Duration: 24:41
🏭 Why Odoo Fits the Machinery Industry
Idis Vanhov, Managing Partner of Nandu (now part of Obiccom, a newly minted Gold Partner in Belgium), presents a compelling case for why Odoo is an excellent ERP solution for companies manufacturing custom equipment and machinery.
The core thesis: no over-customization needed, no complex integrations required. Odoo's standard functionalities cover the key business processes for this industry right out of the box. This is a huge advantage—reducing implementation time, cost, and long-term maintenance burden.
Odoo provides a 360-degree view of operations, managing four critical process flows:
- Lead to Cash – Sales and quoting
- Engineer to Order – Design, BOM creation, and project planning
- Procure to Pay – Purchasing and inventory management
- Service to Satisfaction – Post-installation maintenance and support
🚀 The End-to-End Process Flow
Sales & CRM: Lead to Cash
Everything starts with CRM. Leads come in, account managers nurture relationships, and sales teams create quotations with complex calculations. For machinery companies, pre-sales engineering is time-intensive. Even before an order is confirmed, significant effort goes into cost estimation, feasibility studies, and technical proposals.
Odoo's Sales and CRM modules handle this seamlessly, allowing teams to track profitability from the very first touchpoint.
Engineering & Project Management: Engineer to Order
Once a project is sold, it moves to the Engineering department. Engineers design the machine, create a Bill of Materials (BOM), plan the project timeline, and log time sheets. All of this is managed within Odoo's Projects module, providing visibility into engineering effort and costs.
Idis emphasizes starting with a project template rather than jumping straight to a sales order. Why? Because pre-sales activities (calculations, quotes, technical specs) consume resources. Logging time against a project from day one ensures accurate profitability reporting later.
Product Lifecycle Management (PLM): For companies working in prototyping or iterative design, Odoo's PLM module allows continuous updates and improvements to BOMs. This ensures version control and traceability as designs evolve.
Purchasing & Inventory: Procure to Pay
With a finalized BOM, the Purchasing team sources materials from suppliers. Odoo's Purchase and Inventory modules integrate tightly, tracking what's needed, what's ordered, and what's in stock.
A critical component for machinery manufacturers: Quality Control. Incoming materials must pass quality inspections before entering production. Odoo's Quality app automates inspections at key checkpoints: incoming goods, in-process production, and outgoing finished machines.
Manufacturing: Build the Machine
The Manufacturing app orchestrates production. Operators follow work orders, consume materials from the warehouse, and assemble the custom machine. For complex environments with multiple workstations, the Shop Floor application ensures every operator knows what to do and when.
Idis highlights that Quality checks are embedded throughout the manufacturing process—not just at the end. Inspections occur during production phases and before machines leave the facility, ensuring defects are caught early.
Field Service: Installation & Deployment
Once manufactured, the machine must be installed at the customer site. Odoo's Field Service module enables this by dispatching technicians with worksheet templates that guide the installation process.
Technicians can:
- View the custom machine to pick up
- Complete installation checklists on-site (including quality checks and photo uploads)
- Mark tasks as done, automatically triggering the next workflow stage
This ensures installations are standardized, documented, and traceable.
Asset Management: Service to Satisfaction
Here's where Nandu's custom module shines. After installation, companies need to track and maintain assets at customer locations. Odoo's native capabilities were insufficient for this, so Nandu developed the Asset Management module.
Key features:
- Asset registry: Track every machine by customer, location (building, floor), and serial number.
- Linked assets: For complex machines with multiple major components, link sub-assets for granular tracking.
- Maintenance planning: Schedule preventive maintenance (e.g., annual inspections) that automatically generate recurring tasks.
- Service contracts: Link subscriptions to specific assets (e.g., premium support contracts for certain hardware models).
- Help Desk integration: Tickets raised by customers are linked to the asset, creating a complete service history.
- Component traceability: View which parts (from the BOM) are installed in the machine, with serial number tracking if needed.
- Location history: If a machine moves (e.g., customer relocates), the system tracks historical locations.
This creates a complete service lifecycle view—from installation to every maintenance visit, part replacement, and support ticket. Machinery companies can deliver proactive service, optimize spare parts inventory, and demonstrate value to customers through data-driven insights.
Finance, Analytics & Automation
Of course, Finance is integrated throughout: invoicing, cost tracking, and profitability analysis happen automatically. Odoo's Dashboards and Spreadsheets provide deep insights into production efficiency, project margins, and operational bottlenecks.
Automation and AI: Leverage Odoo Studio to automate repetitive tasks (e.g., generating maintenance tasks, sending alerts when stock is low) and use AI tools for intelligent recommendations.
🎬 Live Demo Highlights
Idis walks through a complete example: manufacturing a custom machine for "Happy Customer."
Step 1: Create a Project from a Template
A lead comes in. Instead of starting with a sales order, Idis creates a project from a template called "Engineering Project." This immediately sets up tasks for the sales team (calculation & quotation), engineering team (BOM creation), and field service team (installation).
New in Odoo 19: The slider panel on the project Kanban view can now be locked open by default in templates, eliminating the need to reopen it repeatedly.
Step 2: Build a Quotation with Embedded Calculator
From the project, Idis creates a quotation. He selects a quotation template that includes an embedded Quote Calculator—essentially an Excel-like sheet within Odoo.
He enters:
- Hourly rate for an operator (€40)
- Cost of a project manager (€90)
- Material margin (50%)
Then he adds estimated components (3 parts with different hourly requirements). The calculator auto-computes pricing. Idis also adds 8 days of engineering time and 2 days of installation time.
Once the customer signs, Odoo automatically generates:
- A delivery order for the custom machine
- 64 hours planned for engineering
- A manufacturing order
- An asset record in the Asset Management module
Step 3: Engineering Creates the BOM
Engineers now detail the machine's components. Idis creates a Bill of Materials with Part A, Part B, and Part C. In reality, this is an iterative process with revisions tracked via the PLM module, but he simplifies for the demo.
The BOM view shows:
- All components
- Unit costs (summed to show total machine cost)
- Stock availability for each part
If a part is out of stock (e.g., Part A1), Idis can generate a purchase order directly from the project view, keeping everything linked and traceable.
Step 4: Manufacturing the Machine
With materials ready, the Manufacturing Order kicks off. Idis schedules production, confirms the order, and Odoo checks component availability.
Plot twist: Part A has sub-components, so Odoo automatically creates a child manufacturing order for Part A. Once Part A is produced, the main manufacturing order can proceed.
Idis produces the machine (in real life, this would involve shop floor workflows with multiple operators and workstations). Done.
Step 5: Field Service Installation
The machine is ready to ship. The last task in the project is "Installation." Idis assigns it to a field service engineer and attaches a worksheet template for the installation process.
The worksheet shows:
- Product to pick up (the custom machine)
- Quality checklist
- Photo upload option
- Customer signature field
The technician completes the worksheet on-site, marks the task as done, and the machine is now live at the customer location.
Step 6: Asset Management & Ongoing Maintenance
The custom machine asset is now visible in the Asset Management module. Idis opens it and sees:
- Customer: Happy Customer
- Asset location: (Building A, Floor 2, etc.)
- Serial number
- Linked assets (if applicable)
- Planned maintenance: Create a recurring task (e.g., annual preventive maintenance starting October 1)
As soon as Idis creates the maintenance plan, a smart button links to the task. Over time, additional smart buttons populate:
- Subscriptions: Service contracts tied to this asset
- Tasks: All maintenance activities (preventive and reactive)
- Help Desk Tickets: Issues reported by the customer
- Components: BOM parts installed in the machine
- Traceability: Serial number tracking for components
- Location History: Where the asset has been over its lifetime
This comprehensive view ensures nothing falls through the cracks. Every intervention, part replacement, and support ticket is recorded, enabling data-driven service optimization.
💼 Summary: A True 360° Solution
Odoo handles the entire lifecycle of custom machinery manufacturing—from initial lead to decades of post-sale service—within a single, integrated platform. No need for separate systems for CRM, project management, BOM management, manufacturing, field service, and asset tracking. It's all there, talking to each other seamlessly.
For companies in this industry, that means:
- Lower TCO (total cost of ownership) – fewer integrations, less customization
- Faster implementation – standard modules cover 90%+ of needs
- Better visibility – 360° view of profitability, operations, and service
- Scalability – as the business grows, Odoo grows with it
Viewpoint: Odoo Perspective
⚠️ Disclaimer: AI-generated creative perspective inspired by Odoo's vision.
This presentation perfectly illustrates our philosophy: one platform, fully integrated, covering every business function without duct-tape integrations. Custom machinery manufacturing is complex—engineer-to-order workflows, iterative BOMs, post-sale service over decades—but Odoo's modular architecture handles it elegantly. The fact that Nandu only needed to build one custom module (Asset Management) to complete the solution proves the power of our standard apps. We don't believe in forcing customers into rigid workflows; we believe in flexible tools that adapt to real business needs. The embedded quote calculator, the linked projects, the automatic generation of manufacturing orders and asset records—this is what integration should look like. And with PLM, Quality, and Shop Floor apps maturing rapidly, even the most demanding manufacturers can run their entire operation on Odoo. That's not a promise for the future—it's happening today.
Viewpoint: Competitors (SAP / Microsoft / Others)
⚠️ Disclaimer: AI-generated fictional commentary. Not an official corporate statement.
Odoo's end-to-end coverage for engineer-to-order manufacturing is impressive, particularly for mid-market machinery companies. The seamless flow from CRM to project management, manufacturing, and asset lifecycle management demonstrates strong process integration. However, large-scale OEMs face complexities that go beyond what's shown here. Advanced variant configuration (CPQ), multi-site global manufacturing with complex supply chain orchestration, compliance requirements (ISO 9001, AS9100), MES integration with IoT and real-time production analytics, and long-term service contracts spanning 20+ years with sophisticated warranty and entitlement management—these are areas where enterprise platforms like SAP S/4HANA with PLM and EAM modules or Microsoft Dynamics 365 with Supply Chain Management provide deeper functional depth. The custom Asset Management module Nandu built is a smart gap-filler, but it raises questions about long-term supportability and feature parity with mature EAM systems like SAP EAM or IBM Maximo. That said, for small-to-midsize machinery builders who don't need that level of complexity, Odoo offers a compelling, cost-effective alternative with genuine business value.
Disclaimer: This article contains AI-generated summaries and fictionalized commentaries for illustrative purposes. Viewpoints labeled as "Odoo Perspective" or "Competitors" are simulated and do not represent any real statements or positions. All product names and trademarks belong to their respective owners.