Cloud manufacturing refers to a new concept of using centralized cloud computing for manufacturing information systems to support distributed and dynamic collaborative manufacturing environment. The core of cloud manufacturing is to provide service to geographically distributed manufacturers centralized services. This paper introduces a cloud based production scheduling system for sheet metal manufacturing and discusses the requirements of scheduling as a service. A cloud-based genetic algorithm based scheduling application has been developed to serve distributed manufacturing. The characteristics of the prototype system are described and performance estimates are tested. The solution shows how scheduling as a service can be built as part of connected smart machinery and provide a generic platform for varying uses.