Shop floor traceability to come from unlikely source

So says engineering development software firm UGS, whose production management systems business unit – the former USData operation, itself bought by Tecnomatix, and in turn acquired by UGS – has done precisely that for its FactoryLink SCADA suite. Mike Croot, sales manager for UGS’ production management group (and ex Rockwell), says it’s an important development that will appeal to manufacturers needing electronic audit trails but not wanting to embark on a substantial MES development. “MES means so many different things to different people and take-up has been very slow,” says Croot. “It’s seen as high risk and expensive. So we’ve taken the traceability functions from our Xfactory MES product and integrated them with FactoryLink SCADA – meaning users don’t have to spend vast sums on getting what they really want, which is a traceability system.” Its development is aimed primarily at the process industries, but Croot indicates that there are also many XFactory MES users in discreet manufacturing, and expects take-up there too. “Five years ago these might have been SCADA plus traceability sales rather than MES sales if the option had been available,” he says. And he may well be right: quality management, scrap, reject rates and causes etc is all standard functionality in the new FactoryLink Traceability system, which features portal access as one of its interfaces for shop floor data access and reporting. Meanwhile, it’s interesting to note UGS’ attention and investment in this area, which is significantly to one side of its PLM (product lifecycle management) foundations. Croot believes UGS rather stumbled on the USData side of its Tecnomatix purchase – itself acquired for the obviously important simulation and manufacturing engineering functionality that is now well integrated into its main software portfolio. Now, however, he sees significant investment from the parent. “FactoryLink was in the doldrums, but now we’re on track to exceed target by in the UK and we’re on track world-wide. We’re not hitting Wonderware’s numbers but we’re not far off Rockwell Software. “Also, XFactory is now being merged into the UGS PLM product as Tecnomatix MES and we have a direct link into Teamcenter [PLM] manufacturing. So users can develop their product BoM [bill of materials] and routing in Teamcenter PLM and then drop that seamlessly into XFactory MES to get all the benefits of seeing what’s happening in production and feeding back into engineering design.” Version 8 of FactoryLink is due out early next year, while v4 of XFactory MES is starting to ship now.