Bottom Line:  Taking on manufacturing challenges and overcoming them by improving end-to-end vsibility and control first breaks down barriers in the way of taking on more customers and growing sales. The clearer and more real-time the end-to-end visbility is across shop floors and production plants, the easier it becomes to prioritize what needs to be improved first to increase production effiency, solve an urgent quality problem, increase yield rates and more. Real-time production and process monitoring data is the life blood that makes end-to-end visibility and control possible and is a ..read more

Bottom Line:  An ERP solution for small businesses makes the most of every growth opportunity by improving end-to-end visibility across every shop floor while controlling costs, production schedules, and delivery dates, freeing up more time for short-notice production runs. Offering short-notice production runs to customers is one of the most proven strategies for growing a small to midsize manufacturing business at scale. To become competitively strong enough to do that, small and midsize manufacturers need to have end-to-end visibility of their shop floors combined with real-time produ ..read more

Bottom Line: Improving shop floor productivity, keeping customers loyal, and controlling costs need to start with real-time production data. The goal is to have end-to-end visibility across all plant floors to see how improving efficiency reduces costs and delights customers by shipping their orders on time.  Ten features an MES solution needs to deliver value are defined in this post. Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) keep shop floors’ steady cadence beating on time while providing the valuable data manufacturers need to increase production efficiency and control costs. An effective ..read more

Bottom line:  Constrained by shortages across their supply chains, manufacturers prioritize Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) to keep production on schedule, so customer shipments are made on time – proving how invaluable every effort focused on improving warehouse management performance is today. Excelling At Warehouse Management Makes You A More Resilient Manufacturer   Supply chains are absorbing much of the shock of rapid peaks and drops in demand and product availability across manufacturing today. Manufacturers who are choosing to excel at warehouse management are absorbing th ..read more

The growth of cloud ERP in manufacturing is approximately 5%, with Financial Management Systems (FMS) and Human Capital Management (HCM) growing at 7% and 10%, respectively. The worldwide ERP market grew 9% last year, reaching $39 billion according to Gartner’s latest market estimates. Despite an overabundance of hype surrounding cloud ERP, Gartner estimates its global market size at 30% of the worldwide ERP market or approximately $11.7 billion in annual revenues. Cloud MES delivers the greatest value at manufacturers with complex multisite requirements, deep integration expertise with Cloud ..read more

Bottom Line:  Unpredictable demand swings caused by the pandemic are stress-testing supply chain management software systems across manufacturing, helping many manufacturers discover new strengths they hadn’t realize they had before. Manufacturers’ toughest challenges deliver the most valuable lessons on surviving in a chaotic, turbulent market today. Take demand planning, the urgent role of supply chain management software, and the need for achieving greater manufacturing efficiency for power tools, for example. Stanley Black & Decker saw orders for power tools, wrenches, tape measur ..read more

Bottom Line:  Any successful ERP implementation starts with a clear definition of business value followed by a compelling vision of greater collaboration and connectedness between workers that get results. Any given ERP implementation has more to do with helping workers and teams become smarter and better at their jobs than it does with technology alone. In 2021 and beyond, the most successful ERP implementations will be those that prioritize the connected worker and focus on how smart manufacturing supports and strengthens them. Asked what integrating smart manufacturing into their ERP s ..read more

Bottom Line: It’s in the striving to always keep improving process and product quality based on insights from their Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) that helps manufacturers become stronger and more responsive to customers in tough times. Manufacturing CEOs say the acid test of business continuity today is to keep delivering the highest quality products they can on or before customer ship dates.  Keeping customers’ trust by choosing to excel at product quality above all is one of the main factors that drive manufacturers to adopt MES systems. And it’s the foundation that makes it pos ..read more

Bottom Line: To achieve lasting success with any digital transformation strategy, manufacturers must put employees first then selectively focus on technologies that enable every member of their team to excel and stay connected. The greatest productivity gains in manufacturing happen when digital transformation strategies put the health and safety of workers first. There’s the risk that focusing too much on technology alone won’t solve the innate productivity roadblocks holding workers back from achieving more. It’s the manufacturers putting workers first and making sure they’re equipped with t ..read more

The Defense Production Act (DPA) is a critical weapon in the fight against Covid-19. For nearly a year, it has been invoked to drive the delivery of COVID-19 testing kits and personal protection equipment (PPE). Now, it will also play a central role in accelerating the production of coronavirus vaccines with the National Strategy for the COVID-19 Response and Pandemic Preparedness released by President Joe Biden on January 21. The DPA gives the President the authority to expedite and expand the supply of materials and services for the U.S. to promote the national defense. In the war against CO ..read more