MES As an Enabler of Lean Manufacturing

Paolo Perico1, Emrah Arica2, Daryl John Powell3, Paolo Gaiardelli4

  • 1Università degli Studi di Bergamo
  • 2Sintef
  • 3Norwegian University of Science and Technology
  • 4University of Bergamo

Details

11:22 - 11:44 | Wed 28 Aug | 004 | WeAT3.2

Session: Lean Production in the Context of the 4th Industrial Revolution

Abstract

Many firms have adopted Lean Manufacturing as a means of increasing productivity and reducing cost, often by focusing on the implementation of Lean best practices to identify and eliminate waste. This paper explores the application of Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) to support the waste identification and elimination process. The majority of MES vendors have now incorporated Lean functionality in their software, but a comprehensive methodology that explains how MES can be used to enable and promote Lean Manufacturing is still lacking. This paper aims at filling this gap by presenting a Lean-MES framework. The proposed framework is validated and extended through a market analysis of MES software, identifying areas for further development for MES vendors.