Imagine a world where real-time plant-floor information is connected to the business systems. Picture purchasing agents perusing actual inventories and usage reports and CFOs looking at authoritative reports summarizing yield and return on investments based on actual events from just a few hours ago. Plant managers have a true picture of cycle times, production costs, manpower resources, and machinery usage. Maintenance managers have up-to-the-second visibility into the health of their facilities and machinery to ensure maximum uptime. Customers see their orders in the system, and vendors have visibility to keep inventories lean while production processes are maximized. At one time, all this would have sounded too good to be true. Until recently, the market wasn''t ready to embrace such a message nor was the technology ready.
Times are changing. The stars have aligned, the technology has arrived, and (if the corporate culture is willing) it is possible right now to have a system that is based on real-time information spanning the market spaces between sensors and supply chain. This is the essence of the Wonderware vision: Empowering the operators on plant floors will have measurable and substantial effects on productivity.
I want to spend my time in this article first walking you through the plant-floor asset management opportunity, and then I''ll talk about how plant-floor automation systems and tops-down ERP systems can best work together. I wholeheartedly believe that the most "intelligent agent" on the manufacturing floor is either the plant operator or the maintenance technician. I realize that this notion may sound like a "workers'' manifesto," but who better to tell you how to get the most out of the machines they work with every day?
Gaining a Clear Understanding of Production Assets and Their Behavior
For plant-floor personnel, the health and reliability of their production equipment (assets) is key. These individuals have long understood the value of automation in order to support the health and reliability of their equipment. Unfortunately, their sphere of influence has been typically at a very local, tactical level and for the most part relegated to the shop floor and department workcell. The result has typically been to install islands of automation to meet these tactical objectives. Predictive maintenance systems, Computerized Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS), as well as control systems (PLCs, DCSs, and OCS Systems) have helped to deliver on these objectives.
With today''s cost, complexity, and sophistication of equipment, the proper maintenance of production equipment is now viewed as a competitive weapon, which can positively affect the bottom line. In many organizations, as much as 15-40 percent of operating costs can be tied to plant-floor maintenance activities.
However, proper maintenance of production equipment is becoming a very complex task. Gone are the days when Fred could determine the imminent bearing failure of a critical piece of equipment based on feeling a minor vibration or smelling the air. Similarly, Oscar can''t commit to customer deliveries if production equipment is unreliable and unavailable.
The solution, as I see it, is "plant-floor-centric," or bottoms-up. If we have control of the plant floor and hence the production process, we can effectively meet the objectives of all the constituents in the organization. Having the best COM or ERP or MES system means nothing if the production equipment isn''t running.
The solution involves total integration at the plant-floor level, i.e. understanding production equipment behavior and its role in the entire production process. Plant automation systems such as our own FactorySuite measure output, efficiency, and quality. These systems provide a wealth of real-time data, perform online assessment of the production assets, and detect undesirable conditions. With integration to a CMMS, these conditions can then be corrected by either operator intervention or maintenance activities that could potentially impact safety, reliability, or efficiency. To this end, we recently introduced MaintenanceSuite, a new, integrated suite of plant-centric software applications designed to improve manufacturing productivity and offer rapid response asset management tools.
Integrated Functionality Reduces Implementation Costs by Up to 80%
We also know from experience that there are many virtues in the integrated or "Suite" approach we''ve pursued, as opposed to the issues involved forcing our customers to integrate several "best of breed" solutions. Today, new standards such as Microsoft''s DNA for Manufacturing and the use of object-based architectures have made integration of disparate software modules easier for connecting business systems together with manufacturing execution and coordination capability for single or distributed plants.
The result is a boon for manufacturing concerns in terms of lowering cost of ownership. Software vendors are now beginning to offer solutions that take the pain out of integration. Until the evolution of objects and universal architectures, our customers had no choice but to develop proprietary interfaces to the modules of functionality they needed. For many, this meant costly long-term maintenance for the software systems they created. Vendors that provide integrated solutions or suites are taking this pain away and taking on these costs. From a software development standpoint, it is extremely painful to improve one component of a suite because the effects ripple throughout the suite. Incidentally, the Y2K problem was in large part a result of many homegrown spaghetti interfaces. Today, our customers have much better choices that may bring them up to 80 percent savings in implementation.
Toward a Plant-Centric Corporate Culture
The next change that will have to take place lies within the corporate culture. Plant-floor people (both operators and maintenance types) will need to be trusted and included in the information food chain if they are to make a difference in their own productivity. Some plant management and most front office management will surely experience heartburn over this. The "command and control" types may never be able to make the transition. I maintain, however, that enabling operators will work in the race to achieve competitive advantage and time to market. When I say "operators," what I really mean is everyone involved on the plant floor from plant manager to operator. It will cause a shift in some of the "supervisor''s" responsibilities. Empowering the operators will require supervisors to focus on more proactive tasks.
What tools are available today? Handheld devices (PDAs, or Personal Digital Assistants) are rapidly appearing on the market. These are enabled through the use of object-oriented technology, high-density intranet communications, graphical user interfaces, fieldbus connections, and the like. Unfortunately, in many manufacturing companies, information is departmentalized, scattered, and controlled by management. I am convinced that sharing the information among the operators via the use of the Internet or intranets will make a significant difference. It''s only a matter of time before the standards committees work things out or, better yet, larger suppliers like ourselves provide rich functionality within our integrated suites.
The Internet has made a lot of this possible as well as mandatory. It is practically impossible to get through a day anymore without the mention of e-commerce. Though I have a bone to pick with those who presume that nearly everything in life now revolves around e-something or other, it has brought about a lot of changes in thinking, particularly from a customer''s perspective. We all have expectations of how we should be responded to more rapidly.
The benefit of e-commerce is simply that it allows us to have closer and faster interaction with our customers. It generally doesn''t mean e-delivery of any of the products represented electronically except software, ironically. The Internet has changed our expectation of response time. And the "e" has forevermore connected the ERP type of system to the plant floor.
The Internet now makes it possible for ordering, scheduling, and manufacturing all to occur where the production takes place. Participants in the "supply chain," especially customers, can all have visibility in the manufacturing process from the beginning of the order at the raw materials stage through to finished goods. In some companies, customers can even place orders that result in customized products. In the high-tech arena, Dell Computer has probably been the most significant in setting these rapid response standards. You can place an order for your next computer via the Internet, have it built to your specifications, and track your order daily as it goes through production all the way to the day it is delivered to your door. To be sure, few of us in manufacturing can duplicate this visibility, but what Dell has proven is that it is possible.
What Enables Improvements in Manufacturing Productivity?
The "enablers" include the ability to utilize real-time information in each part of the supply chain. Informed and connected operators are key. Real-time information coming directly from our machinery to the operator and linked via the intranet/Internet gives us the ability to improve productivity. Internally, the benefits can be enormous. The improved visibility into the manufacturing process will eliminate a lot of waste.
The external or market benefits are the manufacturer''s ability to respond rapidly to changes in product requirements based on customer needs. There will be improvements in quality and delivery as well as a jackpot of competitive advantage through being more agile.
Maximizing Plants as Assets: One of the important benefits to the manufacturer is how these systems can improve the value of their production plants. Often, these plants are seen as independent assets that become more or less valuable based on their ability to stand alone. The plants that have real-time, plant-centric integrated business and production systems will be the most valuable on the market.
Delivering on the Vision. Or, Toward a 2-Tiered ERP Solution: Obviously, I think that Wonderware is uniquely positioned to deliver on its vision. There are other initiatives underway as well among competitors to bring this type of functionality to customers. Ultimately, our manufacturing customer will be better off. What I most object to is the notion that the traditional ERP vendors can offer systems affecting manufacturing productivity.
I believe the best answer for our customers will be a plant-centric information system connected to an ERP system. Some might call it a 2-tiered ERP system. For some companies, say in the middle tier ($500 million to $1 billion), the best answer is simply a package that spans their production processes from the plant floor to the business office but is based in what I''ll call "factory financials." In other words, they can get along just fine without the sophistication of the JBOPS solutions (JD Edwards, Baan, Oracle, PeopleSoft, or SAP). In fact, they prefer a system that comes from vendors steeped in the manufacturing domain. The winners will be those who are first to market and have the best integration to the most pieces while still allowing their customers to customize and add on modules that fit their niches. For a manufacturer, that means systems that are built from the bottom up.