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Essential Software Solutions

Metal Fabrication ERP Software for Fab Shops and Steel Fabricators

Built for Small and Midsize Shops

Fabrication shops run on tight quotes, shifting schedules, and material that has to be traceable back to the mill. Infor CloudSuite Industrial gives you one system for quoting, nesting-ready material planning, shop floor scheduling, outside processing, and cradle-to-grave lot and heat number traceability. 


Fabricators using it report 200% inventory accuracy improvement, 4x on-time delivery performance, and quoting cut from two hours to under a minute. Essential Software Solutions is an Infor Gold Partner with over 100 years of combined team experience implementing metal fabrication ERP software across the US and Canada.

Do below problems familiar to you?


  • Quotes get built in a spreadsheet that lives on one estimator's desktop, and nobody can tell you why last year's identical job was priced 12% lower.
  • Nesting runs in its own software. What gets nested and what got bought are reconciled by eye.
  • Material is tracked as "steel" — not by gauge, grade, finish or heat number — so the drop pile keeps growing and gets bought again anyway.
  • Outside processing goes out by email. You find out the galvanizer is running three days late when the truck doesn't show.
  • Real job cost lands two weeks after the part shipped, which is two weeks too late to do anything about it.
  • Steel moves 20% and every open quote is suddenly a guess.
If you are familiar with at least 2-3 problems, it's time to review your manufacturing process

Unique Infor ERP Capabilities

Production-ready ERP without enterprise overhead. Mixed-mode manufacturing, native quality management and a built-in product configurator, deployed in the cloud. Best fit when you're adding configured products, tighter quality requirements or a second shift, roughly 75–250 employees.


With deep built-in capabilities, Infor ERP seamlessly helps you manage downstream value chains even for outside processing.


  • Execute Mixed Manufacturing models, 
  • Assembly to Order (ATO) for sequenced based components, 
  • Make to Order (MTO) for components to be assembled in just in time (JIT), 
  • Make to Stock (MTS) for components to be produced in lots, 
  • Engineering to Order (ETO) to coordinate the tasks ‘one off’ projects
  • Repetitive for long run production parts

    Build a quote from real routings and real material cost instead of last year's number plus a feeling. Infor CPQ configures dimensional products, options and finishes, rolls up price and cost as you go, and keeps every revision — so when a customer asks why the price moved, you can show them. Volant Products cut quote turnaround from two hours to under a minute at 100% accuracy.

Track sheet, plate, bar, coil and tube by size, gauge, grade and finish as distinct inventory, not as one line called "steel." Dimensional, attribute-based inventory is what makes accurate pricing, honest yield numbers and a usable remnant pile possible. Link stock straight to job demand so you stop buying material you already own.

Keep the nesting software your programmers already know. ERP's job is to hold the material demand, the yield assumption and the actual consumption, and to make sure what got nested is what got bought and what got costed. We'll map the integration during scoping rather than promise it in a bullet.

Sequence across cutting, forming, welding and finishing with capacity and material constraints in view. Advanced planning and scheduling shows you what the hot job actually displaces before you promise the date — and what it does to the other eleven jobs on the floor.

Real-time WIP instead of a clipboard. Operators clock to jobs and operations on the floor, so work-in-process costing on an in-process order is current, and "where is job 4471" is a question with an answer.

Coating, heat treat, galvanizing, plating, specialty machining. Raise the PO, generate the shipment documents, receive it back, and capture the purchased cost straight to WIP on the job — with the subcontract step sitting in the schedule where it belongs, not in an inbox.

Pre-assign lot and serial numbers and trace cradle-to-grave from raw material through the finished weldment. Capture heat numbers, chemical composition and certificates of analysis. Run tolerance-based inspections and hold your ISO 9001 documentation in the system instead of a shared drive, so an audit is a report and not a fire drill.

Actual versus estimated cost by job, by operation, while the job is still open. Automate material surcharges when steel or aluminum moves so a price swing updates your quotes instead of quietly eating the job. This is the capability that pays for the project.

Case Studies

Volant Products

Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

Ellwood Group

Ellwood City, Pennsylvania


METCAM

Atlanta, Georgia

Explore Infor ERP Products

Infor CPQ

Infor CPQ offers a quick, precise, and visual way to select, quote, and place orders.



Learn More

Infor CloudSuite

A comprehensive solution for digitally revolutionizing manufacturing procedures from start to finish.

Learn More

Infor VISUAL

Manufacturing ERP software providing production visibility and automation for increased throughput, productiavity, 

and profits

Learn More

Infor Velocity Suite

Infor Velocity Suite empowers Infor CloudSuite with AI features. It includes process automations, RPA, GenAI, and Process Mining.

Learn More

Be skeptical when choosing an ERP software for your metal fab shop

Essential Software Solutions is an Infor Gold Partner, and we would rather you pick the right system than pick ours. That's what the ERP Evaluation Toolkit is for. Four things, before you spend anything:

  • One free hour: We don't bill the first hour of consultation. No demo, no slide deck.
  • A customized analysis: We go through how your shop quotes, buys and builds — against your actual budget.
  • A side-by-side comparison sheet: See how Infor stacks up against the other systems fabricators shortlist. If it fits, we'll show you the detail and put you on the phone with shops already running it.
  • No strings attached: If Infor isn't right for your shop, we'll point you at the systems that are.

Most small and midsize fab shops get sold the wrong size of ERP. There are three ways this normally goes wrong.


  • Enterprise ERP scales down: This type of ERP systems are built for inter company transfers, global consolidation and multi-plant planning. You don't need to pay for that architecture as a 60-person shop.
  • Generic ERP, bent to fit: Generic ERP systems can handle your invoices and payroll fine. Then you ask it to keep 14-gauge 304 stainless with a #4 finish as its own part number, follow a heat number through a welded assembly, and put a real cost on an offcut and you're paying a programmer to build all three.
  • Separate programs for each problem: A nesting package, an estimating tool, a scheduling board. Each one look like work but nothing talks to anything else unless an API allows them to communicate. However, API will be another cost for software programming. 

Get the ERP Evaluation Toolkit

10 Critical ERP Requirements for Metal Fabricators

Download our ERP selection guide for industrial manufacturers, we have listed 10 critical requirements for metal fabricators.

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Talk with an ERP advisor

Do you have questions about ERP selection, ERP implementation, ERP trainings or any other issues with digital transformation? Talk with one of our advisor, we'd be glad to help you.


Don't hesitate to contact. Our client policy is 'no string attached'.