Category: Technology
By Alan Foster
Industrial companies mistakenly view manufacturing cost reduction as a labor cost issue. Labor is usually not even the largest cost factor. With the trend towards to larger product sets with more Make-to-Order smaller runs, significant cost reduction is a matter of effective work processes across plants and supply chain operations. The winning solution for effective work processes requires simultaneous changes. Read More
By Alan Foster
Why do the majority manufacturers believe they can schedule a plant from the top down and still optimize the plant for throughout and price per unit? There is a simple answer but complex solution. Plant scheduling must be done on maximizing profit per order and not just on line balancing. While knowing the margin and customer-priority for all WIP orders. Read More
By Alan Foster
We are starting 2012 off with a discussion of an area of manufacturing systems that is finally getting ready to come of age over the next year or two. Many industry analysts and writers in the technical press have written for years about the need for system interoperability to reduce the high cost and inflexibility of system integration. In the. Read More
By Alan Foster
In August, we discussed the how collaborative manufacturing methods are required to compete as a global manufacturer. A critical next step in the transformation process toward this goal is aligning of supply chain and plant metrics in support of near-real-time operations decision making. Many manufacturers come at this challenge from only top-down business intelligence methods with financial metrics based on. Read More
By Alan Foster
Master data, which may include reference data, is information that is key to the operation of business and is the primary focus of the IT discipline of Master Data Management (MDM). This key business information may include data about customers, products, employees, materials, suppliers, etc. which often turns out to be non-transactional in nature. In this regard, master data supports. Read More
