RFID (or Radio Frequency Identification) is an auto-ID technology that has been used to track inventory and locate items for years. Recently, RFID has been gaining more and more attention as the costs have come down and the technology has improved. In this blogpost, I...
Long checkout lines at the grocery store are one of the biggest complaints about the shopping experience. Soon, these lines could disappear when the ubiquitous Universal Product Code (UPC) bar code is replaced by smart labels, also called radio frequency identification (RFID) tags. RFID tags are intelligent...
Unlike retailers' and wholesalers' inventories, which consist entirely of items ready for sale, a manufacturing company's inventory will include goods in various stages of production, from raw materials all the way up to products ready to ship to customers. That's why a manufacturer's balance sheet...
The Holy Trinity Sep. 4, 2017 - The number one challenge of manufacturing is getting the right product, at the right time, at the right price. Competitive advantage used to come from automation and more recently digitalization, but this has now become the norm with the...
Knowing your demand is the answer to your supply question. Despite having some general ideas of seasonal shopping frenzies, it’s not always easy to gauge demand given the fickle nature of consumers for the other points in the year. Being swamped with too much inventory hits...
What Is Inventory Management? Inventory management refers to the process of ordering, storing, and using a company's inventory. These include the management of raw materials, components, and finished products, as well as warehousing and processing such items. For companies with complex supply chains and manufacturing processes, balancing the...
Inventory control systems maintain information about activities within firms that ensure the delivery of products to customers. The subsystems that perform these functions include sales, manufacturing, warehousing, ordering, and receiving. In different firms the activities associated with each of these areas may not be strictly...
Competing firms in a market distinguish themselves based on factors such as product price and quality. They also endeavor to satisfy customers with factors such as speedier delivery. Another way to distinguish themselves is by producing custom products. Flexible manufacturing systems allow the use of...
Factory 4.0 impacts the manufacturing processes of a plant governed by the manufacturing execution system (MES). MES is a control system designed to execute, monitor, track, and report operations taking place on the plant floor in real time. Once an MES is established on the...
MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA — The need for extensive plant visibility and streamlined multi-plant operations is reenergizing the manufacturing execution systems (MES) market across the globe. Demand will continue to grow, even among small and mid-scale end users, as solution providers develop cost effective MES solutions...
