Manufacturing Execution Systems: The Next Level of Automated Control or of Shop-Floor Support?

Abstract

Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) are at the heart of industrial organizations' endeavors. While MES were traditionally positioned as an integration technology to bridge the shop-floor with higher level business systems, their current focus seems to be on the digitization of shop-floor activities for the collection, analysis and exchange of real-time information. Still, there remains dispute on the role of MES, specifically with respect to the functions they support in relation to other information systems in the automation pyramid, and their resulting interactions with humans. While MES are often positioned as the top layer of automated control of manufacturing processes, it is perceived by others as an integrated decision support system for the shop-floor. This study aims to shed light on the role of MES to either automate or to augment human tasks. Based on insights of a case study, we found that MES are neither automatic control nor solely decision support. MES' main role is the creation and maintenance of digital twins of products. This involves human interaction, which closely resembles work related to computer-aided engineering (CAE) systems. We expect that work in the sphere of MES will therefore increasingly resemble engineering work.

An Analytics Environment Architecture for Industrial Cyber-Physical Systems Big Data Solutions

“…An approach for automation on the integration of MES with other manufacturing systems that simplify the design and implementation in the food and beverage industry is proposed in [ 21 ]. The approach in [ 22 ] focuses on real-time analytics for activities on the shop floor. Human tasks can be automated or augmented by the new role of MES in the digital twin of a physical product.…”

Manufacturing Execution Systems for the Food and Beverage Industry: A Model-Driven Approach

“…For the manufacturing industry, to fulfill the requirement from the shop floor on the data collection and operation reaction in real-time, the idea of MES was firstly introduced by AMR Research in 1992, and also in this year, MESA (Manufacturing Enterprise Solutions Association) was established [11,12]. According to MESA, the core task of the MES is considered as an information center that enables the manufacturers to optimize production activities [13].…”

Enabling the Smart Factory with Industrial Internet of Things-Connected MES/MOM

“…Due to the improved hardware processing power and availability of vast amounts of data, AI capability is an asset for MES/ MOM to manage operations much more effectively. However, even though MES/MOM is designed to interact with humans in the factory to orchestrate production, literature shows that MES user interfaces have not been studied extensively [80]. Furthermore, literature also suggests that research on chatbot application in enterprises is still nascent [79].…”

“…[79] By contrast, research on the user aspect of MES/MOM is limited. This is despite the fact that MES/MOM is intended to interact with human users to aid them in smooth production management [80,44]. However, the production workforce can make informed decisions with the help of AI-based intuitive assistant systems, such as chatbots for EIS.…”

“…The levels of the functional hierarchy according to ISA 95 [23] Over the last two decades, MES/MOM has evolved to play two crucial roles in the factory [80].…”