Key concepts

Spherecast rests on a few core ideas. Get these straight and everything else in the guide reads easily. Skim this page now, and come back whenever a term isn’t clear.

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Your supply-chain network

Spherecast works from a digital model of your real supply chain. You describe it as nodes - your warehouses, suppliers, channels, and regions - connected by flows:

• Transfers move stock from one warehouse to another.
• Roll-ups aggregate demand and inventory up from many places to a region or total.
• Sales send product out through a channel to your customers.

The important rule: Spherecast only routes supply along the lanes you define. If two warehouses can supply each other, you tell the model that. If you don’t, it won’t. Setting the network up well is what makes the recommendations trustworthy. Start with the Network overview and Locations & warehouses.

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Products, SKUs & BOMs

A product is a single SKU (Stock Keeping Unit) - one specific, sellable or stockable item. A BOM (Bill of Materials) is the recipe for building a finished good: it lists the components and quantities that go into it. When Spherecast recommends manufacturing something, it uses the BOM to know what components you’ll consume. See Products, SKUs & BOMs.

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The demand ladder

The forecast is built in stages, each refining the one before it:

1. Target - the top-down goal, usually set by leadership.
2. Baseline - the statistical forecast, projected from history.
3. Baseline Adj. - the Baseline plus the sum of any included S&OP (Sales & Operations Planning) adjustment lines. This one is derived - Spherecast calculates it. You never type it directly; you change it by editing the adjustment lines that feed it.
4. Consensus - the final number everyone agrees to plan on.
5. Push down - the agreed forecast is handed to supply planning to act on.

Learn more in the Demand planning overview and S&OP lines.

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Supply planning basics

The supply plan is a time-phased grid - products down the side, time periods across the top - showing how inventory rises and falls week by week. The key rows:

• Coverage - how long your stock will last, shown as DOS (Days of Supply) or WOS (Weeks of Supply).
• Available - the inventory you can actually use to meet demand.
• Demand - what you expect to need.
• Supply - what’s coming in.
• Shortage - where demand outruns supply.
• Safety stock - the buffer you choose to keep on hand to absorb surprises.

From this, Spherecast produces recommendations - exactly what to order, build, or move, and when. See the Supply planning overview.

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Transactions and the “Recommended → real” lifecycle

Recommendations become action through three transaction types:

• PO (Purchase Order) - buy from a supplier.
• WO (Work Order) - build a finished good.
• TO (Transfer Order) - move stock between warehouses.

Every one starts life as Recommended (or Draft) - a suggestion that lives only inside Spherecast and hasn’t touched the real world yet. It becomes real when it’s written to your ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning system), at which point it takes on real order statuses. A work order must be approved before it can be written. This two-stage flow lets you review and adjust freely before anything is committed. See Work orders and Writing to your ERP.

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Scenarios

A scenario is a safe what-if copy of the plan. Change forecasts, orders, or assumptions inside it and compare the outcome - all without touching your live plan. See Scenarios.

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Views & reports

A custom view is a table you’ve saved with your own filters, columns, and sort, so your everyday work is one click away. Alongside these are pre-built reports - ready-made analytics you don’t have to configure. See Custom views and the Planning overview.

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Exceptions vs. Data alerts

Two different kinds of “something needs attention,” and they live in different places:

• Exceptions are operational supply issues - a looming stockout, an overstock, an order to expedite. You work these from the Cockpit. See Exceptions.
• Data alerts are data-quality problems - missing setup, a broken integration, an item that can’t be planned because information is incomplete. See Data alerts.

Fix data alerts and your exceptions become trustworthy.

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A note on naming

Some terms in this guide can be renamed by your company, so the labels on your screen may differ. Markets, Channels, Baseline Adj., Consensus, and Expiration are all customizable. The concepts work the same whatever they’re called - if a word here doesn’t match your app, check with your Spherecast administrator for your company’s name for it.