Achieving Operational Excellence: How Manufacturing Process Plans and MEM Systems Work Together to Enhance Productivity  

Synergy and efficiency with MEM and Process Planning improves efficiency across the entire manufacturing lifecycle. How you ask? 

Follow the fictional depiction of Sarah, a Manufacturing Engineer, that is tasked with creating the manufacturing process plan for a new product hitting the market. Together we’ll discover what a day in the life might look like and how Siemens products and solutions help address the main challenges she faces. Let’s get started. 

Consistent production processes yield a successful product launch.

Sarah starts her day in the planning office, reviewing the product specifications and collaborating with the design team. She knows that to ensure consistency, she must create a Manufacturing Bill of Materials (MBOM) and a Bill of Process (BOP) that clearly outlines every component and step needed in production. This will serve as the blueprint for every machine, worker and step involved in the production process. 

Sarah’s main objective is to improve productivity, ensure product quality and manage resources in a way that maximizes efficiency while simultaneously meeting customer demand. However, how can she best manage cost and ensure quality? Oftentimes, integrating new technologies help optimize workflows in high-mix production environments. 

How synergizing manufacturing process planning and execution management generates operational excellence.

As a Manufacturing Engineer, one of Sarah’s top priorities is to manage the challenges of high-mix production by focusing on optimizing efficiency and productivity. This requires tightly integrating manufacturing process planning with manufacturing execution management (MEM) systems. 

Through Siemens’ Xcelerator business platform, including solutions like Teamcenter for product lifecycle management (PLM) and Opcenter for MEM, Sarah is able to establish a seamless, data-driven workflow that optimizes every stage of the manufacturing lifecycle. 

It starts with rigorous manufacturing process planning. Using advanced simulation and modeling tools, Sarah starts to map out the most efficient workflows, identify bottlenecks, and optimize material and resource allocation. This allows her to create a detailed Manufacturing Bill of Materials (MBOM) and Bill of Process (BOP) that serve as the blueprint for production. 

But the real power comes when she integrates this process planning data with Siemens Opcenter for MEM. Opcenter’s real-time visibility and analytics capabilities gives Sarah full control over the production floor. She can monitor KPIs, track material consumption, and identify opportunities for improvement. Automated data collection empowers her to make informed, agile adjustments to keep pace with the constantly shifting market demands. 

Similarly, Siemens supported The Low Voltage Motor (LVM) factory’s digitalization strategy with the ultimate goal of reaching productivity targets, improving delivery reliability and enhancing the accuracy of production data. To achieve this, the factory utilized the Siemens Xcelerator platform and achievements included: 

• Increased productivity via improved machining time by 8 percent in first six months 

• Reduced changeover times  

• Decrease in unplanned downtime 

Implementing continuous improvement steps to drive innovation and maintain a competitive edge.

Predictive maintenance is another key capability that helps maximize resource utilization. By analyzing sensor data and machine learning insights from Opcenter, Sarah can predict when maintenance is needed and proactively schedule it. This not only reduces costly reactive maintenance but also helps avoid disruptions to production, ensuring and accelerating high-mix manufacturing. 

By aligning these two crucial domains of manufacturing process planning and execution management, synergy is created. Sarah is ultimately able to optimize workflows, improve resource utilization, and enhance productivity – all while maintaining the highest quality standards. It’s a powerful combination that gives Sarah and Siemens a competitive edge in today’s fast-paced electronics manufacturing landscape. 

The solution = digitalization.

Recently, companies implementing Siemens’ solutions have seen an improvement in overall production quality. Scanfil Suzhou relies on Opcenter to leverage advanced scheduling capabilities, improving resource usage and OEE. 

“Average NPI time reduced from 40 to 9 hours, enabling four to six NPIs in the same configuration.” 

A huge advantage of Siemens’ Opcenter is the ease of integration with our customer’s infrastructure. ROJ partnered with Siemens because of its end-to-end solution that allows the company to maintain effective time-to-market in high-mix, low-volume production. 

“Production efficiency increased by 20 percent.” 

Siemens solutions drive better manufacturing outcomes.

Adopt a smart manufacturing approach to achieve full visibility and traceability of your production. Optimize your manufacturing processes to ensure better production efficiency, sustainability and regulatory compliance, quality and safety. 

Are you ready to take the next step? Review our solutions and explore resources.