What functions does an MES management system have? What goals can it help enterprises achieve? As more small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises emerge, competition is becoming increasingly fierce. One important way to rapidly improve core competitiveness is to drive industrialization with informatization, accelerate the informatization process, and follow a new path of industrialization. At this time, an MES management system is like timely rain for manufacturing enterprises.

What functions does an MES management system have:

1. Planning and Scheduling
Because the design architecture of ERP systems does not deeply involve process management on the shop floor and cannot obtain real-time production data, most enterprises that have implemented ERP can only obtain production progress data through daily shop-floor work reports (daily production reports). They then manually calculate the production plan for each machine for the next day based on the completion volume of each process that day, newly added orders, and the delivery time of each order, print a "next-day production plan," and distribute it to the workshop.
The first key point in distinguishing a real MES from a fake one is whether production planning is completed through an APS system or through manual forms.
In addition, whether MES can truly play its role also depends on whether it can simplify planning and scheduling. Planners deal with thousands upon thousands of data points every day. They need to understand the daily production progress of every process for every product on the production line and for new orders, while also considering staffing, machine loads, and material arrivals. They must not only ensure on-time delivery for every order, but also maximize production efficiency and minimize costs. Therefore, in large factories without MES support, planning departments are staffed with many experts who understand both processes and management, and overtime is routine for them.

Whether an MES system is effective depends on whether planning department staff have been reduced and whether overtime is still necessary. This is the second point of identification.

2. Real-Time Process Data
A fake MES says that equipping each workshop position with a terminal so employees can enter production data at any time solves the problem of real-time data collection. It may sound reasonable at first, but a closer analysis reveals many problems.
The first issue is how to break down the task of each component of a product to individual machines. Most ERP systems operate based on the product BOM. Materials and processes for each component and process are defined in the BOM, then so-called MRP calculations are performed in combination with rated machine efficiency, and construction orders, workshop production plans, and material procurement plans are exported from the BOM. This is the standard mechanism of traditional ERP.
But in reality, printing enterprises are typical discrete manufacturing enterprises. Running a printing enterprise according to the ERP BOM mechanism leads straight into a deep pit, and this is also the chief culprit behind so many failed ERP projects. Yet many printing companies still take great pleasure in it and treat it as gospel.
Not to mention how much time it takes to build a BOM, one might say we can simply add more staff, even though the purpose of informatization is to reduce headcount and improve efficiency. But most printing plants do not have fixed products. After spending enormous effort building a BOM, no one knows when it will be used a second time. Even when a customer places a repeat order, any slight change in requirements means the BOM must be revised again. The result is that BOM data keeps increasing until even the server can barely run, yet it still continues to grow. More and more people are needed to build BOMs, but the response of business departments becomes slower and slower.
Secondly, how can the timeliness and accuracy of data entered by frontline employees be guaranteed? What if employees do not enter data promptly? What if the data is entered incorrectly? The vendor says this is the customer's execution problem and has nothing to do with the vendor. Fine.A truly good MES should require fewer and fewer people while achieving a higher and higher on-time delivery rate.
3. Responding to Change
For printing enterprises, changes in delivery time, materials, and processes during production are normal. Internal changes also occur, such as machine failures, staff shortages, rush orders, split scheduling, and untimely material procurement. When such changes occur, how managers respond is the real test of an MES system.
The approach of a fake MES is still to modify the BOM, revise the work order, and reissue the task. Fine, then the production workshop can just wait for the process department to handle it slowly. And if customer-side personnel fail to operate the system in time as required, causing data disorder, the vendor will still say it is the customer's execution problem and has nothing to do with the vendor.
Therefore, we see that many printing enterprises, even though they have computers or WiFi tablets at workstations, still continue to use Excel for scheduling, still rely on many paper documents, and still need many people to make production plans and statistical reports.
4. Data Collection

Production process data is the dashboard for measuring an enterprise's lean level and the basis for quality traceability. Process data mainly includes EA (time utilization), EP (performance rate), GP (quality pass rate), plan completion rate, on-time delivery rate, and so on.

MES management systemWhat goals can it help enterprises achieve:

1. Make workshop production transparent

That is, achieve real-time monitoring and feedback on workshop production progress, material status, processing information, and inventory balances.

2. Make production dispatching visual
Provide real-time production capacity data, real-time workshop resource data, and production status data for adjusting operating plans, enabling precise dispatching such as pausing, inserting, advancing, or delaying production operations.

3. Automate production kitting checks

Provide automated kitting checks and immediate kitting notifications for production assembly, with precise notifications to relevant personnel and information on the related kitted materials.

4. Realize informatized production management
That is, provide accurate information support for production operations and processing, and provide managers with correct data for production control.

5. Realize informatized product quality traceability
That is, collect and analyze a series of quality data, such as quality information generated during product manufacturing and closed-loop quality issue handling information, and enable traceability of the product manufacturing process.
6. Digitize workshop personnel, equipment, and materials

Use digital data to reflect the value of all entities in the workshop, including employees' working hours, equipment utilization, and material consumption rates.

The above are the functions of an MES management system. MES manufacturing software is not only suitable for production or inventory planning, but also for other management operations.

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