Manufacturing Business Technology

• Compliance management: IBM launches warehouse for organizing regulatory content
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 11, 2008
  IBM has launched Compliance Warehouse for Legal Control, an integrated offering that is claimed to combine software, hardware, and services to enable organizations with multiple legal and compliance mandates to reduce cost, complexity, and risk.
  
• Anti-piracy campaign: China reports crackdown on illegal software is paying off
  
  Xinhua Economic News Service, February 11, 2008
  China has seen a 53-percent increase in the number of organizations using copyrighted software since new laws came into action in April 2006, according to the country's National Copyright Administration.
  
• Open-source data integration gets a boost
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 11, 2008
  A new alliance enables integration of information between databases, CRM/ERP applications, flat files, RSS feeds, and Web 2.0 destinations without writing a single line of code.
  
  
• Advisory council seeks to heighten corporate business performance
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 11, 2008
  Software AG is bringing together industry thought leaders to create an "All-Star" team for business process management (BPM).
  
• MES specialist Werum posts banner year
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 11, 2008
  Werum Software & Systems, a vendor of manufacturing execution systems (MES) for the pharmaceutical and bio-pharmaceutical industries, recently posted fiscal year 2007 results for Werum America, reporting an increase of more than 40 percent over revenues for 2006.
  
• Hitachi to standardize logistics on Descartes network
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 11, 2008
  
  
• Pinpoint tracking: e-registration stops fraudulent returns without comprising consumer privacy
  
  William Atkinson, contributing editor, February 7, 2008
    Manufacturers and retailers have long sought a method of tracking products through their lifecycles—to ensure only authorized returns and in-warranty work—without infringing on consumer privacy concerns. One company finally offers the technology to do just that.
  
• Versatile RFID: Real-time locating system powers multiple applications, delivers fast ROI
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 6, 2008
  Expanded use of active RFID, real-time locating system (RTLS) technology has helped the luxury automaker Land Rover automate processing of more than 150,000 new vehicles annually.
  
• Wireless upgrade: Lighting manufacturer gets better throughput, reliability with “cooperative” WLAN
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 6, 2008
  Acuity Brands Lighting, one of the world's largest lighting manufacturers, has installed cooperative control wireless LAN equipment from Aerohive Networks to replace an existing network of autonomous access points. The new wireless network supports mission-critical applications, including the company's ERP system, and comprises hundreds of wireless LAN access points distributed among 24 geographically dispersed facilities.
  
• A better focus: Adobe technology brings new life to BI dashboards
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 6, 2008
  Business intelligence software supplier Information Builders has harnessed Adobe Flex technology to create an environment that allows for incorporating animation and other interactive features into BI dashboards.
  
• A strategic difference: Survey says supply chain management is a critical function
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 6, 2008
  A majority of manufacturing companies consider supply chain management to be an essential component of their business strategies. In fact, 56 percent of companies regard supply chain management as either a market strategy differentiator, a customer service differentiator, or a profit center.
  
  
• New APICS partnership lightens the transportation-certification load
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 5, 2008
  APICS certifications are recognized worldwide as standards of professional excellence and quality within the manufacturing and service industries.
  
• High anxiety: Microsoft’s bid for Yahoo! has Google searching for cover
  
  Sidney Hill, Jr., executive editor, February 4, 2008
  It’s clear that Google is at least a bit worried about what might happen if Microsoft absorbs Yahoo!. Why else would Google executives be blogging about the “troubling questions” the bid raises?
  
  
• Successful expansion: ILOG supply chain solutions appeal to new groups of customers
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 4, 2008
  Supply chain management solution supplier ILOG says its foray into areas beyond financial services—and most notably into the manufacturing arena—is starting to show dividends in the form of new sales growth.
  
• Divergent views: Some workers question IBM's business strategy
  
  Michael Kinsman, Copley News Service, February 4, 2008
  Ask any official at IBM to describe what is happening to the computer company today and you're likely to hear about something called "free enterprise." Pose a similar question to any IBM worker in the U.S. and you're likely to hear horror stories about the company's cost-cutting efforts and growth in far reaches of the globe at the expense of domestic workers. Both tell you the tale of IBM today.
  
  
• Total control: New SOA suite pinpoints links between services and business processes
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 4, 2008
  Progress Software claims the latest version of its Actional suite of service-oriented architecture (SOA) management software offers unprecedented ability to understand and manage the relationships between individual services and complete business processes.
  
• Axios advisory: ITIL v3 may not be right for everyone
  
  By Manufacturing Business Technology Staff, February 4, 2008
  There has been a great deal of confusion in the market about the role of ITIL V3 as it addresses issues related to service design and strategy.
  
• Consumption management: Schneider Electric generates huge savings by monitoring energy use 
  
  Sidney Hill, Jr., executive editor, February 1, 2008
  Schneider Electric, the well-known supplier of electrical distribution and automation and control solutions, replaced roughly 7,000 lighting fixtures in 21 U.S.-based facilities and instantly found itself spending $580,000 less a year on electricity bills. It also picked up $196,000 in federal tax benefits. And that was just the beginning.
  
• Three-in-one combination mobile tablet eases operator setup, data integration
  
  By Karen Dilger, contributing editor(kadilger@comcast.net), February 1, 2008
  Today's plant-floor operators are being weighed down by handheld devices that collect and read information, including bar-code scanners, laptops, cell phones, and PDAs. Typically, operators must use separate devices for each function, or attach additional hardware to a mobile device. Users must know how to use each piece of equipment, and they also may need to integrate data with back-end proc...
  
• Network acceleration cures congestion for pharma supplier
  
  By Staff, February 1, 2008
  Palo Alto, Calif.-based Affymax—a former division of Philadelphia-based pharmaceuticals giant GlaxoSmithKline—faced critical network congestion when it moved to a network-attached storage architecture. The network, recalls Affymax Engineer Ben Maulis, had neither the speed nor the capacity to handle the volume of traffic the move entailed.