Cost Effective Warehouse Management System

Along similar lines is the wireless IQ Warehouse Management System (WMS)
module that supports hand-held scanners, personal digital assistants (PDA),
and radio frequency (RF) technology. Consequently it improves plant floor
communications and lowers the cost of inventory data collection. This is
done in conjunction with aiming for on-line updates in almost real-time
(although this kind of functionality tends to be provided by many peer
products, such as Made2Manage). The module handles a raft of inventory
transactions such as receiving, manual adjustments, physical inventory,
production entry or materials backflush, pick tickets, packing slips, etc.
It also provides access to the information from IQ RealTime Production
Monitoring like setup jobs, entered scrap, reported production, printed
labels, or reported downtime codes. For automotive suppliers, another
industry of interest for IQMS, the solution features a serialized inventory
labeling system that is also Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG) compliant.
Although these optional modules require additional shop floor user licensing
and additional hardware, they are often a cost-effective production
monitoring solution, allowing production information to be accessible from
virtually anywhere. Accordingly, machine interface units (MIU) are mounted
directly onto each machine control panel to capture and transfer machine
cycle information to the machine monitoring unit (MMU). The data from each
machine is collected through the RealTime Box and sent back to the Oracle
database via an IQ RealTime workstation (a dedicated Microsoft Windows
server). The capacity for each MMU is sixty-four machines.
For plastic shops requiring even more complex monitoring for molding,
stamping, forming, extrusion, and assembly, there is the IQ Gate application
programming interface (API). It is a gateway to Mattec Corporation'
equivalent solution, one of the leading process monitoring products in the
industry. Information transferred to Mattec includes production schedules or
work order information, item data, and BOM data. EnterpriseIQ, however,
captures production data from Mattec, such as cycle information, downtime
intervals, and scrap information. The API thereby cross-references or maps
scrap and downtime codes between EnterpriseIQ and Mattec. Data is
automatically transferred via the IQ Alert notification system and at
user-defined intervals for data exchange.
The role this API plays gives us a flavor for what is required to interface
just two disparate systems and getting them to "talk to one another". This
tedious job often falls into the IT department's lap, perhaps with help from
vendors. Interfaces typically resemble a batch file upload process, with
data mapped between two different systems so each can understand the other.
Data mapping almost always requires custom work and an unnecessary
"reinvention of the wheel", since the structure of the data is more or less
always unique between the vendors' products. The interface, once written and
tested, is valid until a vendor changes something in the software as part of
a product update. With new versioning, the immense customization effort and
annoyance starts all over again.
While some larger complex enterprises may need a best-of-breed solution to
flexibly extend their activities into e-collaboration, managing this large
application portfolio-much of which involves partnering or extensive
integration and customization-is cumbersome to say the least. While the
best-of-breed approach can have its merits, (see Best of Breed Versus Fully
Integrated Software: The Pros and Cons, Single Source or Best of Breed- The
Debate Continues, and Pure-Play CRM Vendors: Choose an Integrated or Best of
Breed Solution?), we believe it consistently leads to additional integration
costs and complicates service and support arrangements. Interfaces between
components like ERP, CRM, WMS, MES, or e-business usually require
significant tailoring. This can be a barrier to future changes as modified
code needs to be further revised which is notoriously time consuming,
costly, and risky. Moreover, these concoctions can also have a different
"look--and-feel" across the range. For a more detailed discussion see
Integrated Solutions: Look before You Leap.


Source : IPOMS.