Enterprise manufacturing intelligence (EMI), sometimes called manufacturing intelligence (MI) or collaborative manufacturing intelligence, consists of the framework of integrated software and services that bring a company’s manufacturing data from disparate sources together for reporting, analysis, visual summaries, and synchronizing data between enterprise-level and plant floor systems. A common goal for using EMI is to turn plant data into useful knowledge that drives more informed decisions. The core components of EMI include application connectors, data integration, data collection, contextualization, a data or production model, analytics, visualization, and reports or dashboards.
Most manufacturers are already collecting and extracting lots of information but more timely real-time and near-real time information can help companies make better decisions faster. The typical employee spends 30-60 percent of the time collecting and finding the right information, which can be highly unproductive. The common manufacturing criticism heard from clients is, “we’re drowning in data but starving for information.”
Extracting and measuring value
A key driver for implementing EMI is to utilize information that is already being collected, improve knowledge and efficiencies and ultimately reduce the bottom line. EMI can be used at the plant level to improve operational visibility and collaboration and synchronize data between the plant floor and enterprise systems. The technology can also be used at the global enterprise level to benchmark and visualize. Manufacturing is becoming more strategic to organizations. As manufacturing productivity is added to corporate agendas, companies will increase EMI technology deployment to improve productivity and the bottom line.
Whether it is optimization, data integration, or visualization tools, users are looking for simplified, intuitive, easier to use software that supports col-laboration and specific roles. EMI helps companies achieve a higher level of manufacturing excellence by allowing the manufacturer to leverage de-tailed manufacturing information for operational decision- making and to implement global standards and best practices.
“Manufacturers want easy to use tools with consistent visualization that enable collaboration ‘at a glance’, improve knowledge in real-time or near real-time, improve decisions and responses, and are easy to use and deploy,” according to Principal Consultant Janice Abel, the principal author of the study. “Suppliers are responding with simplified integration, streamlined analysis tools, pre-built templates and dashboards, and other enabling applications. In addition, cloud computing with EMI data is just over the horizon.”
The Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence market is one of the fastest growing segments within the Collaborative Production Management (CPM) or Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) software and service market space according to ARC. The market growth is a result of manufacturer’s need for real-time data to drive operational decisions and extract more value from processes. There is a lot of activity with respect to users, suppliers, and technology in this market because of EMI’s potential to decrease costs, implement global standards and best practices, and improve performance. There is momentum for using EMI from all regions of the world, as manufacturers see the benefits from measuring and extracting more value and knowledge from existing data and information.
