Manufacturing Business Technology - February 1, 2006

Technology advances are helping a small team of engineers monitor plant-floor systems and increase machine uptime for a number of manufacturing clients serviced by Rockwell Automation. These customer sites are scattered around the country, but thanks to what is known as machine-to-machine (M2M) technology, about a dozen Rockwell engineers perform their support tasks seated at a c...

• Applications and Services
• Acquire without abandon
• Adhesives maker credits process-control upgrade for product consistency, throughput
• Case-In-Point
• Dynamic modeling helps IT appliance maker achieve lean product development
• Demand Management
• Tractor maker takes cue from Amazon.com to link inventory with customer demand
• Midmarket ERP
• Microsoft Business Solutions unit goes vertical

• Business Performance
• In brief
• Mutual gains
• Ask AberdeenGroup
• What tools tackle transparency in manufacturing operations?
• CFO Interview
• Outsourcing deal with IBM hinges on optimized processes
• Case-In-Point
• Xerox finds the right tool for tracking continuous improvement
• Collaborative Product Development
• Design vendor harnesses Microsoft portal technology for versatile, low-cost PLM solution

• Columnists
• To our valued customers:
• Back Talk
• Are you paranoid, or just perceptive?
• Up Front
• East coast swing

• Integration and Infrastructure
• In brief
• Not just marking time
• Auto-ID
• RFID is growing bar-code sales, not killing them
• Data Management
• EMC bolsters information life-cycle management strategy by acquisition
• Enterprise Application Integration
• Approvals and people are biggest hurdles in large-scale IT projects
• Global Supply Chains
• IBM offers protective infrastructure for secure movement of goods
• High-Performance Computing
• Microsoft unveils version of Windows that runs computer clusters
• RFID Complications
• Tag switching and counterfeiting are security issues particular to RFID
• Service-Oriented Architecture
• Manufacturers find OASIS in the SOA storm—plus a host of practical tips
• Shared Services
• CA seeks to unify IT management under EITM vision
• Wireless Applications
• Need to track high-dollar assets fuels location systems market growth

• Special Report
• Pharmaceutical Industry
• The top of the agenda
• A tough pill to swallow

• Views From the Front
• Consumer Support
• Services association teams with J.D. Powers for detailed certification process; HP is first high-tech achiever
• Content Discovery
• IBM delivers unstructured data-analysis tools to monitor a company's public image
• Corporate
• Study finds real time can derail supply chains
• Econometrics
• Model under development will yield closed-loop solutions for harvesting IT benefits
• Federal Funding
• MEP appropriations still supported amidst tight budget
• IT Careers
• Study shows corporate boards short on CIO expertise
• Information Technology
• Collaboration software war continues apace
• Management Moves
• Manugistics founder returns to board
• Operations
• Process leads for plant-floor apps spending
• Plant-Floor Security
• Government lab keeps hackers away from control systems
• Software Licensing
• ERP vendors evaluated for responsiveness to pricing issues