在我开始涵盖2003年制造自动化行业之前，我花了十年的制造企业系统空间中的技术发展。此时，ERP系统主要为具有巨大资本资源开发和内部IT资源的大公司保留，以支持系统的实施和维护。
但随着ERP系统在大部分制造业中变得更加实惠并扩大，发生了一个有趣的事情。工厂地板和前台直接连接。这发生了很大程度上，使得ERP等前台系统可以访问商店地板数据，以提供更大水平的商业智能，并在整个公司中实现更好的决策。除了这一趋势的软件和运营影响之外，转换为以太网作为事实上的工厂地板网络选项是制造业采用ERP的另一个巨大结果。
Now, as more companies look to invest in technologies after sitting on the sidelines during the recession, a new trend appears to be developing that could have just as big an impact on factory floor engineers and operators as the initial wave of enterprise systems did nearly 20 years ago.
According to a study conducted byPlex系统和Manufacturing Performance Institute (MPI), many manufacturing executives now “find their firms constrained by aging facilities, failure-prone equipment, and outdated software and systems.” These findings support the results of another recent study that noted 40 percent of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems are now more than seven years old, and 7 percent of ERP systems are more than 15 years old.
Yes, Plex Systems is a provider of ERP systems, so it’s not a big surprise that a study they had a hand in developing would show potential for ERP growth. Despite this, the findings noted in their study with MPI are not contrary to what other industry trends are indicating. Considering the greater trends currently taking place across industry—ranging from a focus on greater levels of intelligence for executives as well as operators to a higher level of adoption of cloud-based operating systems—many of the Plex/MPI report findings appear to be in line with clearly evident manufacturing trends.
Some of the principal results of the Plex/MPI study include:
• A majority of manufacturing respondents (60 percent) indicate they operate a traditional ERP system in which hardware and software are on premises; 22 percent operate a software-as-a-service (SaaS)/cloud ERP system; 18 percent have no ERP system in place.
•年销售额较低的公司中缺乏ERP系统：26％的组织销售额低于5000万美元没有ERP。
•三分之二的云ERP用户（68％）在其公司内拥有无限的许可协议，而不是与无限公司公司许可证的传统ERP用户的百分比增加。
•这些许可协议会影响能够访问ERP的员工人数：传统ERP用户的云ERP用户的90％的员工员工。
• Cloud ERP users are significantly more likely to make their systems accessible to suppliers (60 percent cloud vs. 14 percent traditional) and customers (43 percent cloud vs. 11 percent traditional).
目睹了ERP等软件技术对制造业等的影响，我认为这是相当明显的，我们在整个行业的技术驱动的发展中的另一个激增的尖端方面是相当明显的。事实上，基于云的ERP的较低成本可能会大大减少未来几年没有ERP的制造商的数量。
By democratizing access to information across all levels of a company, cloud technologies are already changing manufacturing. It looks like the biggest changes will come as the cloud enables more players in the supply chain to take part in optimizing the manufacturing process.
Considering how inexpensive and ubiquitous the technologies that will enable this have become, I don’t suspect this next foray in industry connections will transpire over the next 20 years. It will happen much faster.
Learn more about how cloud computing is impacting manufacturing today atThe Automation Conferencein Chicago, May 14-15, 2013. Presenters addressing the impact of cloud technologies on industry include: Kai Mariappan from Coca-Cola, Mitch Free from MFG.com, and Arnav Anand from UC Berkeley.
