Title: The strategic design and development of ERP and RTMS

Authors: Johnny K.C. Ng, W.H. Ip

Addresses: Department of Manufacturing Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong. Department of Manufacturing Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong

Abstract: One of the crucial requirements of global manufacturing strategy is the ability to optimise the use of information technology. This paper describes a process to implement manufacturing strategies that are consistent with a particular company|s overall business strategies and results with a conceptual system architecture. A methodology is proposed and used to identify and implement an integrated manufacturing strategy which consists of two major horizons: Enterprise Resources Planning (ERP) and a Real-Time Monitoring system (RTMS). RTMS which can provide up-to-date information for the planning and scheduling of manufacturing orders, monitoring quality, improving communication and increasing productivity is implemented and is integrated with an ERP system. The architecture of the ERP system is designed for a global manufacturing environment. The implementation was designed with a Distributed Object-Oriented Technology (DOOT) which increases the system scalability, configurability, flexibility and inter-operability. The ERP is designed to support real-time data collection and processing for all required production and inventory analysis with a flexible architecture which can meet the distributed business requirements.

Keywords: global manufacturing strategy; manufacturing integration; ERP; distributed object-oriented technology; RTMS.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCAT.2000.000233

International Journal of Computer Applications in Technology, 2000 Vol.13 No.3/4/5, pp.138-150

Published online: 13 Jul 2003 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article