Internet-based Manufacturing Integration

Today’s internet-based business operations require agile manufacturing systems that can quickly respond to a changing business climate. Effective business operation in such an environment depends on information flow throughout the company. This need necessitates integration of information technology throughout the organization, including the business and manufacturing operations. Existing industrial systems, however, have produced large, mostly proprietary, embedded computer-based systems that are almost completely outside of the company’s primary computing environment and thus are not integrated into the company’s enterprise system. This paper presents requirements, conditions, and technology necessary for such integration. We discuss the benefits of such a system and present how object-oriented and networking technologies in general and Java and Internet technologies in particular can help integrate industrial and manufacturing operations with the rest of the enterprise information technology. This integration could create knowledge driven systems which would result in more agile, interoperable, efficient and responsive manufacturing and production systems.