what is manufacturing resource planning 
manufacturing resource planning mrp ii is an integrated information system used by businesses manufacturing resource planning mrp ii evolved from early materials requirement planning mrp systems by including the integration of additional data such as employee and financial needs the system is designed to centralize integrate and process information for effective decision making in scheduling design engineering inventory management and cost control in manufacturing both mrp and mrp ii are seen as predecessors to enterprise resource planning erp which is a process whereby a company often a manufacturer manages and integrates the important parts of its business an erp management information system integrates areas such as planning purchasing inventory sales marketing finance and human resources erp is most frequently used in the context of software with many large applications having been developed to help companies implement erp understanding manufacturing resource planning mrp ii mrp ii is a computer based system that can create detailed production schedules using real time data to coordinate the arrival of component materials with machine and labor availability mrp ii is used widely by itself but it s also used as a module of more extensive enterprise resource planning erp systems mrp ii is an extension of the original materials requirements planning mrp i system materials requirements planning mrp is one of the first software based integrated information systems designed to improve productivity for businesses a materials requirements planning information system is a sales forecast based system used to schedule raw material deliveries and quantities given assumptions of machine and labor units required to fulfill a sales forecast by the 1980s manufacturers realized they needed software that could also tie into their accounting systems and forecast inventory requirements mrp ii was provided as a solution which included this functionality in addition to all the capabilities offered by mrp i the following are a small sampling of some popular mrp ii software providers as of early 2020 for all intents and purposes mrp ii has effectively replaced mrp i software most mrp ii systems deliver all of the functionality of an mrp system but in addition to offering master production scheduling bill of materials bom and inventory tracking mrp ii provides functionality within logistics marketing and general finance for example mrp ii is able to account for variables that mrp is not including machine and personnel capacity providing a more realistic and holistic representation of a company s operating capabilities many mrp ii solutions also offer simulation features that allow operators to enter variables and see the downstream effect because of its ability to provide feedback on a given operation mrp ii is sometimes referred to as a closed loop system mrp i included the following three major functionalities mrp ii includes those three plus the following mrp ii systems are still in wide use by manufacturing companies today and can either be found as stand alone solutions or as part of an enterprise resource planning erp system enterprise resources planning erp software systems are regarded as the successors of mrp ii software erp suites include applications well outside the scope of manufacturing these can include everything from human resources and customer relationship management to enterprise asset management 