"With the new Transport Control feature, which has been integrated into the iTAC.MOM.Suite, material and product transport in production can be monitored and controlled. The goal for transport is to monitor the material situation and prepare material requisition. That way, the continuity of production can be ensured without interruptions on the production line or at a station," explains Peter Bollinger, CEO of iTAC Software AG, a subsidiary of Dürr AG.
The iTAC.MOM.Suite is a holistic manufacturing management system that covers all the functions required for networking and automating processes. It has a modular and scalable design and, thanks to its openness, can be seamlessly integrated into customers' digital platform strategies.
iTAC's previous MES solution has thus evolved into a MOM (Manufacturing Operations Management) system and has recently been expanded with new modules and services and upgraded to an open architecture. The new features include "Transport Control" and cover, among other things, the CRP use case.
"CRP stands for Continuous Replenishment Process and ensures the continuous supply of material. It is based on the Transport Control function and represents the smart part of the tool. While Transport Control displays all transports, CRP manages the transports with more precise information about time, place, quality and quantity. Transport Control can also be used without CRP," explains Peter Bollinger.
Controlling of just-in-time transport processes of material for production
The new feature enables the control of manual and automated transport concepts through transport orders created from the MES according to demand. CRP determines and creates the corresponding transport orders based on the current production and sends them to the corresponding means of transport such as AGVs, forklifts or manual transport tools. Every means of transport, which is controlled manually or automatically, as well as every supply and disposal process can be planned, controlled and monitored with Transport Control.
All transports can be coordinated in terms of time, location, quality and quantity and the automated material transport is optimally adapted to production. The connection to systems such as ERP, WMS and other transport systems is guaranteed. A management interface for all elements for topology, transport management and demand calculation enables central management.
Simply realize transport requirements with new feature
The use of Transport Control brings numerous advantages in practice. For example, any transport requirements can be realized on the shopfloor. In addition, many use cases such as transport order generation according to material or production requirements can be implemented. The new feature also makes it possible to embed material or product logistics in production management. The feature enables logistics to change from a remote reactive or planning role to an integrative role. In addition, reactions to changes in production can be incorporated more quickly into logistical processes.
Peter Bollinger explains: "With the new feature, we can achieve seamless embedding of workpiece logistics in the production process and ensure the use of automatic or manual transport concepts to link process steps. Transport Control promotes the realization of just-in-time processes in material supply for production. This leads to greater flexibility and cost optimization in production."
