > Create one line for each months legacy sales history with the date corresponding to the previous months history, i.e. 16/02/2014, 16/3/2014, etc for 12 months. The sales quantity is the sales demand for the corresponding months. This gives users visibility of legacy sales history,
Then I have created one extra line that replicates a legacy system weighted average sum, i.e. the total sales demand for the last 6 months + the total sales demand for the last 3 months.
(Pause for a cup of tea and a biscuit) .. To finish the legacy systems simplistic weighted average scenario (It would have been 6 Months + 3 Months / 9 to get to a period average demand), I have allocated a period key (to the one extra line that I have created)that divides the sum by 9 months.
AX then predicts the average quantity to order for that item over a 9 month period.
MRP when you include the forecast model will then suggest this quantity along with any AX sales order history replenishment requirements.
You can also add reduction keys into the forecast to gradually reduce the dependence on the historical period average demand, if need be.
I appreciate its no where near a perfect solution, but AX only needs to rely on historical sales demand for approximatley 9 months or so until AX sales orders takes over.
In summary:
Is this a good approach albeit with some short comings?
Has anyone actually imported historic sales demand so that AX MRP can use this history to recommend reorders?
Can anyone offer another solution?
I appreciate your time in reading and hopefully offering some advice
Kind regards
Martin