Manufacturing Business Technology articles

Recent articles from Manufacturing Business Technology

Bill Polk: Tremendous opportunity ahead in automation software.
March 1, 2009... Bill Polk In my last column I cited reasons why U.S. manufacturers should be looking to our own shores when analyzing their value chain networks. Some of them included currency fluctuations, fuel volatility, and supply chain risk associated with manufacturing in remote, low-cost labor...

Julie Fraser: S&OP matures into strategic process.
March 1, 2009... Julie Fraser In tough times, everyone must pull together. Fortunately, companies have been learning to do that for a while. In the past five years, sales & operations planning (S&OP) has become a more common process for manufacturing companies of all sizes and segments. And it's being...

Cindy Jutras: What gets measured does get managed.
March 1, 2009... Cindy Jutras The primary business drivers impacting ERP strategies have been--and probably always will be--growth, customer service, and cost reduction. In the past, growth and customer service jockeyed for position at the top of the list, with the need to reduce costs playing an...

Skillfully social.
March 1, 2009... By Hope Neal, Contributing Editor Companies embrace wikis, blogs, collaboration tools found on the lofty Web 2.0 landscape In January, PTC , a supplier of product life-cycle management (PLM) software, released Windchill ProductPoint, describing it as a social product development...

Lighten up.
March 1, 2009... Roberto Michel, Senior Contributing Editor Recessionary times call for business intelligence-based insight to lean supply chain performance Maintaining a lean supply chain during flush economic times isn't exactly easy, but staying lean during a recession times is tougher by far. In...