Over the past couple of years, the desire for implementing Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) has grown twofold. CIOs, Plant Managers, and Quality representatives all know and understand the benefits MES can deliver. However, the challenge is being able to implement MES solutions without major plant disruption, while interfacing to an ever growing number of manufacturing support systems. This is where Enhanced Information Solutions (EIS) has truly stood out. EIS offers OpsTrakker, a suite of mobile apps that provide MES solutions eliminating paper-based work processes inside a manufacturing floor. From material consumption reporting, production output reporting to line clearance activities and equipment usage, operators and supervisors inside the plant can now have access to all the information literally on the palm of their hands. Founded in 1994, EIS works with customers to implement MES within shorter project cycles to more quickly realize business benefits that include high ROI, enable a change in operation mindset, and provide a mechanism to build on lessons learned quickly.

Mobility delivered

“EIS has seen a growing market for mobility and the potential for how this could be a game-changer for manufacturing companies,” says Mike Eiselt, President at EIS. OpsTrakker was born from the vision of addressing today’s complex MES systems; the fact that MES systems are built on old technology, means it takes a longer time for them to be configured, vali¬dated and installed. Starting from scratch with the latest mobile technology, OpsTrakker is designed to allow the implementation of apps that are easily installed and configured. OpsTrakker currently offers four MES apps that run on desktops and on any hand-held devices such as smart phones, iPads or tablets.

The product’s first module, eLog¬Book, eliminates the use of paper-based equipment logbooks from the manufacturing floor by providing a mobile solution for operators and supervisors to gain access to equipment status data from anywhere in the plant.

Following the eLogBook application, the firm’s eForm module removes other non-equipment paper-based forms from the shop floor and converts them into forms that are executed on a mo¬bile device. This results in easy data access to all departments, allowing plants to focus on process improve¬ment and product quality initiatives instead of paperwork activities.

Real-world results

The system can prevent data entry omissions; quality can review only those logbooks in which exception conditions occur; and logbooks will never be lost or difficult to find.

Using the EIS OpsTrakker solution, one of EIS’s customers removed over 60 logbooks and forms, from the manufacturing floor and replaced them with 20 iPads to record the same in¬formation. In just over 3 months, over 10,000 logbook en¬tries were recorded. Using OpsTrakker’s review by exception functionality configured within the system, the quality department reduced the number of forms that need to be reviewed by more than 94 percent. This freed up the quality department tremendously, allowing resources to focus on improving product quality, not paperwork quality.

EIS IS EXTREMELY EXCITED TO DELIVER AN MES APP BASED SOLUTION THAT WILL HELP COMPANIES ELIMINATE PAPERWORK, IMPROVE QUALITY, AND SUPPORT A 21ST CENTURY WORKFORCE

Future growth

Looking ahead, EIS strives to better implement its services and the best practices and has charted a roadmap for OpsTrakker that includes new applications for Global Tank Management—keeping track of tanks that move from plant to plant, eBOM—record consumptions and product output in real-time, and eInspect—in spection based screens to search for product defects and provide process metrics. EIS is extremely excited to deliver an MES app based solution that will help companies eliminate paperwork, improve quality, and support a 21st century workforce.