You hear a lot of talk these days about a concept called e-manufacturing -- with pretty much every vendor saying they support it and magazine ads saying you need it.
While there's a lot of disagreement about what "it" is, one thing's for certain -- e-manufacturing will never be successful without integration of the systems on the plant floor. This article will attempt to put some definition around the term e-manufacturing, but more importantly, will explore the issues associated with integrating plant floor systems for more successful e-manufacturing operations. We will explore some reasons why it is necessary, what it promises, and what components are needed to achieve it. All the while, we will try to ground the issues solidly with real-world examples.
The Catalyst -- A Collapsing Supply Chain
E-business "solutions vendors" tend to spout off about their alphabet soup offerings -- "B2B this," "CRM that," "SCM these." They attempt to help their customers connect to suppliers and get more direct feedback from customers. While this is very important to a corporation, ultimately, someone needs to make something and get it into the supply chain for delivery to the customer. You can have all of the most sophisticated CRM or e-business infrastructure software in the world, but it means nothing if your manufacturing operations aren't integrated on the factory floor.
Expectations of Manufacturing
What keeps manufacturers up at night? Finding answers to several questions. "How can I make better decisions about my processes?" "How can I make more products, faster, responding to customer requests, and spending less money doing it?" "How can I get a return on the huge costs for manufacturing equipment?" The answers to all of these questions stem from understanding how products are made today -- understanding the processes and making modifications to them based on real-world results. Gathering information from these plant devices and turning the raw data into information that you can act on, or prove something with, is the central principle behind integrated manufacturing systems.
Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan backs up claims of integrated manufacturing systems in a recent testimony to Congress. He stated, "but the recent years' remarkable surge in the availability of real-time information has enabled business management to remove large swaths of inventory safety stocks and worker redundancies, and has armed firms with detailed data to fine-tune product specifications to most individual customer needs."
Where the Rubber Meets the Road
Integrating plant floor systems happens in three dimensions -- within an operation, between operations, and between the plant floor and the rest of the enterprise. Let's use a candy bar manufacturer as an example.
Integration within an operation is the most common, and it's critical for optimized performance of that given activity on the plant floor. Let's take a portion of the operation that wraps individual chocolate bars and sends them to the case packer. Using data gathered from sensors, switches, and other devices on the conveyor, the control system governs the motors driving the conveyors (likely a programmable controller or personal computer) and communicates information over a plant floor network to a human-machine interface (HMI) system (likely a computer screen or factory-hardened terminal) so that operators know what's going on at any given moment in the process. If the wrapper starts to run low on raw materials, a controller needs to send a message to the HMI system so that an operator can refill the machine before it starts to send unwrapped candy bars on to the next operation. It sounds simple, but there are lots of ways to accomplish it, and today's more sophisticated control systems are designed to make this integration between control and human-machine interface extremely easy and repeatable.
Integration between operations is the next most common occurrence, but it still doesn't happen often enough. This level of integration merges the entire manufacturing process into a single coordinated system. Using the same candy example, coordination between the wrapper, the conveyor, and the case packer is critical to improve productivity, prevent downtime associated with errors, and even reduce energy costs. When the operator shuts down the wrapping machine, the controller can notify the conveyor system to shut down to save wear and tear on motors as well as the energy associated with keeping the conveyor running. Likewise, the case packer, which is "looking" for wrapped candy bars to feed its operation, can also be shut down for that period of time. The most sophisticated manufacturers will even take advantage of the shutdown further up the line to perform scheduled maintenance on other machines. These activities of course impact other operations further up and down the line -- from raw materials usage to warehousing and shipping. All of this requires close coordination between control systems on individual operations, using networks that are designed to control, collect, and communicate plant floor information to the points where it can help improve efficiency of the operation.
Vertical Integration -- the New Frontier
The newest frontier for the factory floor is integration of plant floor devices (and the information they generate) with the rest of the enterprise. This is one of the keys to effective e-manufacturing in that you can't make decisions on operations without information generated from the plant floor itself. There's been a lot of talk about factory floor-to-enterprise integration in the past, but two recent developments have made this easier than ever before -- new networks and better software.
Different parts of the manufacturing operation require different types of networks -- primarily due to the amount and type of information being transferred and the physical environment. Up until recently, these networks had little in common with each other where it counted most -- at the protocol layer. It wasn't all that different from crossing the border between France and Germany and having to learn a completely new set of traffic laws in a different language. Today, companies like Rockwell Automation are supporting new networking technology that allows you to install the right network for the environment, but a common set of protocols and services across all of the networks. Called NetLinx, it allows a factory to deploy DeviceNet, ControlNet, and EtherNet/IP (or any combination of the three) and use a common, routable protocol across all. This greatly improves network response time and makes it much easier to share information between the different levels.
But networks alone won't do it. Data dispersed across an enterprise does not allow a manufacturer to make good decisions. Data must be turned into actionable information, it must be relevant, it must be timely, and it cannot be overwhelming. Only a well-architected information layer can help a manufacturer with these things. This is one reason why high-powered database administrators (DBAs) are sought-after people within an organization. A good structure to databases, the data they contain, and the applications that use them is the only defense against not having the correct data, at the right time, in the right place, and in the correct amount.
Many manufacturers run their business off enterprise-level applications to run finances, purchasing, order entry, etc. These systems are called Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems and can even be used with manufacturing modules for plant maintenance or bills-of-material, and with the right modules could extend all the way to human resources. These systems could be internally developed packages, or larger ERP systems such as SAP, Oracle, PeopleSoft, or J.D. Edwards. As with the information database layers, these systems are only as good as the data that resides in them. Their presence alone does not guarantee that a manufacturer will be successful. In fact there are enough horror stories about implementations gone wrong that manufacturers should understand that purchasing and developing an ERP system is not nearly as important as what you do with whatever system you choose.
Having a networked plant floor, well-architected information systems, and nimble enterprise systems does not guarantee success. These systems must be enabled to send data to whatever system needs it. The shop floor cannot make products unless it knows what products to make.
There are transaction manager programs available that allow users to download information from SAP or virtually any ERP system. The ERP system may want to track the "health" of a machine's assets, but how many "turns" a machine has had is information an ERP system cannot just imagine, it needs the real-world data from the plant floor. The information system's applications may help users make decisions about how a process is doing. Appropriate software programs can be used to retrieve the data from the plant and load it into its own information store.
Transporting data back and forth from information systems and plant systems, plant systems and enterprise systems is no small task. The recent trend is to discuss these software products in a category called Enterprise Application Integration (EAI).
The Promises of Plantwide Integration
So how does all of this integration manifest itself in real-world benefits? Let's use our candy manufacturer as an example.
Reduce WIP: Work in progress (WIP) can hurt as much as a real whip. WIP by definition means that products aren't finished, and that the products that are not finished cannot be sold. You can't ship half-full cartons of chocolate bars to customers, so if there isn't coordination between the wrapper and cartoner, there's a good chance that you'll have inventory sitting around idle. One manufacturer we know could barely drive forklifts through their plant due to the WIP lying all around. By using scheduling software program, such as Rockwell Automation's RSBizWare Scheduler, they were able to streamline and sequence their orders to minimize WIP.
Reduce Cycle Time: Cycle time is the time it takes to produce a product from the time it is ordered. If cycle times are too long, products don't get shipped to customers on time. Because inventory is not turning at a higher rate, the equipment manufacturers' produce is not being utilized to the highest efficiency. For our candy manufacturers, cycle times can be improved in a number of ways through better integration. First, upgrading the response times between the sensors and the controllers can result in improved throughput on the machine. Second, if the controller notifies the operator that it's almost out of wrapper, the operator can add more without causing a full shutdown. Third, using vertical integration, production schedulers can compare orders from multiple customers and create a shift schedule that optimizes all machines and gets products to customers faster.
Asset Utilization: Users are looking for a return on the investments made for shop floor equipment. Most manufacturing machines are no small investment, so before deciding to purchase new equipment, users have to make sure the existing equipment is being fully utilized. It is also important to determine if the machines are frequently faulting due to the same reasons, which means that downtime analysis is important. By implementing an efficiency and uptime tracking tool such as Rockwell Automation's RSBizWare PlantMetrics system, manufacturers can determine accurate mean-time-between-failure statistics for their equipment. Let's say we've got one cartoner that can handle three kinds of candy, and another that can handle only one. If the manufacturer uses the information he has on production, he can schedule production so that the multi-function cartoner isn't tied up performing functions that could be handled by the other one.
Fact-Based Decisions: A central point of e-manufacturing is gathering and presenting the information from the shop floor, allowing the manufacturer to make informed decisions. Let's say our candy manufacturer has a big order come through from a major retailer, who wants 5,000 cases of three different products shipped to 20 locations around the country. Using information from the plant floor on raw material availability, production capacity, and distribution options, the company can plan a strategy to make sure the right products are shipped to the right locations at the right time -- without disrupting other customer orders.
In another example, Rockwell Automation worked with Werner Ladder to install transaction manager software at its headquarters in Greenville, PA, integrating plant floor production facilities with the business systems that run Werner's corporate enterprise. With the installation of the new system, Werner is able to better track production in its fiberglass ladder manufacturing area and has reduced paper inventory, thereby realizing substantial savings with improved inventory tracking. By simply gathering and analyzing data they had never before tracked, Werner has reduced inventory variations by 66%.
Conclusion
Ultimately, the success of e-manufacturing relies on getting information extracted and distributed to places where it can do the most good -- whether that be in another part of the manufacturing operation or elsewhere in the enterprise. Effective integration of plant floor devices with one another and with higher-level systems is the first step toward creating a truly next-generation e-manufacturing environment.
Mike Pantaleano is RSSql Product Manager with the RSBizWare marketing department of Rockwell Automation. His expertise is in database development, data transactions and integration.
