If you could build your own MES…

[AgentSmith]

If you could build your own MES, what are the killer features you would want and how might you architect it?

[TimT]

One of the biggest hurdles I've encountered on projects is filling the gap between what the customer expects an MES to do and the actual capabilities of an MES. The challenge lies in not only describing why a solution may be difficult to implement the way they envisioned, but also in explaining how we need to solve it given the capabilities of the platform they've selected. As much as MES vendors want to sell customers on how easy these systems are to stand up and begin using, they never are. The thriving business of MES integrators is proof of this. And, although I haven't worked with newer MES's like Tulip, Apprentice, or MasterControl yet, I have worked with POMS Aquila, and it still required a decent level of scripting for more complex logic and integrations.
Today, whenever I begin a new project, my starting point is almost always a Visio or LucidChart. I've always thought, wouldn't it be great if we got stakeholders and SME's involved from the beginning in the build of their MES. If there was a tool that allows the customer to quickly and easily generate the basic requirements and can also put some guardrails on expectations by giving them a feel for what's required in building a recipe.
This leads me to the feature. A configurable (ability to enter in a table or diagram format) and fully automated requirements gathering, validation, and reporting tool. This feature would have a simple interface that allows for only the necessary, basic information to be captured like what the operator and/or system is expected to do, the esigs required, and the logic path for advancing to the next step. Then, ideally, those base requirements could be used to automatically create a base recipe in an authoring application/module where the actual system integrations and detailed transition logic can be configured. The tool would have an automatic feedback loop so, after the initial base requirements are approved and the recipe implementation is underway, whenever a requirements tagged recipe attribute is checked in and a change is identified, the requirements owner is notified and can either approve (change accepted) or deny (recipe reverts) the change. An approval would update the requirements keeping them synchronized with the effective MES recipe.
But the fun doesn't stop there! The tool could also automatically generate the required test scripts to ensure all recipe logic is covered through approved scenarios and be able to automatically create and execute corresponding orders for recipe qualification. This would all be tidied up through an automatically generated RTM and validation summary report.
I believe a tool like this would save a ton in man hours even if the site/network is already using some third party qualification system. Instead, it seems most MES's are focused on operator headgear...