We hear the same story from almost every batch manufacturer we work with: “We love NetSuite for financials and inventory, but production planning takes way too much manual effort.”

And it makes sense. NetSuite gives you a strong foundation with work orders, BOMs, and inventory management. But if you’re running a food production line, blending chemicals, or formulating pharmaceuticals, there’s a whole layer of batch-specific complexity on top of that. Recipes, variable yields, lot traceability, and the constant question of “what do we need to produce today based on what’s actually been ordered?”

That’s why we built BatchWizard, part of our ProShop suite. It adds a proper batch manufacturing layer on top of NetSuite. Completely native, no middleware, no third-party integrations to worry about.

Taking NetSuite Further for Batch Production

Here’s what typically happens. A production planner opens NetSuite on Monday morning. They pull up open sales orders in one tab, check inventory levels in another, open a spreadsheet to figure out what needs to be produced, then manually create work orders one by one. For a company running 50+ batches a week across multiple product lines, this can eat up 2 to 3 hours every single morning.

The bigger problem isn’t just the time. It’s the mistakes. Over-producing because someone missed that inventory was already allocated. Under-producing because a new sales order came in after the morning planning session. No visibility into what’s already been planned versus what still needs attention. BatchWizard was built to extend NetSuite’s manufacturing capabilities so batch producers get purpose-built tools for the way they actually work.

How BatchWizard Actually Works

We tried to keep this as simple as possible. The whole point is to take a process that used to require multiple screens, spreadsheets, and tribal knowledge, and collapse it into a few clicks.

1. It pulls your demand automatically. Open sales orders, transfer orders, reorder points, safety stock. BatchWizard aggregates all of it into one view. No more tabbing between screens or maintaining a separate planning spreadsheet.
2. You group orders into batches. Based on your equipment capacity, minimum batch sizes, or whatever constraints make sense for your operation. The system suggests groupings, but you have full control to adjust.
3. One click creates all the work orders. Components, quantities, lot assignments, routing. Everything gets populated automatically. What used to take an hour of manual data entry takes about 30 seconds.
4. Full traceability as you go. Every input, every yield variance, every lot number. All captured in NetSuite as the batch moves through production. When it’s done, inventory updates automatically with actual yields.

Here’s what the demand view looks like:

Planned batches ready to go:

The main order dashboard:

Why This Matters Beyond Just Saving Time

The time savings are obvious, but there are a few things people don’t think about until they’re actually using it:

Traceability becomes automatic. If you’re in food, pharma, or chemicals, you know the pain of lot tracing during an audit or recall. With BatchWizard, every batch has a complete record of inputs, outputs, and yields, all in NetSuite. No more digging through paper logs or separate spreadsheets when an auditor asks “show me every product that used lot #4572.”

You actually see yield problems. When you’re manually tracking production, it’s hard to spot that Batch Line 2 has been running 3% below expected yield for the last month. BatchWizard captures actual vs. expected yields on every batch, so trends become visible fast.

Your planners make better decisions. When demand is aggregated and visible in real time, you stop over-producing (because you can see what’s already planned) and stop missing orders (because new demand shows up automatically). It sounds basic, but the number of manufacturers still running this in spreadsheets is staggering.

Nothing to integrate. This is a big one. BatchWizard runs inside NetSuite. There’s no middleware, no API connections to maintain, no separate database that can get out of sync. Your IT team doesn’t get another system dropped on their plate.

Who Uses This

Mostly manufacturers in food and beverage, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, cosmetics, and plastics. Basically anyone who produces in batches and needs to track lots and yields. We’ve seen it work particularly well for companies in the 50 to 500 employee range that have outgrown spreadsheet-based planning but don’t need (or want to pay for) a full MES system.

Part of a Bigger Toolkit

BatchWizard is one module in our ProShop suite. Depending on what your operation looks like, you might also want CatchIQ for catch weight management, CoYield for co-product tracking, or FlexBOM for flexible bills of materials. They all work together, but you can also deploy any of them standalone.

If any of this sounds like your situation, we’re happy to show you how it works with your actual data. Reach out to us and we’ll set up a walkthrough.