Manufacturing

Manufacturing companies aim to embrace a ‘lean’ manufacturing model and it is typically left up to production managers and their teams to figure out how to make this happen. Often this task is performed in addition to their established workloads and they continue to be measured on metrics such as fills rate, inventory turns and asset utilization.

Lean principles such as removing waste from the process and minimizing the order-to-delivery cycle require a high level of collaboration and visibility throughout the extended supply chain. Manufacturers need to be able to plan effectively and execute against the plan, while remaining flexible to change. The key to excellence in supplier and production management is maintaining an efficient and effective production plan that is continually updated and optimized on an hourly or more frequent basis.

Managers with lean manufacturing responsibilities need a system that provides visibility and collaboration both inside the enterprise and into their customers and supplier base; that is a system that will deliver on the promises of lean inventories and accelerated cycle times.

Managing today’s challenges in manufacturing supply chains

Organizations striving to embrace a lean manufacturing model are dealing with the challenges of:

• Unplanned events

  Machines may break-down, operators may not be available or the yield may not be as expected. Manufacturers must be able to accommodate and take these unplanned events into account as they plan and re-plan their production activities.

  Viewlocity Technologies’ manufacturing solutions provide a realistic, down to the minute production floor schedule which is constantly updated to account for unplanned disruptions.

• Pressure on lead time from order-to-delivery

  Products need to be made available to customers when they want them. Customer demands are usually last minute and not always predictable. By minimizing the total lead time from order-to-delivery, manufacturing companies achieve high levels of customer satisfaction and also make better use of their assets.

  Viewlocity Technologies’ solutions simulate all activities in real-time and update planned start and completion times for all work center activities. The solution provides complete, real-time visibility of the end-to-end process to all stakeholders in the production process. This helps managers and personnel to quickly and proactively identify and resolve issues.

• Inventory management

  Manufacturing companies need to balance asset availability (such as machines and labor) and utilize these appropriately to meet demand while keeping inventory levels low. They need to do this in the face of increased uncertainty in demand and supply.

  Viewlocity Technologies’ manufacturing solutions take all resource constraints into account and provide a cost effective, feasible schedule that considers shop floor realities such as operator hours, tool availability, setup or changeover times, routings and bills of materials.

For manufacturers, Viewlocity Technologies has the solutions you need to:

• Lower operating costs
• Reduce inventory levels
• Improve service level and customer satisfaction
• Increase throughput
• Enhance planner productivity
• Improve efficiencies and optimize use of assets

Contact us today to find out how Viewlocity Technologies can help in your manufacturing organization.