Planning Technology
When your planning solution reaches its limits at a customer site, it reflects back on your software. Discover how software providers can extend missing capabilities and enhance their planning processes without the need for in-house development.
Planning Technology: How software providers can extend their planning solutions without building from scratch
A planning solution is ultimately judged by what it delivers for the customer. When capabilities are missing or planning quality falls short, the gap becomes visible at the end customer and reflects on the software itself. This page explains how providers of APS, MES, SCM, ERP, and PPS solutions can extend their portfolios with MCP Workforce Management, enhance planning performance through AI-as-a-Service, and create recurring software revenue streams.
Planning Technology is MCP’s partner programme for software providers and implementation partners. The guiding principle is simple: your product remains your product, while MCP provides building blocks that fit where they add value rather than replacing existing software. On this page and in the linked technical articles, we share insights gained from more than 300 planning projects on integration, data flows, and successful partnerships, including cases where an integration does not make sense.
Key takeaways
- Planning solutions typically leave two types of gaps in industrial environments: a functionality gap when a planning domain such as workforce scheduling is missing, and a quality gap when rules and heuristics are no longer sufficient to handle growing complexity.
- Each gap requires a different approach: extending existing solutions with MCP Workforce Management as a ready-to-use application, module, or white-label offering, and improving planning quality through AI-as-a-Service integrated directly into existing planning logic via API.
- MCP Shopfloor Monitor complements solutions that lack direct feedback from production operations.
- Your platform, roadmap, and customer relationships remain entirely under your control. MCP provides the building blocks and continuously develops them further.
- For software providers, this creates recurring software revenue, strengthens competitive positioning in complex tenders, and reduces delivery risk through components that have already been proven in production environments.
- The right approach is determined not by software category, but by where customers are currently forced to intervene manually in the planning process.
Where do planning solutions leave gaps in industrial environments?
Planning solutions leave gaps wherever the resulting plan cannot be executed in practice the way it was calculated. The root cause is usually either a missing planning domain or planning logic that is no longer capable of solving the problem with sufficient quality. These two types of gaps manifest themselves differently and are rarely considered together:
A capability is missing. The solution plans orders, machines, and materials, but not the people required to execute the plan. Or it plans without receiving feedback on what is actually happening on the shop floor. This gap is highly visible: it appears as an unanswered requirement in tenders and as an Excel spreadsheet running alongside the system at the customer.
The solution does not plan well enough. Rules and heuristics can produce a formally valid plan as long as complexity remains manageable. Once sequence-dependent setup times, tanks, batches, and competing resources come into play, the plan becomes a starting point that planners have to repair manually. This gap is less obvious because the system appears to be functioning.
The common thread is that the impact is felt by the end customer, but the gap originates in the software. In most cases, the right answer is not custom development, but a specialised building block that integrates precisely where the gap exists.
Extend or improve: what are the options?
Software providers have two options for closing these gaps. They can extend their portfolio with a missing planning domain, or they can improve the planning capabilities already built into their solution. Both approaches can be pursued independently or combined, depending on the specific requirements and opportunities.
| Criterion | Extend: MCP Workforce Management | Improve: AI-as-a-Service |
|---|---|---|
| What the building block is | Web-based application for workforce management in manufacturing environments, including a planning assistant that provides targeted optimisation recommendations | Industrial optimisation algorithms for existing planning logic, delivered as a cloud-based service |
| Gap addressed | Capability gap in the portfolio | Planning quality gap in the existing solution |
| How it is deployed | As a standalone application with interfaces, an integrated module, or a white-label solution; deployable in the cloud or on the customer’s infrastructure | Via API: your solution submits the planning problem, receives the optimised plan in return, and presents it within your existing user interface |
| What your customer sees | Depending on the deployment model, either a connected application or functionality delivered under your brand | Your user interface only |
| Prerequisite | Your solution provides the production demand and workforce requirements | Your solution already represents the planning problem within its existing planning model |
| Outcome | A workforce plan that can be executed with the available qualifications | A plan that remains feasible under real-world constraints |
MCP Shopfloor Monitor is a standalone building block for solutions that do not provide their own production feedback, such as APS, SCM, or scheduling systems. It creates visibility into what should be happening and what is actually happening on the shop floor, ensuring that planning is based on real-time operational conditions. For MES providers that already cover execution and production feedback, it is generally not required.
What do software providers gain from Planning Technology?
What software providers gain from Planning Technology
Software providers gain access to capabilities their customers expect without having to develop them in-house, while creating a business model that extends beyond implementation services. The benefits can be seen in four key areas:
- Expand your portfolio. Workforce planning and industrial optimisation become part of your offering without the need to build an internal optimisation or workforce management team.
- Create recurring revenue streams. These building blocks generate ongoing software revenue that extends beyond individual projects and grows with your installed customer base.
- Win more complex projects. Tenders that require workforce scheduling, qualification management, or optimisation can be addressed with confidence. Planning challenges that cannot be solved with rule-based logic alone become a competitive differentiator.
- Reduce delivery risk. Instead of relying on custom development, you deploy building blocks that have already been proven in production environments. MCP supports your teams with technical expertise and hands-on implementation experience.
At the same time, the customer relationship remains entirely yours: you manage sales and customer engagement, while MCP provides the technology and domain expertise behind it.
Overview of Planning Technology articles
The following technical articles explore both approaches in greater detail, covering integration models, data flows, roles and responsibilities, and the path from the first customer enquiry to a successfully deployed solution. Each article includes a quick assessment and highlights the factors that can cause an integration to fail.
Extend
9 October 2026
Workforce Management for Software Providers: How Planning Platforms Can Integrate Workforce Planning Without In-House Development
Learn how ERP, APS, MES, and scheduling providers can offer workforce planning as an application, integrated module, or white-label solution, how data flows between systems, and when Shopfloor Monitor is part of the solution.
Improve
9 October 2026
AI-as-a-Service for Software Providers: How Planning Solutions Gain True Optimisation Without In-House Development
Learn which planning challenges can be solved through industrial optimisation via API, from setup-time optimisation to batch formation, and how an integration can scale from an initial use case to a growing customer base.
How planning connects from forecasting to an executable production plan is explored in the End-to-End Planning category. If you are missing a specific topic, feel free to get in touch with us.
Which building block fits which software solution?
Which building block is the right fit depends less on the software category and more on the capabilities your solution already provides. The overview below highlights typical starting points based on practical project experience:
| Your solution | Typical customer gap | Recommended starting point |
|---|---|---|
| APS and Scheduling | Heuristics reaching their limits, workforce planning handled separately, no feedback from production operations | AI-as-a-Service, Workforce Management, and Shopfloor Monitor |
| MES | Production feedback is already available, but qualification-based workforce planning is missing and detailed scheduling is often rule-based | Workforce Management, AI-as-a-Service for solutions with existing planning logic |
| SCM | Plans are created without considering workforce availability or the actual status of execution | Workforce Management and Shopfloor Monitor |
| ERP and PPS with planning modules | Planning based on rules and average values, with workforce management and execution handled outside the system | AI-as-a-Service to improve planning quality, Workforce Management for workforce planning |
Which gap should be addressed first?
The first gap to address is not the most technically interesting one, but the one that repeatedly occurs across multiple customers. A building block only delivers real value if it can be reused across your customer base. In practice, three observations reliably point to the most critical gap:
| Observation among your customers | What it means | Recommended building block |
|---|---|---|
| Planners regularly adjust the results manually. | The planning logic is not solving the problem effectively enough. | AI-as-a-Service |
| A separate spreadsheet is maintained alongside your solution for shifts and qualifications. | Workforce planning is missing from the portfolio. | Workforce Management |
| The actual status of production is communicated through verbal updates or paper-based processes. | Planning is based on outdated information. | Shopfloor Monitor |
Another indicator can be found within your own organisation: if demanding customer requirements repeatedly end up in the backlog as custom developments, it is often a sign that a reusable building block is missing. Conversely, if the same issue occurs with only a single customer, it is usually not the right starting point for a scalable solution.
How does a partnership start, and who is responsible for what?
A partnership starts with a specific use case from your customer base, not with a framework agreement. Only once the value has been proven with a pilot customer is the building block rolled out more broadly across the customer base.
- Select the use case. Which gap occurs across multiple customers: an optimisation challenge or missing workforce planning? MCP supports the identification process.
- Joint workshop. Product teams from both organisations define the integration model, data flow, and responsibilities.
- Define the pilot customer. A customer with a clearly defined planning challenge and agreed performance metrics.
- Implement the pilot and prove the value. The building block is deployed at the pilot customer and measured against the results of the existing planning approach.
- Businessplan und Ausrollen Auf Basis des Piloten entsteht der gemeinsame Businessplan, und der Baustein wird weiteren Kunden angeboten.
- Software providers. Responsible for the platform, roadmap, sales and customer support, and for integrating the data exchange.
- MCP. Provides Workforce Management, Shopfloor Monitor and the algorithms delivered through AI-as-a-Service, continuously develops these solutions, and supports modelling, interfaces and domain-specific questions.
- Implementation at the end customer. Defined jointly on a project-by-project basis.
An in-house development is usually only worthwhile if the respective planning area is a core part of the product itself. Otherwise, it ties up capacity that is needed for the core product and requires ongoing maintenance. The articles compare both approaches in detail.
What can cause an integration to fail?
- Starting with the exception. Using a one-off customer project as the entry point makes the integration expensive and difficult to reuse.
- Choosing the wrong approach. Better optimisation does not close a functional gap, and an additional module does not fix weak planning logic.
- Providing incomplete data.A component can only consider the information it receives: missing constraints in optimisation or missing qualification requirements in workforce planning cannot be taken into account.
- Unclear data ownership. Which system is the source of truth for qualifications, shift models or constraints must be defined before the first customer project.
- Starting without a baseline. Without a before-and-after comparison using real data, the benefits cannot be demonstrated to customers.
Quick check: Which approach fits your solution?
This self-assessment helps you determine whether extending, improving or combining both approaches is the better fit for your solution. Tick the statements that apply to your customers.
Frequently Asked Questions About Planning Technology
Planning Technology is MCP’s partner programme for software providers and implementation partners. It offers two approaches: MCP Workforce Management, optionally combined with Shopfloor Monitor, extends a solution portfolio as a ready-to-use application, module or white-label solution. AI-as-a-Service enhances existing planning capabilities through industrial optimisation delivered via API.
Workforce Management is a ready-to-use application that complements a missing planning area: production-oriented workforce planning. AI-as-a-Service is an optimisation technology that improves existing planning logic and requires your solution to already represent the planning problem.
No. The principle is simple: we do not replace planning solutions, we enhance them. Your solution remains the leading system, while the components connect to the production plan or the planning logic.
Yes. Workforce Management makes a plan executable from a workforce perspective, while AI-as-a-Service improves the planning itself. For employee assignment, Employee Resource Assignment provides a dedicated optimisation algorithm. Both components can be integrated either individually or together.
Generally, no. If an MES already covers production feedback and execution, Workforce Management is the relevant component. Shopfloor Monitor is designed for solutions that do not provide their own feedback from the shop floor.
AI-as-a-Service runs as a cloud service: your solution sends the planning problem via HTTPS in JSON format, receives the optimised plan back in the same format, and displays it within its own user interface. Workforce Management is a web-based application, deployed either in the cloud or on the customer’s premises, and connected via standard interfaces. APS systems are integrated via OData, while ERP and MES systems are connected via REST or CSV.
They are based on mathematical optimisation and, where appropriate, machine learning, not on a language model. Some of the algorithms are built on a metaheuristic framework developed jointly with TU Wien. External solvers such as Google OR-Tools can also be integrated.
For software vendors
Planning technology for your product – without in-house development
Would you like to offer your customers powerful planning and optimisation capabilities without developing them yourself? Let’s talk about how our technology can be integrated into your product or complement your portfolio.
Book a partner callSources and Notes
The classification of gaps, approaches, typical starting points and the partner model is based on project experience and the linked technical articles. The overview by software type is intended as guidance, and the quick check as a self-assessment. Neither replaces a detailed analysis.
- VDI 5600 – Manufacturing Execution Systems. Describes the functional scope of MES solutions and helps distinguish which component is responsible for which task.
- Aachen PPC Model, developed by the Institute for Industrial Management (FIR) at RWTH Aachen University. It assigns planning tasks to organisational responsibilities and helps identify where specific functions are located within a planning landscape. Described, among other sources, in: H. Luczak, W. Eversheim (eds.), Production Planning and Control: Fundamentals, Design and Concepts, Springer.