Back to Basics: What is MES?

Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) is a term which was first discussed in the 1990’s to describe the functionality of software aimed at providing operational management and providing an interface between ERP systems and shop floor control systems. Over the years a set of standards, ISA S95 and MESA have been created to define MES functionality standards.
The MESA model describes functionality such as:

• Tracking
• Genealogy
• Planning
• Scheduling
• Performance
• Resource allocation
• Labour management
• Quality control

MES has the capabilities to control operational and performance challenges facing manufacturing companies today and provides the intelligence to allow for innovation of new products and processes. Some of these capabilities might include: 

• Automatic downloading and execution of the production schedule
• Master data management for manufacturing operations such as recipes, bills-of-material and quality specifications
• Local dispatching of production work orders to lines and machines according to available capacity
• Tracking and analysis of work-in-progress (WIP) and inventory consumption,
• Downloading of equipment set points and coordinating the sequence of operational activities
• Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) monitoring
• Web-based reporting for flexible access and collaboration

• Creating "as built" records of the products; complete genealogy of materials, equipment, and systems used
• Product Quality Management and Statistical Process Control (SPC)
• Equipment availability and utilisation tracking and analysis
  
  
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