Using this function you can tell the FERT generator which reference material it should use as the default when creating a finished product.

Thus you can enter any number of different material variants for one configurable material by always using a different characteristic valuation.

At the same time you can control that the FERT generator converts each variant to finished products by assigning your configurable materials to different reference materials.

You define the reference group in Customizing. You assign a reference material to each reference group.

When entering the reference group in Customizing you control, for example, in which modus the FERT generator should run when creating a reference material.

When calling the FERT generator in the application you must enter a reference group. By doing so you decide on which reference material the FERT generator should base the finished product.

You can, however, enter the configurable material as you like. Note that reference and configurable material must have the identical base unit of measure and master grid. If you use categories, the same is valid for the coverage strategy of both materials.

Thus you can assign different reference materials to a configurable material.

The FERT generator creates a new finished product according to the characteristic valuation you have entered for your configurable material. The FERT generator creates the material master of the new finished product by using the master data of the reference material.

Using the reference group you can determine which data should be contained in the master record of the finished product to be created.