ERP and MES: essential cooperation
ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) is used at production sites to manage resources and support production managers by helping them with organizational aspects (type and quantity of materials needed to produce an order, estimated lead times based on inventory and supplier supply, etc.).
The MES (Manufacturing Execution System) allows you to monitor and organize all industrial production by serving as a link between operators and the supply chain. However, the distinction between the functions of the MES (Manufacturing Execution System) and those of the ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) is sometimes still difficult for some to grasp.
Complementarity, convergence…what exactly does this mean?
the important role of erp in businesses
For quite some time, industries have focused on automating their processes to increase productivity. Although some companies are still in the early stages, many have a high level of automation and SCADA. More recently, large and small manufacturers have invested heavily in ERP systems for all aspects of business management. As a transactional decision-making tool for production planning and organization, ERP has now enabled the integration of functions at the highest level of CIM (Computer Integrated Manufacturing) across an enterprise and has been confirmed as a corporate, multi-site, unifying tool. But for the production manager, it is execution that matters. MES is aimed at production managers, providing them with detailed operational control of production, which will enable their entity to progress.
MES and ERP are naturally complementary
ERP and MES
are complementary for the circulation and use of manufacturing information within the company. On the one hand, ERP and MES do not work on the same time scale: an ERP rarely works on less than half a day, while MES works on timescales of minutes or tens of minutes. This difference in time scale masks another more significant one: ERP was not designed to collect and process data in real time at the fine granularity required to manage and control processes and meet stringent traceability and performance improvement requirements.
In the absence of MES, production must be carried out with no other assistance than the manufacturing order issued by the ERP, and at the end of each manufacturing order, all the data characterizing it (quantities actually produced, materials consumed with their origin, inspection results, execution time and losses, rejects, etc.) must be entered directly into a form managed by the ERP. This results in data entry operations that are extremely costly for operators and unreliable. Manufacturers are generally aware of this and often ask the ERP system integrator to develop “customizations” that allow them to capture information at different stages of production, synchronize it, and transmit the consolidated information back to the ERP.
Ce qui revient en fait à développer un MES spécifique ! Est-ce une bonne opération ? Certainement pas sur le plan des possibilités offertes, de l’évolutivité ou même du budget de l’opération.
The MES will organize detailed production tasks and feed information into the ERP system
Today, the complementary nature of ERP and MES is widely recognized, particularly by manufacturers who have been using ERP for some time and have a better understanding of its functional scope. Increasingly prevalent standards, both proprietary (such as SAP XI) and open (such as ISA-95 Part 5 and B2MML), also facilitate exchanges between these software programs. COOX offers several exchange mechanisms adapted to your existing ERP or CAPM. The implementation of standard MES software allows for the detailed structuring of operations for which the ERP system only provides a “macro” view, thus enabling their execution without the need for paper-based or informal processes. The diagram below shows an example of a manufacturing recipe, as seen from the ERP and MES systems.
Furthermore, in order for the company to get the most out of it, the ERP must be richly fed with data and information collected in the field. Standard MES software such as COOX, for example, with its integrated import and export functions, can provide operators and the ERP with information on actual production and scrap quantities, performance levels, process and product traceability (product genealogy and material flow tracking), providing real-time information for company management and enabling subsequent planning schedules to be refined.
MES is an information system focused on the factory, workshops, and the operations that take place there. It thus serves as a unifying tool for cross-functional areas such as production, quality, maintenance, and processes, and is essential for managing and controlling production operations. In that it consolidates information and feeds into the ERP system, it is an indispensable complement to the latter for efficient production.