Engineering change orders, checked against everything already in motion.

An OEM changes a design while your floor is still building the last one. Someone has to find what moved, then work out what it hits: kits already pulled, boards already placed, parts on the shelf that serve only this assembly, and purchase orders still open with suppliers. Miss one and you build the old revision, or buy parts nobody will use.

In the proof of concept, AI reads copies of ECOs you already processed and drafts the impact list your engineer would have written: each change, where it lands and a proposed action, with the record behind every line. Your reviewer sets it beside what your team actually did.

The change comes in many shapes. OEMs send it as an ECO, an ECN, a redlined PDF or simply a new BOM with a new letter. The draft compares the new revision with the one you build today, line by line: parts added or removed, quantities changed, a manufacturer part number swapped, reference designators moved, a DNP turned on or off. Then it looks outside the BOM. A new bare board revision, a changed note on the assembly drawing, a placement file that no longer lists every reference designator the new BOM places, or new firmware for a programmed part can matter as much as any line, and many shops give a programmed part its own number for each firmware revision.

Effectivity decides what counts as affected. An ECO may take effect at once, with WIP stopped and reworked, at the next build or order, at a serial number or date code, or only once existing stock is used up. The draft reads the effectivity the OEM wrote and sorts each job and each bin against it. When the ECO says nothing about timing, that becomes the first question back to the OEM, never a guess.

Every affected item needs a disposition. Boards already built can be used as is, reworked or scrapped, and rework follows IPC-7711/7721, the guide to rework, modification and repair of electronic assemblies. Parts the change removes become excess, and some can't go back: non-cancelable, non-returnable parts on an open PO, reels bought to a minimum, a custom part made to order. The draft proposes an action for each item with quantities and PO status, and marks what looks like excess or obsolete stock. Who pays for that material is set by your agreement with the OEM, so the draft lists it and leaves the claim to your program manager. A new board revision usually means a new stencil and new machine programs too, so those go on the list for re-quoting.

Your system holds part of the answer. In Cetec ERP, an ECO shows the current revision's BOM beside the new one, and Cetec's documentation says it intentionally does not replace components on open orders automatically: each order's temporary BOM is changed by hand, and orders tied to the ECO can be held from release until it is complete. In Epicor Kinetic, a revision is checked out to an ECO group in Engineering Workbench, and its changes reach the live part only at check-in. Either way, the test reads exports of jobs, stock and open POs from around the day each ECO arrived, or the lists your team made then, and never logs in.

Your reviewer. The owner names the person who knows your change process best, often a manufacturing engineer, a program manager or the document control lead. They hold each draft against what your team did with that ECO: changes found and missed, jobs and stock flagged, dispositions proposed, open POs caught and the questions put to the OEM. Include an ECO that changed only firmware or the board, and one that arrived mid-build.

After a yes, each new ECO gets a draft impact list as it arrives, for about 30 days.

Your engineer checks every line, sets each disposition and decides what goes back to the OEM. Nothing changes in your ERP, on a traveler or on a PO until a person makes the change, and the scoring continues through the month.