Built by a publisher. Ready for yours, and for the press that prints it.
Titles and editions, print runs, paper, presses, printers, binders, agents and dispatch. Tathven Agentic ERP runs a publishing house and a printing press the way they really work, with an AI assistant that knows your books, both the ones on the shelf and the ones in the ledger.
Tathven Agentic ERP grew out of a working publishing house that has printed and dispatched books and journals for decades.
Who it is for
Publishing and printing
📚
Publishers who print outside
Your titles, your paper, and the printers and binders you send them to.
🏭
Publishers with their own press
Some titles on your own machines, others sent outside, and the costs of both kept apart.
🖨️
Printing presses
Estimate a job, quote it, schedule the machines, buy the paper, print, and bill print as a service at the right GST rate.
The pain points
And how Tathven answers each one
Titles, stock and sales
1
“Which edition is that stock?”
The pain
A reprint, a revised edition and last year’s edition share one title and one code. Spreadsheets add the stock together, the wrong edition gets dispatched, and nobody knows what an old edition is still worth.
How Tathven solves it
A title keeps one code, and each edition is a version under it, with its own stock, cost, MRP and ISBN. Stock is never added up across editions, so the warehouse picks the edition the order asked for. The item screen carries the publisher’s fields: author, ISBN, pages, edition, release date, synopsis, pre-order date, issue month for periodicals, and the press specification (paper size and quality, pages per form, copies printed, last printed).
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “how many copies of the 5th edition are in the main godown?” and the assistant answers from the stock of that edition, not the title’s total.
Each edition has its own code, year, rate and stock.
2
The paper runs out halfway through a reprint
The pain
Paper is the biggest cost and the longest lead time. Buy too much and capital sits in the godown; buy too little and a reprint stops.
How Tathven solves it
Material planning works out what each print run needs, and proposes the purchase and the reprint for you to confirm. Paper is counted the way a press counts it: reams, sheets and forms convert by themselves. Reorder suggestions and a scheduled “what to order” mail reach the buyer before stock runs short. Fast-moving titles are classed A automatically, so counting and buying start with what matters most. Stock is held by godown and bin, with stock-takes and variance reports.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “what should I reorder this week?” and the assistant lists the reorder suggestions. Then it prepares the purchase order for you to confirm.
The material plan: what to order, how much, and by when.
3
Agents, booksellers, schools and government buyers all want different terms
The pain
Agents buy on credit, retail buyers must pay first, schools want a quotation and government orders come through GeM. Each discount is negotiated separately, and a parcel leaves before anyone checks the money.
How Tathven solves it
Every buyer has one record with its own type, credit days and credit limit. An order is cleared for dispatch only when it is paid, unless the buyer is an agent, a government buyer or a customer on credit terms and the order is within those terms. Discount schemes are set once and attached to the buyer. Quotations carry an expiry date and become orders in one click, and government orders come in through the GeM connector.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “which agents are over their credit limit?” before you release the next order.
Every deal on one board, stage by stage, with its value.
4
Dispatch by post, courier and lorry
The pain
Hundreds of small parcels go out by India Post or courier, bulk orders by lorry or rail, and a customer’s “where is my book?” means digging through registers.
How Tathven solves it
Each dispatch mode is set up once, including India Post, courier, lorry, rail and electronic delivery for e-books. A carrier dispatch cannot be saved without its tracking number, and packing slips are printed for postal bundles. A returned parcel is recorded as a return, not a cancellation, so stock and accounts stay right.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
A customer’s WhatsApp message lands in the CRM inbox against their record, so the answer to “where is my book?” is one click away.
A buyer’s WhatsApp message, answered from the CRM inbox.
5
GST on books and print is not simple
The pain
Printed books and journals are exempt, while printing services, paper and ink are taxed at different rates. A wrong HSN or a manual GST return is a notice waiting to happen.
How Tathven solves it
Tathven ships with a publishing HSN catalogue:
books and journals are carried as exempt;
printing on the publisher’s paper, and printing of books and journals, at 5%;
advertising material, calendars and cartons at 18%;
paper and stationery at their own rates.
GST returns (GSTR-1, GSTR-3B and the annual return) are built from the tax ledger, not typed in. Purchases are reconciled against GSTR-2B, and a filed month is frozen.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
When a new item has no HSN, the assistant suggests one from the catalogue for you to confirm.
Costing
6
Print costing is guesswork
The pain
A book’s cost depends on forms, reams, plates, cover board, binding and wastage at every step. Every reprint is costed again on a calculator, and the cover price is a gut feeling.
How Tathven solves it
Each book has a bill of materials that speaks print: body paper, wrapper, end paper and inserts, plus plate making, printing, sewing, binding and lamination. Tathven converts pages to forms, forms to sheets and sheets to reams for you. Job rates and wastage are kept per operation. A costing order works out the cost of the run, with your overhead, and suggests a sale price. Once approved, it sets the item’s cost and price.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “what will 2,000 copies of this title cost?” and the assistant reads the bill of materials and the latest costing. It moves the costing through approval when you confirm.
A bill of materials that speaks print: operations, each with its paper.
7
Paper prices move, and nobody re-costs the list
The pain
Paper, board and printing rates change every few months. The cost sheet on file is a year old, and titles quietly start selling below cost.
How Tathven solves it
The cost-drift view compares each title’s costed price with today’s rates and shows which titles a price change has pushed out of line, by how much, so you re-cost the ones that matter.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “which titles did the paper price rise hit?” and the assistant answers from the cost-drift figures.
8
Plates and set-up costs land on the wrong run
The pain
Plates made once are reused across reprints, and one make-ready serves several forms. Charge it all to the first run and that run looks expensive; forget it and every reprint looks cheap.
How Tathven solves it
A shared step, such as plates used across several runs, is costed at its share, one Nth to each run, so every run carries a fair part of the set-up.
9
The estimate says one thing, the job says another
The pain
The run used more paper than planned, the binder charged more, and the difference disappears into the month’s accounts. Nobody learns from it.
How Tathven solves it
Paper and materials are issued against the production or job order, and work in progress is valued as the order moves. When the order is closed, anything left over is written to a production variance account, not hidden in stock. Scrap and spoiled sheets are recorded as scrap, and rejects on a run are recorded with the run.
Production: your own press, outside printers, or both
The production workspace: costings, job orders and approvals.
10
Paper sent to printers and binders goes missing
The pain
Paper, board and covers go out to a printer and the books come back from a binder. What was sent, used, wasted and still owed lives in a register and in somebody’s memory, and the printer’s bill arrives with nothing to check it against.
How Tathven solves it
A job order sends the work to an outside printer or binder, or to your own press. Material is issued against the job order and the unused balance comes back against it. The finished copies are received, and the job-work bill is checked against the job order. GST’s ITC-04 return for material sent to job workers is built from the same records.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “which job orders are still open with the binder?” The assistant moves a job order through approval when you confirm.
11
Some titles on your own press, some outside
The pain
A publisher with its own press still sends the overflow outside. The two costs mix in the books, so nobody can say whether the press is cheaper than the printer down the road.
How Tathven solves it
Each job order is marked as done in-house or by a contractor. A contractor’s bill and your own press’s conversion cost post to separate accounts, so the two can be compared title by title.
12
“Which press is free on Thursday?”
The pain
Machines, make-ready and binding all compete for the same week. The schedule lives on a whiteboard, and a rush order upsets everything without anyone seeing what slips.
How Tathven solves it
Each press, folder and binding line is a work centre with its own machine-hour rate, working calendar and maintenance plan. Production orders are scheduled on a board against what each machine can actually do. A machine due for maintenance is flagged, and a daily mail lists the maintenance that is due or overdue.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “which production orders are running late, and why?” or “which press is free for a 10,000-copy run?” The assistant reads the schedule and the machines. It then prepares the schedule, a reschedule or extra overtime hours, and nothing changes until you confirm.
A week on the schedule board, machine by machine.A work centre with its machines and hourly rate.
13
The floor does not know what the office knows
The pain
Operators start and stop jobs on paper, downtime is never written down, and the office learns about a breakdown or a spoiled run a day later.
How Tathven solves it
The shop floor screen starts, pauses and stops each run, with rejects and downtime recorded as they happen. Utilisation and OEE show how much of each machine’s time went into good copies. Each work centre has its own operator pool, with skills and leave. Overtime is added as extra hours on the machine’s calendar, so a late shift is planned, not improvised.
✨ How the agentic ERP helps
Ask “what is on the shop floor right now?”, “how much downtime did the four-colour press have this month?” or “what is our utilisation by machine?”
Utilisation and OEE by work centre, with why machines stood still.One day on the schedule board.
For printing presses
14
Every enquiry needs an estimate, today
The pain
A client wants a price for a book, a calendar or a run of cartons by this evening. The estimate is built on a calculator from paper rates, plates and machine time, and two estimators give two different numbers.
How Tathven solves it
The same costing order works for a client’s job: paper by the ream, plates, machine-hour rates, job rates and wastage per operation, and your overhead, all from your own rates, so every estimator gets the same number. The quotation goes out with an expiry date and becomes an order in one click.
15
Billing print as a service, at the right rate
The pain
Printing is a service, not stock. Book printing, commercial printing and cartons each carry a different GST rate, and the invoice has to say so.
How Tathven solves it
Print services are set up as service items with their SAC codes:
printing of books and journals at 5%;
advertising material, calendars and cartons at 18%.
A service line on a sale order is billed without touching stock, and the tax comes from the code.
16
Machines, paper and people in one place
The pain
A press runs on its machines, its paper and its operators, and each lives in a different book.
How Tathven solves it
Everything in “Production” and “Costing” above applies to a press:
work centres with machine-hour rates and maintenance plans;
a scheduling board and the shop floor screen;
utilisation and OEE;
paper bought, stocked and issued in reams and sheets;
the variance between estimate and actual.
One system, and an assistant that knows it
17
“Every question needs a report”
The pain
Every question needs a report, and every report needs the one person who knows how to run it.
How Tathven solves it
Ask Tathven’s AI assistant in plain language. It answers from your own data, within your own access rights:
stock by edition;
cost drift;
late orders and machine load;
credit limits;
open job orders.
It can also do the work:
prepare a purchase order;
plan or reschedule production and add overtime;
move purchase orders, production orders, job orders, costings and sale orders through approval.
Each of these comes as a card you check and confirm. Nothing is posted until you do.
18
One system, not five
The pain
Accounts, stock, production, sales and HR in separate software means retyping, mismatched numbers and month-end reconciliations.
How Tathven solves it
Stock, production, sales and finance are one system, and every stock movement reaches the books by itself. Tathven HRMS shares its people and holidays with production planning. Tathven AI Workspaces keeps contracts, artwork and documents beside the records they belong to. The CRM keeps each lead, enquiry and WhatsApp conversation with the customer it belongs to, and can sort and draft replies to support tickets for your team to send.
The CRM beside the ERP: tickets, pipeline and forecast.
Feature by feature
What you get
📚
Titles and editions
One code per title, stock and cost per edition, ISBN, author, press specs, barcode labels.
🧮
Costing
Cost per run from forms, reams, plates, machine hours and wastage, shared set-up costs, suggested sale price, cost drift.
🏭
Production
Print-aware bills of materials, production orders, job orders in-house or outside, material issue and return, work in progress, production variance.
🖨️
Presses and floor
Work centres with machine-hour rates, scheduling board, shop floor runs, downtime, utilisation and OEE, maintenance plans.
📦
Paper and stock
Reams and sheets, material planning, reorder suggestions, godowns and bins, stock-takes, lots.
🤝
Sales
Quotations, orders, print services, agents and government buyers on credit terms, discount schemes, GeM.
🚚
Dispatch
India Post, courier, lorry and rail, tracking numbers, packing slips, returns.
🧾
Tax and accounts
Publishing HSN and SAC catalogue, GST returns from the ledger, GSTR-2B reconcile, ITC-04, full accounts.
✨
Agentic ERP
An assistant that answers from your data and prepares the next step for you to confirm.
🔗
One platform
ERP, HRMS, AI Workspaces and CRM with a single sign-in.
Tathven Agentic ERP
Start with your next print run.
Bring your titles, your presses, your printers and your agents. Tathven Agentic ERP brings the rest. Choose Books, Inventory or Manufacturing, and grow without changing systems.
