Learn all about Katana and your inventory process flow
Inventory process flows in Katana
Katana Cloud Inventory is an inventory management system that helps manufacturers, wholesalers, and ecommerce merchants streamline their inventory process flow. Use the interactive map below to see exactly how Katana can help your business.
See how Katana Cloud Inventory effortlessly optimizes the different functions of inventory management.
Shop floor
Katana enhances manufacturing operations by enabling real-time tracking, scheduling, and reporting. With the Shop Floor App, businesses can create operators and assign tasks, allowing for real-time progress tracking. Get comprehensive insights into manufacturing costs, resource allocation, and material usage, facilitating more efficient and informed production management.
Inventory levels and costs update as items move from process to process. Shop floor operators can track, and update tasks specifically assigned to them using the Shop Floor App to avoid confusion. Managers can reassign tasks or priorities for orders if necessary, while Katana will automatically reallocate materials and resources to fit the new flow.
Once a manufacturing order is created, materials and resources are automatically allocated to production in Katana. A warehouse operator can then move the materials to the shop floor, ready for production. If your items require end-to-end traceability, you can add serial numbers to materials and manufactured products.
Quality control is an important step in the inventory process flow, which ensures that the final product is free of faults. If you handle perishable goods, you can also assign expiration dates to batches to give further control over the shelf life of your items and serial numbers for warranty tracking, assistance with device support, refunds, and recalls.
Warehouse
Katana helps optimize inventory process flow and sales order fulfillment by assigning tasks to operators and providing live updates. The Warehouse App allows for efficient picking and packing of sales orders, improves accuracy and speed through barcode scanning, and simplifies inventory organization by assigning default storage bins — for better inventory tracking and management.
When items run low, you can create a purchase order (PO) in Katana for your suppliers. It only takes a couple of clicks to create a PO, and if you’re missing materials, components, or subassemblies from the same supplier, we will notify you so you can include them in your order. You can also create outsourced POs for delivery directly to your contractor.
Before moving your items to the correct storage bin, they must undergo inspection for quantity and quality. If everything is fine, the operator can use the Warehouse App to scan the barcode on the supplies, update the stock levels, and mark the order as received. It is also possible to partially receive orders if items are still in transit.
Warehouse operators move the supplies to storage, usually close to the shop floor, for easier transport to production. The operator can manually update the stock levels or use a barcode scanner once moved to storage. When a manufacturing order is created, the operator moves the materials to a bin on the shop floor, ready for production.
Stock in Katana updates automatically in real time, but you should perform stock counts to ensure that stock levels are correct. Stocktakes are done monthly, quarterly, or yearly, and some companies require them for audit purposes. Another alternative is a cycle count, where you limit the counting to certain item categories or only some selected items.
In Katana, you can group the required ingredients for selected manufacturing orders (MO) into a consolidated pick list. This enables you to be more efficient on the shop floor by picking all the necessary ingredients for the day or a bunch of MOs simultaneously without going back and forth between the workstation and ingredient stock.
Once a manufacturing order is marked as completed, the finished goods are moved back into the warehouse and placed in storage with products ready to be sold. When a sales order is created, you can make a picking task for your operators to pick and pack the items for shipping. Once packed, the items are moved to the shipping area for delivery.
Once the item reaches the customer, you can mark the sales order within Katana as delivered. Katana enables you to track batches for products and materials in your stock by assigning batch/lot numbers to purchased and manufactured items, giving you full end-to-end traceability if you need to track your products.
Office
From integrating with leading software to automating your production planning, Katana gives you the toolset to centralize and manage many aspects of your business. The Planning and Forecasting add-on will help improve efficiency, compliance, and financial health. It will also assist you in enhancing cash flow management and improving your inventory process flow by preventing stockouts and overstock.
Katana integrates with the best-in-class software on the market to create a smooth process from purchase to sales. Native integrations, code-less templates, or custom API integrations allow you to create custom workflows and connect all your business apps to manage your sales, manufacturing, and accounting to one platform.
Production planning and scheduling is achievable with several features, including the real-time master planner that automatically schedules production and assigns resources. Reorder points and Planning and Forecasting automate many of your inventory management responsibilities to ensure you’re stocked and ready to fulfill orders.
Before selling or manufacturing anything, you must set up your inventory management system. This includes creating your BOMs and SKUs and integrating your business tools. Proper implementation enables automatic inventory adjustments and cost calculations for your products and tracking the availability of materials to complete manufacturing orders.
Storefront
With the rise of ecommerce and other selling strategies, you can think of your storefront as a place where customers buy your products if you’re creating your own inventory management flowchart. Using Katana, you can implement omnichannel selling strategies to manage your B2B, B2C, offline, and online sales channels all in one place. Start meeting demand with accurate inventory insights.
When a sales order is created at a location with selling enabled, either manually or via integrations, the stock levels at this location will automatically update in Katana to reflect the change in real time. If your finished goods are selling fast, you can perform a stock transfer from your warehouse to your storefront to avoid a stockout.
Shop floor
Katana enhances manufacturing operations by enabling real-time tracking, scheduling, and reporting. With the Shop Floor App, businesses can create operators and assign tasks, allowing for real-time progress tracking. Get comprehensive insights into manufacturing costs, resource allocation, and material usage, facilitating more efficient and informed production management.
Inventory levels and costs update as items move from process to process. Shop floor operators can track, and update tasks specifically assigned to them using the Shop Floor App to avoid confusion. Managers can reassign tasks or priorities for orders if necessary, while Katana will automatically reallocate materials and resources to fit the new flow.
Once a manufacturing order is created, materials and resources are automatically allocated to production in Katana. A warehouse operator can then move the materials to the shop floor, ready for production. If your items require end-to-end traceability, you can add serial numbers to materials and manufactured products.
Quality control is an important step in the inventory process flow, which ensures that the final product is free of faults. If you handle perishable goods, you can also assign expiration dates to batches to give further control over the shelf life of your items and serial numbers for warranty tracking, assistance with device support, refunds, and recalls.
Warehouse
Katana helps optimize inventory process flow and sales order fulfillment by assigning tasks to operators and providing live updates. The Warehouse App allows for efficient picking and packing of sales orders, improves accuracy and speed through barcode scanning, and simplifies inventory organization by assigning default storage bins — for better inventory tracking and management.
When items run low, you can create a purchase order (PO) in Katana for your suppliers. It only takes a couple of clicks to create a PO, and if you’re missing materials, components, or subassemblies from the same supplier, we will notify you so you can include them in your order. You can also create outsourced POs for delivery directly to your contractor.
Before moving your items to the correct storage bin, they must undergo inspection for quantity and quality. If everything is fine, the operator can use the Warehouse App to scan the barcode on the supplies, update the stock levels, and mark the order as received. It is also possible to partially receive orders if items are still in transit.
Warehouse operators move the supplies to storage, usually close to the shop floor, for easier transport to production. The operator can manually update the stock levels or use a barcode scanner once moved to storage. When a manufacturing order is created, the operator moves the materials to a bin on the shop floor, ready for production.
Stock in Katana updates automatically in real time, but you should perform stock counts to ensure that stock levels are correct. Stocktakes are done monthly, quarterly, or yearly, and some companies require them for audit purposes. Another alternative is a cycle count, where you limit the counting to certain item categories or only some selected items.
In Katana, you can group the required ingredients for selected manufacturing orders (MO) into a consolidated pick list. This enables you to be more efficient on the shop floor by picking all the necessary ingredients for the day or a bunch of MOs simultaneously without going back and forth between the workstation and ingredient stock.
Once a manufacturing order is marked as completed, the finished goods are moved back into the warehouse and placed in storage with products ready to be sold. When a sales order is created, you can make a picking task for your operators to pick and pack the items for shipping. Once packed, the items are moved to the shipping area for delivery.
Once the item reaches the customer, you can mark the sales order within Katana as delivered. Katana enables you to track batches for products and materials in your stock by assigning batch/lot numbers to purchased and manufactured items, giving you full end-to-end traceability if you need to track your products.
Office
From integrating with leading software to automating your production planning, Katana gives you the toolset to centralize and manage many aspects of your business. The Planning and Forecasting add-on will help improve efficiency, compliance, and financial health. It will also assist you in enhancing cash flow management and improving your inventory process flow by preventing stockouts and overstock.
Katana integrates with the best-in-class software on the market to create a smooth process from purchase to sales. Native integrations, code-less templates, or custom API integrations allow you to create custom workflows and connect all your business apps to manage your sales, manufacturing, and accounting to one platform.
Production planning and scheduling is achievable with several features, including the real-time master planner that automatically schedules production and assigns resources. Reorder points and Planning and Forecasting automate many of your inventory management responsibilities to ensure you’re stocked and ready to fulfill orders.
Before selling or manufacturing anything, you must set up your inventory management system. This includes creating your BOMs and SKUs and integrating your business tools. Proper implementation enables automatic inventory adjustments and cost calculations for your products and tracking the availability of materials to complete manufacturing orders.
Storefront
With the rise of ecommerce and other selling strategies, you can think of your storefront as a place where customers buy your products if you’re creating your own inventory management flowchart. Using Katana, you can implement omnichannel selling strategies to manage your B2B, B2C, offline, and online sales channels all in one place. Start meeting demand with accurate inventory insights.
When a sales order is created at a location with selling enabled, either manually or via integrations, the stock levels at this location will automatically update in Katana to reflect the change in real time. If your finished goods are selling fast, you can perform a stock transfer from your warehouse to your storefront to avoid a stockout.
Optimize your inventory process flow with Katana
Get the tools you need to streamline operations, improve efficiency, and ensure optimal stock levels
