Five typical use case for automated quoting

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Manual calculation and quote creation still costs machining companies too much time, profit, and business. Five scenarios illustrate when automated quoting for turning parts and milling parts using Spanflug MAKE delivers real advantages.

Challenges in contract manufacturing today

Many contract manufacturers and CNC machine shops know this situation: The volume of inquiries is growing, time for careful cost estimation is becoming scarcer, and experienced estimators are hard to find. At the same time, the pressure is rising to respond quickly and competitively without losing sight of profit margins.

 

Spanflug MAKE automatically calculates manufacturing times and costs for custom machined parts directly from CAD models and technical drawings. Five scenarios illustrate where the software delivers the greatest benefits.

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Does this sound a familiar challenge you are facing with your workshop?

Small-batch production: High variety, low volume

Companies that specialize in small-batch machining face a unique challenge: every customer inquiry is different, every job requires a new cost estimate, and the order value often does not justify spending hours on the calculation.

Automated quoting keeps up with any part mix, no matter how wide the variety or how many different parts come in each week. You get calculation results within seconds and can generate a ready-to-send quote in just a few clicks. Regardless of how many different parts are requested.

Your best people should be running the business, not the spreadsheet.

In many machine shops, the quoting job falls to the most experienced employees. Often, these are the owners or shop managers themselves, who are also responsible for machine investments, managing customers, leading staff, and driving the company’s strategic development.

With the right software, less experienced employees can also create reliable and precise quotes without needing in-depth knowledge of machining and cost estimation. Smart quoting software also automatically identifies manufacturing-critical features in complex parts that are easy to overlook or underestimate manually, and flags what needs to be considered. Automated quoting thus frees up valuable time for your company, allowing you to expand this strategically important process to others in your team without compromising on quality or precise results.

Decades of valuable expertise are at risk of walking out the door

In many companies, the calculation of quotes relies heavily on the knowledge of individual long-time employees. Which cutting values for which material to use, which setup times for which machine — this knowledge is often held by only a few people. When these experts retire, the risk that decades of manufacturing and quoting experience will be lost, is real.

With Spanflug MAKE, you can centrally create and store calculation templates and machine settings for specific materials and manufacturing processes. This makes the expertise of the most experienced specialists in the company available to all employees via shared settings for all users in your organization. In this way, our intelligent software supports you to standardize knowledge transfer and make the generational transition easier to plan.

Completing jobs at the planned margin

Winning jobs only to find out at invoicing that the job was completed below cost is not a model for growth. Inconsistent quoting methods or estimates based on orders from 3 years ago can result in significantly less of the expected profit remaining even before work even begins. This is especially true in times of strong price fluctuations for stocks and consumables.

Automated quoting based on real-time data, on the other hand, ensures consistency in methodology, makes it possible to predict profits and to meet margins better. For every single quote.

Venture into new market segments: limited experience, quote due today

Contract manufacturers expanding into new industries or trying to win customers from new market segments often receive RFQs for parts that fall outside their area of expertise. Without experience from similar projects, it can be time-consuming or difficult to provide an accurate quote. There is a high risk of quoting a price that is either too high or too low.

Automated quoting with Spanflug MAKE provides precise manufacturing times and costs for these parts as well, and it also suggests the appropriate machining strategy.

Read our case study to learn how Schwab CNC is tapping into new customer segments with Spanflug MAKE.

Read our case study

Automated, data-driven quoting as a strategic tool

The five scenarios show that automated quoting is not a luxury for large companies, but a practical tool for everyday contract manufacturing. The challenges may differ, but the goal is the same: faster, more consistent, and more reliable quote calculation. Spanflug MAKE helps CNC machine shops create quotes directly from CAD models. It makes machining and quote calculation expertise accessible to more employees, helping companies submit precise and competitive quotes faster — even for projects outside their core areas of expertise.

Start for free. Benefit immediately.

Your machine shop, too, can benefit from automated quoting. Our software solution Spanflug MAKE is ready to use immediately and delivers precise results. No large database or long training phases are needed. And best of all: you can calculate up to 5 parts per month for free.

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