Information Visibility for OEMs and EMS Providers -- The availability of Web-based manufacturing information can better integrate OEMs and EMS providers-and ultimately improve their relationship.

The contract electronics assembly industry is maturing and facing new challenges as each electronics manufacturing services (EMS) provider strives to differentiate itself by giving its customers unique advantages. As with any company, opportunities exist for EMS providers to improve their business practices and manufacturing processes. When EMS providers try to identify the primary threats to their profitability and customer satisfaction, issues such as quoting, communication with customers and efficient change control come to mind.

Typically, many of these threats share a commonality: information visibility and access and the collaborative processing of this information. At several points in any product's life cycle, EMS providers may be inhibited by poor access to centralized information and an inability to provide their customers with access to manufacturing information. Some typical throttling points include obtaining information from customers efficiently, communicating results back to them responsively, overhead and time in new product introductions and engineering changes, efficient and easy information access, and the internal and external communication of ideas and changes.

If these problems are considered as a whole, data visibility is at the core of the issue. Today's EMS providers ultimately have the information they need to make products and communicate to their customers, but they can distinguish themselves by how well they disseminate information to their own personnel and especially to their customers.

Transcollaborative manufacturing (TCM) software is one solution for effectively disseminating information. TCM software provides the framework to organize, store and control information and then make it easily accessible so personnel can better perform their jobs and customers are more closely involved in the entire process, from project quoting to field repair. This technology can improve the relationships an EMS provider has with its customers. For EMS providers, two areas of information management are key:

- an efficient "digital dialog" with customers at several key points in a project or product life cycle

- access and control of internal manufacturing information.

The Customer Visibility Challenge

During the development of a contract with a customer, an EMS provider requires efficient information visibility and access, so decisions can be made consistently and quickly, without losing control and introducing quality problems (Figure 1). The first step involves obtaining customer product data including computer-aided design (CAD) files, bill of materials (BOM) data, approved vendor and manufacturer requirements, supporting documentation, and specification control documents.

The traditional means of handling this information is through manual transfer or, in some cases, exchange-based software tools. However, both methods disconnect the customer from the EMS provider and preclude an efficient digital dialog. Furthermore, errors often exist within customer data, resulting in an iterative process of communicating these problems to the customer, without a seamless communications mechanism.

Another step in the project involves quoting and design for manufacturability. The customer offers the product design, but the EMS provider has all of the process information about its factories. Quickly analyzing the producibility of a product in a specific factory can be very difficult. Design for manufacturability (DFM) tools developed primarily for fabrication do not adequately touch the assembly factory floor or consider routing and total process capability. Thus, DFM tools cannot provide legitimate feedback on the potential of process-centered, cost-saving design changes.

Later in the project, after the customer has decided to make the product, another point of dialog becomes important. When the process is developed and the BOM is established, the approval of prepared data must be obtained as quickly as possible. In many cases, the EMS provider does not involve the customer in this process, but this omission can lead to disputes later on. The EMS provider/customer relationship can be strengthened and miscommunications avoided by involving the customer in the electronic approval process.

Very few EMS providers can give their customers controlled access to quality or tracking data being derived from the manufacture of their products or the progress of their orders. This inability alienates the customers from the actual processing of their products, which is, of course, very important to them. For the EMS providers who do offer this service to their customers, executing such tasks involves much overhead and manual work to compile reports for the customers, and the real-time benefit of the information is lost.

The Internal Visibility Challenge

In addition to the points in a product's development cycle requiring a digital dialog with a customer, many other activities within the EMS provider's enterprise require efficient internal information visibility.

Rapidly developing the previously analyzed product information into the final process, with documentation and machine programs pertinent to the target routing, is key to an efficient new product introduction. Central visibility to all facets of the factory and its capabilities is critical at this stage.

Once the process is developed, the electronic approval cycle becomes a bottleneck in many companies because it is often paper-based. Management typically lacks visibility to the status of all approval processes and cannot easily monitor the reasons for rejections flowing in from many sources.

The delivery of visual, dynamic documentation to the factory has proven difficult because systems have not been available in a Web-based platform that can support documentation beyond simple linked electronic files. Providing line operators with dynamic, multimedia information complete with the full BOM and quality information has proven elusive.

The EMS provider requires status monitoring and product tracking, and many systems have been available for this purpose. However, enterprise resource planning (ERP) and other manufacturing execution software (MES) systems have not been Web-based and lack the visibility to the design data, revision control, the full visual document set, and the storage and knowledge of machine parameters. Therefore, these systems cannot track the full scope of the process.

Web-based access to quality data and to product and component tracking data and genealogy has also been elusive. Many manufacturers spend enormous effort manually compiling product tracking data when equipment in the field fails and must be repaired or retrofit.

The Next-Generation EMS Provider

TCM software enables EMS providers to eliminate the information voids along the road to product release, in production and out into the field (Figure 2). In a company employing TCM software, manufacturing proceeds much differently than in the traditional contract manufacturing environment.

Product data communication

At the beginning of the process, the communication of the OEM's design and product configuration data is improved. Traditionally, the OEM gathers information, sends it to the EMS provider, possibly via a software tool, and then waits for notification of any errors that might be uncovered. An iterative process then begins until all issues are resolved. The problem with this method lies in the lack of "OEM-side" troubleshooting of even the most gross data problems.

With TCM software, the OEM uses its browser to load in product and BOM data. The loading is actually occurring in the TCM server at the EMS facility, but, from the OEM's perspective, it appears as a simple desktop browser utility. The information is validated using the full power of the TCM server through a secure and remote Web interface. When errors are revealed and resolved, the TCM system stores the information from the OEM until the EMS process engineers and configuration managers begin working on it. This process eliminates many problems in the basic data without time-wasting iterations between the EMS provider and its OEM customers.

Some companies use an Application Service Provider (ASP) model for these design collaboration activities, in which a third party provides an on-line bridge between the OEM and the EMS provider. However, this model places an unnecessary intermediary in a process that can be more efficiently conducted from the EMS server where the TCM system resides.

With the TCM method, the intermediary cost is eliminated, critical data never leave the EMS server, and the EMS provider does not depend on other parties for the service. The TCM solution is technologically similar and functionally identical to the ASP model, except the technology is licensed by and resides with the EMS provider, a more cost efficient engineering collaboration.

Process-centric DFM

When data are received in the TCM server, the EMS engineers "apply" the product to one or more factories. Because the TCM software offers visibility to factory layouts, machine definitions, routing configurations, product revisions and product process revisions, and all data about how prior products have been assembled, a process-centric analysis can be performed.

Design for manufacturability (DFM) from a bare-board or component layout perspective is valuable, but DFM with regard to actual process capability and factory configuration can reduce ongoing manufacturing cost. EMS engineers can "apply" the product design to their factories and determine potential cost savings, see the production lines and processes the product would require, and make suggestions to the OEM to assist in reducing the product's cost.

Rapid data preparation for product introduction

The next phase assumes data are received and problems are resolved. The software system then allows the engineers to quickly set up component assignment along the routing, optimize and program machines, and automatically develop comprehensive documentation sets. Setup checklists for the process and logical routing decision points are established. Using TCM software, this process occurs rapidly, primarily due to simplified and centralized access to the full scope of manufacturing resources available within the enterprise.

Electronic approval cycles

Regardless of the speed of data preparation for introducing a product to the factory, the approval of a BOM and process for production release can halt the product's assembly. In a TCM environment, the software issues notifications to persons who must review process, documentation and bills of materials. These persons then simply enter their web browsers and review the full data from the central server. They may also reject with reason, and the TCM system returns their feedback to the OEM to assist with the required corrections.

Managers monitor the progress and outstanding issues of all approval cycles to instantly learn why certain projects have not reached the factory floor and what they must do to fix the problem. More importantly, OEMs can be put in the approval cycle via remote Web-based access. This capability gives the OEM a final approval in a product's journey to production, reducing disputes later in the process and eliminating the risk of eroded OEM/EMS relationships caused by disputes.

Information delivery to the factory

When approvals are obtained electronically, the delivery of information to the factory is instantaneous via the Web. Work and job order data are harvested from the enterprise resource planning (ERP) system or input manually, pre-production checklists are presented to operators prior to allowing job run, and, finally, the system makes everything required for production immediately available to operators.

Tracking

When products are being run, every detail of their movement through the process and all activities performed upon them are logged. Rework incidents, re-routings, tuning steps, data collection points and event information acquired from machinery are "attached" to the product as it moves through the process. This capability is achieved via Web browsers, and access to the resultant information is also via browsers.

Monitoring and quality

Managers and customers have immediate Web-access to real-time tracking data. The location of product, the yield rates, quality parameters, shipment status and other factors are all available through simple Web portals.

Product genealogy

Product genealogy is available for the entire scope of products from one serialized component to a PCB and up to a final integration into a large system of many subassemblies. The input of a serial number from any component of a given system explodes a hierarchical tree of every product within that assembly. This information can be drilled down further to expose the process through which the product proceeded and all information collected during the process. OEMs and EMS managers then have immediate product genealogy access.

Conclusion

TCM software has emerged from many disparate solutions to one system that offers centralized Web-based information visibility for EMS providers and their customers. The software's framework creates a digital dialog with customers while controlling and expediting internal data preparation and manufacturing execution. Finally, TCM technology helps EMS providers attain the most important goals in any business: customer retention, acquisition and satisfaction.

Jason Spera is chief executive officer of Aegis Industrial Software Corp., Horsham, PA; e-mail: [e-mail].

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